7th November, 2012.

Just a quick message to anyone that is reading my Whitsundays blog, especially TSPers. At the moment I am still in the Philippines. enjoying wonderful hospitality and interesting experiences.

I'll get back to Whitsunday Wandering when i get back to Australia.

I have to apologise to anyone trying to follow this blog.  I have had a lot happening this month with health and injury issues and I am also trying to get a brief holiday.  I ptobably won;t post now until the first week of December, but when I am back, I will have some pics of a few more things people don't get to see much in the Whitsundays.

There will be more information on walks on a few islands and things to do, bulked out by some more pics of things people might miss.  A little history and a few pictures of historical locations, as well as some little known places.

For anyone who has visited Cid Harbour, did you know there is a large fresh water swamp on the island?  Have you seen Ross Islet in September?  Had a picnic on Lady Islet?  Seen the rock with the rectangular hole that looks like it was cut using tools?

Over the next year I hope to take visitors to this site on a descriptive and pictorial tour of places like Gulnare Inlet and Hill Inlet.  Hiking behind Whitehaven Beach.

Nara Inlet - an introduction

Looking out of Nara Inlet

Rugged Nara Inlet on the south side of Hook Island is one of the best known spots in the Whitsundays.  It was not named after the local Ngaro aboriginal tribe that once populated the area, despite the similar sounding name, but after a yacht named Nara, owned by a visitor to the island around 1912.  (Source - Ray Blackwood).

By 1981 when I began visiting the area regularly, the cliffs in Nara Inlet had become covered with the names of yachts that had stayed there.  Many names belonged to famous racing yachts and others were well known in cruising circles.  Tour guides used to say a lot were painted by competitors in the early Sydney to Hobart races, but there's a certain lack of logic in the locations of Nara Inlet, Sydney Harbour and the fact that the race proceeds in the opposite direction.  There is no doubt though, looking around, that quite a few of the race competitors in particular years are represented.

The main waterfall at Nara

Apart from sailing graffiti, there is another form of rock art that Nara is famous for.  In a number of locations around Nara Inlet and in fact, around the Whitsunday Islands, are rock shelters that were used by the indigenous people for shelter when they hunted, gathered and fished on these islands.  I suspect that most of the known caves at Nara Inlet were discovered by racing rock artists in the 60's and 70's.  In the late 1980's the QNPWS fenced off one shelter that contains ochre paintings on the walls and over time made, then modified a walkway.  The latest modification to the walkway cuts off the track to the lookout, and to the top of the falls.  It also cuts off access to another few caves or shelters.

Dry season pools remaining at the top of the falls

It is still possible to get from the walkway to the falls track if you know what you are doing, and if you take care.  About a hundred metres past the shelter is a rock that has been used as a lookout many years.  It gives great views across Nara and out to the Whitsunday Passage.  From there the track winds into open (for the moment) forest, then down to the top of the main waterfall. Actually, to the second level of the falls.  It is a beautiful walk, but easy to get lost if you don't take notice of where you are going.  At this point you are well off any sanctioned trails.  The top of the waterfall is a nice place to sit and have lunch.  On a hot day there might even be fresh water left in the pools after the last rains.

There are some interesting rock formations along this track, and many, many years ago a few of us would spend the night in a clearing just off the track.  These days such activities are illegal.

The shelter, the board walk and the lookout and falls track are all accessed via a little beach on the right about 500 metres before the head of the inlet.  there is a sign, and there are steps leading up.  there's room here to park a few dinghies, but watch the rocks as the tide falls if you have a tinny or glass dinghy.  And watch the oysters if you have a blowup doll.

Below the staircase to the shelter

At certain times of the year you may be serenaded in the evening, or woken harshly in the morning by a strange mournful sound.  There are goats on the islands, particularly around Nara.  The goats were supposedly introduced to the islands along the coast to provide sustenance for survivors in the event of shipwreck on this treacherous coast.  If you've ever tried walking around on this rough terrain, or chasing a goat anywhere, you would realise how funny that is.  Nevertheless, goats abound here.  Inside the 'Goat Cave', near the head of Nara, there's a room that holds more than a dozen goats.  The entrance to this cave is small, and when the billy decides you are in his territory, he tends to leave at high speed, knocking down anything in his way.  The nannies and kids follow after.

