Day 32, Year 3: Beautiful Lizard Island
Date: Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Weather: Partly Cloudy Day with AM Sprinkles; Winds ESE 20-25
Location: Watson’s Bay, Lizard Island, Queensland, Australia

Lizard Island is truly one of Australia’s gems. The Whitsunday Islands were nice, and we have visited some wonderful towns along the coast, but this island is a little slice of paradise. The snorkeling here is fantastic. The coral is not the best we have seen in the South Pacific but the GIANT clams are phenomenal, and there are just loads of fish. We only thought we had seen giant clams in the Vanuatu. The clams here are a good four feet in length, maybe more, and when you find an empty shell
where a clam once lived, I’m sure either Mark or I could crawl down inside the shell. In fact, I might try that tomorrow. And aside from being big, they are beautiful. We went snorkeling twice today, once in the middle of the bay and again on the north side of the anchorage. Both places were fantastic and we will snorkel in both places at least a couple of more times before leaving here. When we went snorkeling in the morning, the sun was not shining brightly, so the underwater photos didn’t
capture the real beauty of the clams. And when we were snorkeling in the afternoon, the sun was shining but our underwater camera gave us a problem once again. It keeps telling us that that the battery door is open which would allow sea water into the camera. When that happens, we immediately stop using it, but then we never find water in the camera. We are going to have to play with this during the next couple of days, but if the problem isn’t solved, we will have to get another camera before
heading to Indonesia.

This afternoon there was a birthday party on the beach for Jay on Makani Kai. He was twenty-eight today. It is scary when your fellow cruisers are younger than your own children! We have met some wonderful people here that we will be traveling with this season. This afternoon, a few of us formed a “grandmother’s club.” Jeanette on Reflection and Pattie on This Way Up, both Australian catamarans, love cruising but find it very difficult to be away from the grandchildren. Jeanette is flying home
from Darwin to visit before heading to Indonesia even though the grandchildren visited while she was in Cairns last week. But then home for her is not far away. Pattie has eight grandchildren, two of which live in Vancouver, Canada, so she has more experience in dealing with the long periods of time between visits. I just can’t wait to get to Darwin so I can see Sam via Skype once more. Pattie and Jeanette both think we will have internet in Indonesia more often than I have been expecting, so
I hope they are right about that. Mark has also been meeting lots of other captains and learning lots about sailing from here to Darwin. Dave and Pattie on This Way Up have been over the top of Cape York five times, so they are a wealth of information. Many of the boats we have met here are leaving tomorrow, but we will be staying for a few more days and will meet new cruisers that we expect will arrive tomorrow. So we will learn as much as we can from others while enjoying one of the most fantastic places we have been on the Voyage of Windbird.

080610 Day 32 Lizard Island Birthday Party