Sailing up the coast of Queensland has been an absolute joy, it’s possibly one of the most beautiful coastlines I’ve ever seen, with the exception of New Zealand, of course.
I haven’t seen that much of Australia so far, but from what I have seen I’ve been surprised at just how much I like it. I’m not sure what I expected, but I certainly didn’t expect it to be this beautiful, or this tropical. Having said that, I would never want to live here, there are way too many dangerous things with sharp pointy teeth and long hairy legs, and I’m not just talking about the locals.
Australia has possibly the largest collection of “nasties” deadly critters anywhere in the world, the spiders alone are enough to scare the feathers off an Ostrich. I saw my first (and I pray last) Huntsman spider when we were in the rainforest, “Holy crap” it was bigger than my hand, I could never live anywhere that this critter calls home. And that’s without all the crocodiles, sharks, box jelly fish, scorpions and deadly poisonous snakes to name just a few, way too many nasties here calling Australia home, I will not be settling down in their territory, but I’m enjoying visiting it, all be it with caution.
I’ve deliberately not been in the water much, I’ve only been swimming once or twice, with my silly suit on; this is referred to as a stinger suit by others. Bob insisted on buying me this delightful outfit so I wouldn’t miss out on the snorkeling here.
My silly suit consists of tight fitting, black stirrup pants, with a high neck, long sleeved bright turquoise, zip up top, a navy balaclava, divers socks and gloves, can you even begin to imagine what I look like in this ridiculous get up, especially with the added accessories, snorkel mask and flippers! And all to protect me from the box jellyfish! Really, the outfit alone is enough to scare them away! And no, there will be no photographs posted of me wearing this. The snorkeling here is just not good enough to tempt me into an outfit where I would look like a bad impersonation of the Penguin, ‘Danny DeVito’ in Batman. Although it would give everyone else a good laugh.
I did buy myself some seriously thick soled wet shoes, to protect myself from stepping on a ‘Stonefish’ another delightful Australian critter whose sting will cause excruciating pain followed by possible death! My shoes mean that I can at least safely hunt for seashells in the shallow water without putting my family at risk of Mum’s hospitalization or funeral expenses!