View on the way to the falls

Anchorage is good all the way into Nara.  There is a reef around the edge, and a lot of reef inside Refuge Bay.  There are less decent beaches than in Macona Inlet, and the beaches in Nara Inlet actually disappear completely at high tide.  At low tide though there are a few that can provide a relaxing diversion at low tide.

Swimming, exploring in the dinghy, fishing and walking ashore are fun around Nara, and in later posts I'll look at a few spots and things to do.

Cid Harbour South End Walk

You'll be climbing up a rocky creek bed

Most yachties that holiday in the Whitsundays find themselves in Cid Harbour on the western side of Whitsunday Island for at least part of their trip. It is an easy shakedown sail for bareboat charterers, and a nice sheltered place for those travelling aboard their own vessel. The harbour is comfortably large, with two protected areas safe enough for keel boats within a one by two nautical mile area. I made Cid Harbour the base for most of my time aboard all five yachts I've owned up here, and when people ask if I ever get bored with spending so much time in this particular place I just smile.

You see, Cid Harbour alone can keep me amused for weeks at a time. There is always something interesting to see and somewhere to go. You can choose a different spot for a day's outing for fourteen days and each day explore a different place and you will still have places that you haven't explored.

And only a short distance up you get views like this

Cid Harbour proper extends from Hughes Poiint in the south, past Sawmill and Dugong Beaches, and into Dugong Inlet. The east arm of Dugong Inlet is navigable with care, by trailer sailers, the west arm is accessable to and good anchorage for most types of yacht. From Sawmill Beacb, south into the area behind Hughes Point is good anchorage along the Whitsunday Island shore. The hook behind Hughes Point is coral reef, although I have parked a thirty foot trimaran on the shore there and also two of my trailable yachts.

But there's still a long way to go

Today we'll visit this southern end of Cid Harbour tucked inside Hughes Point. Holding is excellent all along here over mud until you run into the shallows. Like a lot of our little adventures, it's a good idea to take a small lunch and at least two 500ml bottles of water per person. Take the dinghy south towards the beach and the mouth of the mangrove creek. To the left of the mangrove creek you will see a very small beach with a small coconut palm at the left side. Land the dinghy here and tie or anchor it. The walk starts at that palm tree. If the Queensland Parks Service has removed the tree, then the walk starts at the left end of the beach. Behind the palm there's a small gully that becomes a swampy creek after rain. I don't recommend the rock climbing part of this trip after a lot of rain or during rain. It is dry weather work.

Even from here

Follow the gully about 150 to 200 metres. The distance depends on how well you follow gullies. You will come to a rocky creek. If you came out at the right spot you will be at what used to be the swimming hole. In the old days after rain water ran here for months. There was a rock hole with water neck deep. In 2008 it was still waist deep. Since 2010 it is almost full of rock. Turn left at the creek and start following it upstream. Only about twenty metres along you will come to a small rock face that is a waterfall at certain times of the year. Climb around this and continue until you come to a semi circular wall that is also a waterfall in wet season. There used to be a well defined track up from here but around 2006 it washed away, so now you have to search for a way around this small waterfall. If it has been raining, this is as far as you can go easily, although with a little persistence you can find a safe enough way around and over the fall.

Once at the top, you are in the rocky bed of the creek. Often there is drinkable fresh water flowing here long after the rainy season. Carefully follow this creek upwards. Turn and look behind you regularly because around here you will begin to see some pretty views across Cid Island to the mainland.

You go up and up

If you keep climbing from here there is another set of small falls or rocks then the creek narrows to a gully. If it is very early in the day and you are adventurous, it is possible to turn up the left gully here and continue about 400 metres to the base of the first rocky outcrop on your left. From there, views extend across Cid Island, South Molle and the mainland to the west, and Hook Island to the north.

