Adventure

Very early on in this trip, maybe even before we left home, I wrote a blog post describing it as a caravan adventure. It felt like that. It felt like we were taking a risk, doing something exciting and unusual. Someone, I cannot remember who, left a comment on that post challenging that thought. They said that hopefully it would not be an adventure because that meant that things hadn't gone to plan. That we would be taking risks. That the outcomes were uncertain.

Early this morning our family of five boarded a catamaran in Monkey Mia hoping to spend the next few hours sailing about watching the dolphins, sharks, dugongs, turtles and other sea life. 

Farmer Bren helped the crew 'heave ho' and then we settled in for the ride.

At first the trip was glorious.

The ocean was turquoise, the borrowed Polaroid sunnies gave us a giggle and let the girls see the water better, there was a pleasant breeze and an optimistic feeling on board.

We sailed for a while and we did see a couple of dolphins, some logger head turtles and some jumping fish, but try as we might none of the bigger sea creatures were anywhere to be seen.

And then the 'severe weather warning' that wasn't meant to reach us until this afternoon turned up.

We watched it in all its dark grey gloomy glory heading towards us from across the bay. 

At first we thought we would be able to outrun it back to shore. But then we realised we couldn't 'run' that fast. 

So we stowed all our valuables, donned borrowed yellow waterproof jackets and huddled under the  tiny bit of shade cloth shelter and waited.

And it didn't disappoint. We saw spectacular lightning, heard thunder that made us scream with fright and got absolutely and completely saturated. 

When we finally arrived back at the dock the crew offered us another sailing trip for free to take over the next few days. We declined ours because we are leaving tomorrow, but the truth is I think that all of us feels like we had our sailing on Monkey Mia adventure already.

We may have not seen many of the sea creatures they advertised but we had such an exciting and thrilling time. We explored unknown territory, experienced something potentially risky. Things hadn't quite gone to plan.

But we had a ball. We yelled at the crazy loud thunder, we laughed at each other as we got progressively wetter and started dripping, we huddled in tight to fit more people under the tiny shelter and we chatted with people from all over the world that we otherwise might have not even noticed.

After we got off the boat and had warm showers and changed into warm, snuggly clothes, we had a hearty lunch of pasta with pesto and spent the afternoon listening to the rain on the roof, watching movies, crocheting and writing in our journals. 

What an amazing, adventurous and cozy last day in Monkey Mia. One I am certain we will never forget.

Happy travels. x