Kangaroo Island

My overdue visit to Kangaroo Island finally took place just a couple weeks ago. My lovely friend, Bella picked me up at the airport in Adelaide and we were headed towards our great adventure. We took the ferry and got there in the afternoon and headed straight to Bella’s friend’s, Carlos’s home. Carlos kindly offered to host us and we had the best view ever from his home.

That day we took it easy, but the next day we started full on. We started the day with an ocean dip, which was oh my, so cold, but oh my, so refreshing, energizing, uplifting and so much more. I can’t emphasize enough how madly I got in love with ocean swims! I was always the person, who even in summer, would go for a quick 30 seconds dip and quickly run out of the water shivering. I would have never imagined that my today’s version of me will initiate ocean swims and in winter too!

Ready for an ocean swim

I got involved with a fundraising community that supports cancer research and that was my main motivation to do cold dips. I’m so eternally grateful that I discovered the benefits of ocean swims and now I’m literally obsessed! On a good day, it’s part of my routine to start the day on a good note aka with an ocean swim. Bella and I did it 3 days in a row and one of the days I persuaded Carlos to join us too. He was reluctant at first, fair enough, and I may have pushed it a bit, but once all three have done it, we all felt amazing. Of course everybody wore something yellow too because we were supporting the Daffodil Cold Dip, the charity I mentioned earlier. Funny enough, even Bella’s car that we travelled around with, was a bright yellow too. It’s like the theme of the whole trip was yellow!

Team yellow

So, as I mentioned, every day started with a refreshing cold dip, followed by lots of exploring. My only wish for this trip was to see seals in their natural habitat.

I was a happy child when I saw them, heard their sound and witnessed their playful attitude. Seals are such a special creatures, feeling confident both in water and land, but sadly they are endangered. Seal Bay, where we saw most of them, we were following the boardwalk and observing them from distance.

Did you know that seals go out to the ocean for three days, during that time they feed on fish, then they return to the shore to rest? Fascinating!

Baby seal
Seals playing

Apart from seals, which was the ultimate highlight of the trip, we visited also Remarkable Rocks.

Remarkable Rocks

We made our way also to Admirals Arch, where we saw more seals. I was in heaven!

Beautiful rock formation and seals, seals everywhere!

Admirals Arch

This trip has been amazing and filled with lots of seals, that I enjoyed so much to observe! I believe we have so much to learn from them: they are sweet and sensitive, but in the same time strong and resilient, always up for a little play, but strong enough to defend themselves.

Now I have a little seal zipper charm that not only reminds me of this great trip, but hopefully reminds me also to be a little bit like a seal.

Kangaroo Island, with the seals, the rocks, the untouched nature and the beautiful flowers, a great place to visit any time of the year. And so great for cold ocean swims!

Kangaroo Island flowers
Kangaroo Island is blooming

Magical Whitsundays

Great Barrier Reef

I don’t even know where to start: with how stunning the Great Barrier Reef is, how magical snorkeling there is or how special Hamilton Island is…

For my second time in the Whitsundays the weather gods were on my side and for most of the trip they provided great weather.

Started off the trip in Airlie Beach and landed on Proserpine airport excited to revisit some places and discover some new ones.

On my first day I settled at my accommodation and then headed out to a sunset cruise, the same I took a couple years ago, when it was rainy and the sunset was not there at all. This time on the other hand, it was beautiful. To natures beauty it contributed connecting on the boat with a lovely elderly couple, Robyn and Fred, who shared their adventures travel stories with me and we enjoyed the sunset cruise together, followed by a lovely dinner back in Airlie beach.

Sunset cruise views

To these days we keep in contact with Robyn and Fred and I’m sure we will meet again. Their invite to Orange is in the back of my mind and one day I’ll honor it.

For the dinner in Airlie Beach my friend Olesia joined as well and we were about to start our first time travel together.

Olesia is a great travel buddy but we needed a bit time together to adjust our travel style.

Probably one of our most memorable travel memory is flying in a helicopter above the Great Barrier Reef. Stunning is an understatement if I want to describe the view. I’ve never quite seen anything like that and I’d encourage anyone to do the helicopter tour prior to the sailing trip.

Great Barrier Reef

As I mentioned earlier: sailing trip. Well, that was quite an adventure. I spent two nights on a catamaran with a group of people, sailing around the Whitsundays. Most times the journey was smooth, expect sometimes quite rocky. I didn’t get seasick and I actually enjoyed the whole experience, although as usual, the water activities are always a bit out of my comfort zone. I was the only weak swimmer in the group, so I insisted having a vest while snorkeling. That just gave me enough confidence and comfort to go ahead and explore the wonderful sea world. The amount of colorful fish I’ve seen blew my mind away. The water was cold, but you quickly forget about it when you are distracted with looking at the beautiful coral and fish.

While on the boat, the lovely team looked after us, fed us healthy food and we all had a great experience. Sunbathing on the deck, sharing great travel stories and enjoying the stunning rainbow were just a few things that I cherish now.

Sailing
Whitsundays

One of my favorite memories from the sailing trip was going back to Hill Inlet lookout, where I’ve been a couple years ago but then it was cloudy and rainy, therefore I couldn’t experience the beauty of the colors I did this time. It was a beatiuful sunny day and the view was breathtaking.

Hill Inlet lookout

It’s always nice to revisit places that once made an impression and Hill Inlet lookout is one of those places for me.

Wandering around Whitsunday Island and exploring Whitehaven beach, seeing up close the stingrays and so much more. Incredible!

But after the sailing trip, what was about to happen was just as amazing. That was Hamilton Island!

Olesia and I were ready for the most fun part of our trip! On our first evening on the island we got a lift in the buggy to One Tree Hill, where we witnessed a beautiful sunset that kept calling us back until the rest of the trip!

The atmosphere, with live music and complementary ice cream were magical. The palm trees with the sunset looked out of a fairytale.

One Tree Hill sunset

The following day we had our own buggy to drive around and in a short time we covered pretty much the whole island, taking strangers for a lift when we had the chance. Driving around in the buggy was quite an experience and filled our hearts with lots of joy and with this opportunity I’ll give a shoutout to Olesia, who did the whole driving around with a smile on her face.

With our buggy: Pierre

Pierre, as I named our buggy , took us around the whole island and we enjoyed it so much.

We had beautiful sunsets and sunrises, saw plenty of kangaroos and enjoyed the laid back Hamilton Island style.

We were fortunate to stay 2 minutes walk from Catseye beach, where we caught a beautiful sunrise on our last day and at the cafe had our morning coffee too.

Catseye beach in the background

In support of our lovely travel community we also hope that we brought a smile to Harriet, who was celebrating her birthday. We don’t personally know Harriet, but in the travel community we are all friends.

Happy birthday, Harriet!

I won’t lie, it was not easy to wave goodbye to Hamilton Island. And I believe I’ll be back one day and maybe, just maybe, I’ll be driving around in another Pierre.

That being said, Hamilton Island and the Whitsundays were quite a good experience, considering that in the midst of all the positive, a bit of negative squeezed in too, in the form of a bad news regarding my on going visa battle. It will be all fine, I kept reminding myself, while enjoying as much as I could, but still having this in the back of my mind…

To summarize, I’d like to leave you with this: if Whitsundays and Hamilton Island are on your list, go sooner rather than later and definitely do a helicopter tour, push yourself out of your comfort zone and don’t skip snorkeling and if you have the chance drive around a buggy on Hamilton Island – these activities will not only give you amazing memories but will stay with you forever!

Catseye Beach on the last day