honeymoon, part the first

Greetings from the other corner of the world! The toilets still flush the same way, but Channel 8 comes after Channel 10 on the TV for some reason.

The 23-hour epic voyage across the Pacific was actually fairly comfortable. Asiana's business class was comfortable if dated, and the food was a surprisingly successful attempt to provide good vegetarian plane fare - with some exception (can the words "vegan breakfast" really be used together in a valid sentence? The answer is a resounding "no.") Our journey terminated rather unceremoniously with a domestic flight from Sydney to Hamilton Island, aboard which were several gentlemen of questionable social grace. That's a polite way of saying "rugby players who quaffed three beers apiece, cussed unabashedly in front of the small children sharing their row, and belched for seconds at a time without breaking a sentence." Welcome to Australia, mate!

Thankfully the honeymoon aesthetic was restored when we were met at the Hamilton Island airport by a Hayman Island representative, who told us they would take our bags and we should board the launch to the island, have a drink, and wait. The "launch" is actually a 70-foot yacht, and we sat in the wheelhouse while they poured champagne for us and the five other couples being picked up that day. So, it begins.

Hayman Island is pretty luxurious. It's difficult to judge coming from the near-perfection that is The Carneros Inn, but in terms of visuals it's absolutely stunning. They've given us a fair share of complimentaries, including a room upgrade (we now have a lanai overlooking their beautiful pool), champagne, chocolates, and daily breakfast buffet. They've got honey straight from the comb here - why don't all breakfast places do that? Also, fresh passionfruit, and I mean the fruit itself.

So far we've definitely taken advantage of the setting, and the weather has more or less cooperated with a pretty good showing of sun. The Whitsunday Islands are a beautiful retreat; they are almost completely uninhabited save for a few resorts. It has taken us a couple of days to really get relaxed, but the sun+water+sand+alcohol equation has been proven yet again. The best part is due to the way our travel worked out, we're waking up at 6am with the sun. This is unusual, especially for me, but it's perfect since everything we want to do here is just during daylight hours.

Today (Sunday) was a day of adventure. In the morning, we climbed in a tandem kayak and paddled out to the rocky point at the end of the beach, where we found ourselves surrounded by stingrays. Literally, dozens and dozens of their shadowy hooded forms, large and small, skated the bottom beneath my paddle. I love swarms of things, but this was a bit creepy. The crazy thing is that entire area and what must be a kilometer in each direction becomes totally dry at low tide, so clearly they migrate in and out of that area daily at least.

After lunch we hopped on a seaplane which whisked us to Whitehaven Beach, home of arguably the most beautiful beach in Australia: a miles-long stretch of white powder that looks and feels like baker's sugar. The plane then took us to a boat docked in the outer reef, where we snorkeled for an hour and saw ridiculous reef-y stuff, like a massive forest of stag coral, too many exotic fish to count, and a giant clam with an ultraviolet beard. Some other people in the group saw a morey eel - I'm actually kind of glad we didn't.

We leave tomorrow for Palm Cove, which is a coastal town further north, from which we'll be able to make forays into the nearby rainforest. Better pictures to follow.