In the 1980's this was one of our access points to Whitsunday peak, but later the Dugong Beach track became more popular and a couple of years ago the new one from Sawmill Beach. These days the old Whitsunday Peak track is almost impossible to follow. The climb up to the lookout is steep with loose rock and plenty of opportunity to break an ankle if you are careless.

And we still haven't reached the gully leading to the first outcrop

About 400 metres or so past that outcrop is another steep climb to a rock that also has a good lookout. From here it is almost a kilometre to Whitsunday Peak, but again, almost impossible these days to find the old track. The views from either of these outcrops are spectacular, but even the views from the open areas of the creek itself are excellent.

It's a pleasant way to spend a morning, but please - be careful and take notice of where you've been.  This bush is not a good place to get lost.  Remember too there ARE snakes on the islands.

Introducing Macona Inlet - Hook Island

In the early versions of the book A Trailer Sailor's Guide to The Whitsundays there is a short chapter on Macona Inlet.  It is mostly about getting there and the anchorage itself, but there was no way to let people see the beauty of the place.  We'll visit Macona a few times over the life of this blog, but today I want to introduce the main anchorage.

The image above is a screencapture of a google map, because inserting the link code (google's approved way of adding a map) opens the map at some fictitious address somebody has created online.  I hope Google decides to rectify this. 

 The bay with the gold star in the middle of the map is the main anchorage in Macona.  There is room for about half a dozen yachts in here in good weather and for about three or four in stormy weather.  If you arrive at Macona Inlet and it is a bit crowded, just stay out of the main anchorage and choose another spot further out in the inlet.  As long as you stay clear of the reef around the entrance and the eastern side, there is plenty of good holding in mud.

The main anchorage however is surrounded a reef wall.  The middle is mostly sand.  At low tide it is protected from most swell, and at very low tide, well, you can see from the pictures.

Looking across Main Anchorage in Macona Inlet

The ideal time to enjoy Macona Inlet is on a sunny day when the tide tables show a low tide of about 0.10 some time between 10am and 2pm.  If you are lucky enough to get a low in the morning, the water should be crystal clear.  Once the tide gets down around 0.30 the reef will be out and visible.

Tide's out - check the brown stuff

On a clear day if you enjoy snorkeling, the marine life can be amazing to watch.  Pretty corals, multi coloured fish darting in and out of the rocks and corals, the odd seahorse hovering and sometimes a turtle or two swimming around the edge of the reef.

There is a sandy beach on the north side of this anchorage that is a popular spot for sunset drinks and nibbles.  Please pick your times to go ashore according to the tide, and avoid dragging dinghies across the reef on the way to the beach.  Facing north, towards the beach there's a clear sandy break in the reef to your right.

As the tide returns the sandy beach gets smaller until it all but disappears.  At some high tides it vanishes altogether.  Unlike Nara Inlet on the other side of the hill, Macona Inlet has quite a few sandy beaches around it.  Some are shallow, sheltered and safe for kids to play and swim in, having no problems with currents.  Always watch for stingrays however, around any Whitsunday beaches.

Brown stuff up close

When you first see the reef at Macona Inlet it looks just like a lot of brown rock and weed.  From your boat it doesn't look particularly appealing, but taking the dinghy ashore will give the opportunity for a reef walk.  Be very careful wandering around here.  There is a lot of sand between the corals, so there's no excuse to stand on things that might break.  Also, remember that corals are living creatures.  Among the rocks and corals are various other forms of life. Keep ya big feet away from them too!  If you walk carefully you can see many different types and colours of coral.

Brown stuff even closer.  This is what visitors in a hurry miss out on,

One day we were discussing the limited number of colours in the Macona corals.  During the discussion we realised that on one walk we had noticed something like twenty variations of colour, shape and type.  And that was just what we remembered.  Heaven knows what we actually saw.  About the rarest we discovered was red, but it is amazing what is actually there in a relatively small patch.

