Upon arrival in Mackay Australia we checked in and underwent a stringent biosecurity inspection before settling in for a few nights at a dock!  Just enough time to thoroughly clean the boat, perform some maintenance and reprovision! 

For the next few weeks we will be cruising from Mackay to Darwin discovering the islands of the Great Barrier Reef on the way.

Our first stop just 16 NM from Mackay was St Bees Island where we picked up a mooring and did a little exploring and most notably some whale watching ! it is quite magical to observe these giants and their babies so close to us! They seem very playful. We trot o capture some videos that we will link later. The photo above was taken from the dinghy as we motored along a couple whales.

Very rocky beach where we landed the dingh at high tide. A mere 30 minutes later we had to lift it back to get it in the water.

St Bees is known for its thriving koala population but we were not able to go into the forest. 

At dusk, birds started singing and we were gifted a magical sunset and more whales swimming by. Quite an amazing start to our cruising.