Airlie Beach and the Cyclone!

Ok ok, so I am finally at Airlie Beach! A place I have wanted to go to for years as it is the take off spot for the Whitsunday Islands in the Australia Great Barrier Reef! I was sooo excited to be there... then i found out a cyclone was coming! Oh NO! My boat cruise to the islands ended up getting cancelled and I had to stay in Airlie. I was lucky enough to get another spot on the next boat cruise available, but this still gave me an extra couple of days to hang out in Airlie.

Airlie is like a backpackers heaven! It is nothing but fun and games and a lot of late nights! I lost my phone, promptly after my arrival, on my first night there... Go figure! As the cyclone hit, it was 5am and the winds were definitely exciting to watch. However, and luckily, no real damage occurred. The cyclone came and went, but we were still unable to go anywhere as there was damage to the north of us and the cyclone was hitting to the south of us. I and 4 guys whom I shared a cabin with (1 German and 3 Italians) decided to rent a car for the day to explore the area we were in.

We went to a place called Dingo Beach. We did not see any dingos. The tides here were incredible. In the 2 hours we were there, they moved out about 40m! As the tide ebbed, we went onto the sand flats and explored the life of little critters. We saw both starfish and crabs mating. Must have been the full moon! There was an enclosed area that you could swim in, the fence protected you from jellyfish. We also saw some camels. Later in the afternoon we drove to a place called Cedar Creek. There was a massive waterfall here that we splashed around in all afternoon :)

More pictures can be found at http://picasaweb.google.com/find.barlow/AirlieBeachBackpackerHeaven#