Twisted and folded.

Aside from the reef around the main anchorage, there are some others in Macona Inlet.  Like most of the anchorages on the mainland (western) side of the Whitsundays, the water is stirred up by the strong currents.  After calm weather though Macona Inlet has a few rather nice spots to enjoy.  Curlew Beach at the entrance has some lovely views out into the Whitsunday Passage, and there's a special little beach further in that has a parade of tiny starfish as the tide changes.

Of all the anchorages around the Whitsunday Passage, Macona and Cid Harbour are favourites. Macona has the disadvantage of no toilet facilities, but the advantage of peaceful beauty, several beaches and places to explore in the dinghy and on foot.

Green Stuff

In a future visit to Macona Inlet we'll explore a little further around the inlet and also look at Curlew beach.

I planned to update this occasionally in the course of doing some 'proper' writing and digging through pictures to find stuff for someone, but it seems a few people have decided to visit.  So I've decided to do a couple of things.  The blog will jump around a lot.  It won't be a circular route around the islands, and I won't explore each anchorage in detail as I did in the book. Instead there will be snippets which I hope will build into a nice overview of things to see and do here.

I hadn't planned anything for today, but I will begin something on one particular anchorage just for fun.  Until I can get down to work on it, here's a teaser.  This specimen was found in one of the places people stop for the night, but seldom stay long or go ashore to look around.  It is one of my favourite anchorages and in the right conditions can be a great place if you have kids to keep amused.

Sailing to Whitehaven Beach via Hook Passage

There are two practical ways to get around to beautiful Whitehaven Beach on the eastern side of Whitsunday Island.  For those coming directly from Hamilton Island or one of the southern anchorages along the bottom of Whitsunday Island, there is Solway Passage which will bring you to the southern end of the beach.  In stronger southerly conditions or for those in smaller vessels, the northern route down the eastern side of Whitsunday Island is often much more comfortable.  An overnight in any of the anchorages close to Hook Passage makes the trip simple, remembering that there will be about four to six hours traveling involved for most of us.  My personal choice is to anchor in Macona Inlet on the southern side of Hook Island, and start from there.

Approaching the north end of Hook Passage.

Leaving Macona Inlet around daylight is a good way to begin a trip to Whitehaven Beach.  The early morning voyage around the corner and into Hook Passage is beautiful, especially if you have a calm morning.  Exit Macona along the western side past Curlew Beach to avoid the reef at the entrance, then keep well clear of the reef until you turn left into Hook Passage.  From there it is good water all the way past Hook Island Observatory.  Keep your eyes open as you travel north in Hook Passage,  On a clear day when there's no wind and not much tide, you just might see turtles and dolphns here.  I've even seen whales over the reef just at the point where you have to turn to enter the passage.  Take care at the north entrance/exit to Hook Passage.  If the wind is against the tide it can  get rough for a small trailer sailer.  This is rarely an issue early in the morning, but if you are making the trip and you have around twenty knots of breeze against the strongest part of the tide flow, it can be nasty.  If in doubt stay well away from the shore.  At least until you are on the eastern side of Whitsunday Island.

Follow the Whitsunday Island shore for about half a mile and you will make a small turn to the right, You'll see Border Island appear in the distance.  Continue to follow the coast for another mile and make another small turn to the right and you are now around on the eastern side of Whitsunday Island.

Heading down the east side of Whitsunday Island.

From here to the bottom end of Whitehaven Beach is almost nine nautical miles in a straight line.  Just off to port you will see a small island, Dumbell Island.  Steer so that you pass about mid way between that and the nearest point sticking out from Whitsunday Island.  You will be passing four headlands on the way to Whitehaven,  The last has a small island opposite.  This is Tongue Point and the little island is Esk Island.  If you hug the coast down here, you will add perhaps another mile and a half to your journey when you have to go out around Tongue Point.  It is simple to just stay off the coast a bit.

You will recognize Whitehaven as soon as you see it.

