WHITSUNDAY ISLANDS, AUSTRALIA

For the next three days and two nights we'll be on a live-aboard sailing tour of the Whitsundays, a group of coastal islands that are part of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Reserve, and a World Heritage Area. We're sailing on the Ragamuffin II, a 53-foot racing sailboat that previously competed in Australia's Admiral's Cup. (From the number of similar boats offering Whitsundays cruises, it seems like this is where all the old racing boats are put out to pasture.)

After arriving last night in the backpacker party town of Airlie Beach, we were picked up this morning by bus and taken to Abel Point Marina, where we climbed on board and met our skipper, Matt, first mate Andy, and our ten fellow passengers (see below), most of whom are American exchange students on a semester break. (It should be interesting to be around so many Americans again, after three months as a minority....)

After motoring out of the harbor, Matt and Andy raised the sails and we cruised through the Whitsunday Passage (named by Captain Cook, like everything else in the Pacific) . The crossing was a little rough, as we're getting some weather from Cyclone Monica far to the north. On the bright side, the gusty winds meant we could sail at a pretty good clip, so it didn't take long for us to reach our first destination, Hook Island, where we moored in a sheltered bay.

The Whitsundays are surrounded by fringing reefs, which means there's some great snorkeling just offshore, so Andy took us closer to the beach in a zodiac and we jumped in. In this part of Australia, it's still "stinger season," which means that deadly box jellyfish might be floating about, so we all wore stinger suits, which are basically lightweight nylon wetsuits. Not very sexy, but functional. Unfortunately, because of the weather, the visibility wasn't too great, but we did see coral and a large number of fish species (parrotfish, wrasses, damselfish, angelfish, butterflyfish, clown fish, triggerfish, etc.). We also saw a school of some pretty large reef squid, which kept changing color from blue to red as they cruised the reef in formation.

After a lunch of sandwiches and quiche, we cruised to a different bay, and Chris, Chase and I tried snorkeling again. This time, we fed slices of bread to the fishes, which swarmed around us en masse. It was crazy--there were so many that you could reach out and touch them, and they wouldn't even swim away! I also spotted a large potato cod (grouper) and a red-and-white crayfish (spiny lobster) in a hole in the reef.

In the evening, we relaxed on deck, talked with our shipmates, and had a great spaghetti dinner. As we were eating, we heard strange splashing noises all around the boat--on investigating, we discovered that dinner was being served in the water, as well: Small fish were being attracted to our boat's lights, which in turn attracted massive schools of squid! As the squid went after the fish, they attracted larger predators--namely, medium-sized grey whalers and reef sharks--we saw up to six or seven at once! So for several hours, fish, squid, and sharks were all darting about and jumping out of the water to attack their prey and/or avoid being eaten--it was unreal! That experience alone was worth the price of the whole sailing trip.

People met today:

• Matt and Andy, our Aussie crew.
• Liz, a teacher from London, who's had the most sailing experience of any of us passengers.
• Peter, from Holland, four months into traveling around Asia and Australia.
• Brian, Mark, and Kyle, from the U.S. and studying for a semester in Sydney. (Brian and Mark are from Chicago, while Kyle is from Las Vegas.)
• Henrik, from Denmark, friends with the above three, and studying at the same school.
• Chase (from Maine), Kara, Rose, and Tom, Americans studying for a semester in Brisbane.