Early in Airlie

Current location: Nomads: Airlie Beach, laying by the pool in a hammock to be 100% precise.

Favouring past experience, we decided to stay with Nomads again in Airlie Beach, after 6 nights of straight camping, staying in a hostel was the last thing I wanted to do, I longed for a fancy hotel with a bubble bath and scented candles, just to restore myself from a lack of showers, flushing toilets and hair straighteners ! Of course this wasn’t going to be the case, however knowing that Nomads policy is to have an en suite bathroom in most bedrooms, swayed me to believe that this would be the better choice & the closest thing to luxury. And to my delight I was completely right, we were booked into a six bed dorm, which are situated into little cottage looking huts, in blocks of three. The hostel isn’t too busy, and I expect that the reason for this is because the hostel down the road is a few dollars cheaper a night. Due to the lack of people booking in, I assume, we have only had to sleep one night with a full room, most nights have been just us two, which is as you can imagine pure bliss! Complete with full access to an en suite modern newly built bathroom, and separate toilet. The décor is mainly varnished timber meshed with a mocha coloured paint, which makes a pleasant contrast to the Nomads in Noosa, Rainbow beach and Noosa which had funky coloured paintings and retro designs poorly put together on the walls. The ceiling is pyramid shaped and has hard wood beams outlining which creates a spacious feeling and air conditioning units are smartly placed to cool the entire room with a fan to circulate the air, there are black steel framed bunk beds, however me and David were booked into a double bunk, where there is a single at the top and a large double sized bed at the bottom, apparently, it’s the only one available in the whole hostel, so believe me did I thank my lucky stars that we were blessed with such luxury.  There is a communal pool and volley ball area, and just down the path there is a bar with reasonably priced drinks and pool tables, laundry facilities are convenient and well-spaced, the kitchen area, I’ll admit is a little basic, however we haven’t had a chance to use it just yet as we have been eating out most nights. I’ll admit this isn’t the most financially smart way to live, but after camping for so long, a nice meal in a restaurant sure does soften the wound. In saying that, the restaurants along the strip of this small town aren’t too pricey. You could go from a posh dinner at Mamma Jacks which works out around $25 a head with a drink (Neptune pizza is a ‘must’ should you have a taste for sea food) to a $13 meal deal which includes a fair sized portion main meal and one drink (average pub food, but great live music. The Australians really do know how to sing) to a $5 deal at club Phoenix, where you arrive between 7-8pm and receive half a free pizza with any drink purchase of $5+ (a little heads up, this clubs does Agwa bombs, Warning: they will get you smashed!)

A downside to the town, is that the actual beach in itself is pretty small, I expect it has a lot to do with the Whitsunday’s excursions, as the thing to do here, is to get a boat and sail across to one of the many islands. They do have Airlie lagoon, which is a man- made beach, more of a family place. The Marina where most yachts are docked is beautiful. We are going on a Catamaran, called Wings III and the kind lady booked us in to a double room, as we are a couple, which I’ve heard from friends are the rooms that are most coveted. We have decided to do Scuba diving whilst on board, as there are many limits as to where you can do it in Cairns, due to high shark/jelly fish risks. One dive works out to be $70, this includes full swim suit & kit hire along with a quick lesson to make sure you don’t die down there. I am a bit nervous as I’ve heard many times that Scuba diving can go horribly wrong, should your breathing become out of sync and you intake water. I also have issues with the fact that it’s quite common for a shark to casually swim past you. But ill report back to you on that as soon as I know more. I just overheard one of the staff shouting about a pool party that’s about to start. I guess that means It’s probably a smart idea for me to put my laptop away. And to be honest the sun is scorching , so ill need to get out of this hammock before my skins turns leathery ! Ahhhh run away ! More soon folks !