You probably won't see much of Whitehaven Beach until you pass between Esk Island and Tongue Point.  When it appears, you won't mistake Whitehaven for anything else.  There is six kilometres of sparkling white sand.  On a sunny day the contrast between the blues of the water, the greens of Whitsunday Island and the White of the sand is astounding. Immediately on your right, Hill Inlet almost cuts Whitsunday Island in half, reaching withing about a mile of turtle bay on the south side of the island.  From Tongue point it is about three and a half miles in a straight line to the southern end of Whitehaven. It will probably be around ten o'clock in the morning by the time you drop anchor at the southern end of Whitehaven beach.  The tourist boats will probably begin arriving a little closer to lunch time.

The water here is usually, though not always, very clear.  The bottom is the same fine white sand as the beach and it holds an anchor very well.  A keel boat can sneak in fairly close, but remember to check your tide.  A number of boats have been left standing or lying off Whitehaven by an outgoing tide.  Obviously a trailer sailer or multihull won;t have the same problem.  Be aware though that the first ten or twenty metres out from the shore can be fairly steep depending on the tide.  Anchor accordingly.

Depending on the tides and the weather you may decide to anchor off Whitehaven for the night, or spend a night in Tongue Bay or if you are in a Trailer Sailer or multihull, perhaps Hill Inlet.  If you left Macona Inlet or Cid Harbour at dawn,

Most people come and spend about four hours at Whitehaven Beach.  I often spend a week or two at a time there.  In another post I will let you in on some of the ways I fill in time at Whitehaven Beach.

The Wet - The Whitsundays

One of the sadder things I see is visitors to The Whitsundays who spent a lot of money to have their dream holiday here sailing the beautiful postcard-blue waters. And it rained!  So there we have our intrepid adventurers.  Maybe a family of four or more, or perhaps a honeymoon couple.  Cramped like sardines into their forty foot luxury yacht.  Watching videos and trying to keep out of each others' way.

It's the tropics!  It rains!  It doesn't rain as much as it did in the good old days, when North Queensland had two seasons each year.  Back then we had 'the dry' and 'the big wet'.  The big wet really was.  The Bruce Highway would be cut for days at a time, occasionally for weeks.  The single railway line that joined the coastal towns would disappear in places.

The thing to remember is that there is a reason it is called tropical 'rain' forest.  For the tourist it brings a whole new perspective to our islands.  Climate change means that since about 1990 there have been shorter and more gentle wet seasons.  Instead of months of variable flooding rain with creeks along the coast rising and falling over a week or so, we seem to get one concentrated disastrous flood at a time.  Even with those changes, when the wet season rain hits the islands it transforms them into a wonderland.

This waterfall is in Cid Harbour.  It can be seen
from the main anchorage when it rains and there are
another half a dozen you can get to by dinghy,
without having to tramp through the rainforest.

Overnight, after wet season rain, there are waterfalls around the anchorages. Cid Harbour and Nara Inlet are the best places to enjoy these transformations.  At night whenever it stops raining you can hear the water rushing down the creeks and across the beaches.  In the mornings there are whole new places to explore that on a previous day may have appeared boring.  Fresh water showers under overhanging cliffs.  Bathing in fresh water pools.  Careful hiking along the banks of what were dry rocky gullies, but are now pretty miniature rivers brings a new view of plants and wild life.  The view through the trees to the water and to your yacht are different, somehow vibrant.

In these days of climate change we do get rain in winter but the traditional wet season is summer.  When it is hot and steamy and your skin should be peeling because of the sun, the water from the sky, while it makes one sweaty, can be a wonderful relief.  Tropical downpours are not icy.  It can be very pleasant to wander around in the rainforest, soaked to the skin.  having the sweat washed from your body.  Feeling clean and smelling the freshness.

The Whitsunday Islands in the rain are beautiful.  Even Whitehaven Beach on a rainy day has plenty to offer.  Enjoy the wonderland...

RossD.

In The Beginning...

