Where Buoy Meets Gull - Whitsunday Adventure - Day 5

Saturday’s adventures.

On Saturday we sailed to Blue Pearl Bay – supposedly one of the best spots for snorkeling.  I finally decided that I should go in as well.  So I clawed myself into my rented stinger suit – MAN that thing was TIGHT!  I even had trouble getting the ankles over my heels.

Here I am getting ready to jump in.

After the initial chilling shock, things were fine underwater.  And so now, those of you who have followed my blogs forever know that you now get the FISH OF THE DAY! The one I chose is the biggest one I saw - not in deference to Chris and his need for bigness - but because it's one of my favorite fish because when I was on my first recreational scuba dive up in Cairns, the minute we went down this big Wally came over for attention and actually KISSED us!  (Well, we kissed HIM, but he LET us!)  It is the giant Maori Wrasse!  
These are not my photos but they give you a good idea.   Mine was at least four feet long, and greenish like this, with zig-zag puzzles all over his snout.  I've never been able to POST photos of the Fish of the Day before - do you like this better than just the verbal description?

The coral of the day looked like tasty romaine lettuce leaves, and when I googled it, up came these photos.  Mine was paler green than the first one, but shaped a lot like the second one.  I called it "lettuce coral" - and guess what the official name is?   The first photo is called "lettuce coral" and the second photo is called "cabbage coral"!

            

Now here's a strange thing.  I haven't been a bit seasick yet.  Well, to be fair, I've take a QUARTER of a motion sickness pill each day to make sure and prevent that - that's all I need.  Much more and I get sleepy with horrid dry mouth. Anyway, I was doing just fine in the water, enjoying the fish and the coral.  Then, I put my head up to check on Chris, and all of a sudden, I was quite nauseated with a horrid dizzy headache!  I had to stop and go back to the boat and lay down.  SO strange - that's never happened to me before.  Chris reckons perhaps the wet suit was SO tight it cut off my circulation, but I just can't believe that happened.  Anyway, after I rested for a few hours, I was fine again. 
It was quite lovely there, and very calm.  Almost TOO calm we found out.  (More on that later).  Chris did the cooking again - fish and potatoes tonight on the deck grill!  This is REALLY a vacation for me - yes?  We had some wine and watched the sunset.  

The seagulls were a trip.  ONCE I threw a tiny piece of fat overboard (because I didn't want to eat it), and one gull came and swooped down to fetch it.  Then he flew back and told ALL his friends about it, so that we had the beggars and all their cousins squalling for more!  A couple of them even came and parked themselves on the dinghy in case something else might stray off the table, but NO, I had learned MY lesson, thank you!  

In contrast, the sea eagles were majestic, soaring in to roost each evening.  This is the best I could do with a photo - but you get the idea, they were large and glorious and not squabbling little rats!

We were hooked up to a mooring, which was quite large - about 3 feet in diameter, and of course, quite sturdy.  But we found, since there was no wind, we were at the mercy of the waves and the currents.  That meant that every once in a while, the mooring would loop us around and then bang into the side of the boat - BANG!  BANG!  BANG!  Quite startling, really, and though we racked our brain to figure out a way out of it, we couldn't stop it.  So throughout the night we were awakened by this horrendous banging.
So basically, so far, the days are just great, and the nights are horrid!  Does it get any better?  Stay tuned.