In the early 1990's I had a web space called Whitsunday Wandering on what was then a GEOCITIES community called, appropriately The Tropics.  There I wrote about living and sailing in Australia's Whitsunday Islands aboard my catamaran, Storm Season, and in Leisurely, my Hartley 18 Trailer Sailer.

After some time dedicated to work and other pursuits I returned to sailing purchasing Enya, my Embassy 18 trailer sailer in 2001.  After a serious motorcycle accident in early 2004 almost forced me to give up sailing, I was reprieved in 2005 when I found a Seaway 25 trailer sailer on a mooring locally and decided the huge side decks of the quarter ton racing class yacht would allow me to move about with relative safety.  I was proven wrong several times, but we all learn.

When I lost Volcano in cyclone Ului in March 2010, I was lucky enough to find a fairly decrepit Cavalier 26 keel boat, again found locally, and once more, a quarter tonner.  Shepherd Moons has been my project ever since, and with my health continuing to deteriorate, will probably be the last yacht I own.

I got a lot of support, and made some fun friends in those years before business life and later, a series of injuries changed my life.  I also wrote some guides to cruising in this island paradise of ours.

This blog will be an attempt to share some of the adventure of what is now more than thirty years of sailing among these islands.  It will be a rambling thing.  Parts will be reminiscences, some will be hints and tips and much of it will be devoted to sections of the book I wrote in the 80's called 'A Trailer Sailor's Guide to The Whitsundays'.  Parts of this book are still floating around the Internet in various stages of update.

So where to start this time?

StormSeason at Stonehaven Anchorage, Hook Island in 1982

I got a taste for The Whitsundays when I first came here during an around Australia trip in the 1970's.  I returned again briefly after I moved to Queensland in 1977, but it wasn't until 1981 that I bought a small catamaran and moved here with the intention of some day living on a small yacht and making the islands my home.

Storm Season was a Windrush 16 surfcat, designed in Western Australia and different in many ways from my earlier boats.  Unlike the popular Hobie 16, the Windrush was designed to handle real surf and carry a load.  It is amost impossible to bury a bow in any conditions, and I had photos of my crew and I standing on the very tips of the bows while she was sailing.

Among the modifications for my seventy mile jaunts up and down this stretch of coast were an extra cross beam on the trampoline frame to make an area to lash gear, including forty litres of water and a tent, and another beam fore and aft below the tramp that hinged under the mast.  This was lashed at the rear of the trampoline frame and could be swung out if the boat ever capsized.  There was also a spare pulley at the top of the mast with an endless loop haliard.  If the boat capsized, a spare lifejacket was attached to the halliard and hauled to the top of the mast.  this brought Storm Season up on her side.  From there I could get around on one hull, and walk the frame out.  hand over hand along the frame I would reach the balance point and she would pop back upright, no matter the waves and wind.  The exciting part was when the upper hull came down.  Several times i was hit in the head, or ended up under the boat as she started sailing again.  But with a little deliberate capsizing, not an easy thing to do in with a Windrush by the way, I eventually got it down to an art.

Storm Season was a fancy name for what was a very basic little yacht, but she took me safely through some scary weather up here where a few times a year we have some very stormy weather.  A two man tent that could be erected on the trampoline gave me many comfortable nights either drawn up on a beach somewhere or at anchor.  A few times I sailed into anchorages miles from the nearest alternative island and fifteen miles from the mainland to be asked where on earth I had come from on 'that tiny boat' in 'this weather'.  She always got me there and always got me home.  Aside from forty litres of water, the storage compartments in the hulls always had more drinks, and a supply of canned and dry food.  The space aft of the mast, in addition to the water containers, carried food, the tent and a couple of diver's bags of gear.

I had a ball with that boat, but eventually my wife decided it was time I spent some quality time with her and my son.  Once, when I took my one year old sailing to one of the islands in a storm she had a panic attack and brought him home on a ferry.  I'll never understand women.  He had his little life jacket on - and he was usually tied to the mast....