13th April 2017 - Hamilton Island - all is well

Thursday 13^th April 2017

20 degrees 20.843S

148 degrees 57.062E

Hamilton Island marina

All is well on 2XS.  Pete and Martin are beavering away fixing this and that.  The shredded headsail has been removed and is being replaced by an EXTREMELY bright little storm sail, which should do the job very niftily.  Speedy orange!!

 Some bits of the marina are broken

Some boats are smashed.

Poor Daydream!

But mostly Hamilton Island is open for business.  The restaurants are full of happy chatty people.  Catseye Beach is looking great.

A bit of work needed but

everything looks much better than I expected.  The trees are denuded and the whole island looks as if a bomb has hit it but Hamilton Island is definitely open for business!

The hill used to be lush and green

Yesterday Harry and I did a small bus trip, on one of the free blue buses.  Our driver told us that he had gone to the Convention Centre to shelter from the cyclone.  There were  lots of people there, in there, reasonably confident of their security.  Until the roller doors in the delivery bay blew in… He said he saw a few 120 kilo men swept off their feet and slammed to the ground – amazing nobody was seriously injured.  When the doors blew in the full strength of the cyclone went through building and they all had to race for the toilet blocks.  Our driver was in the men’s toilet with 54 new friends, all, standing jammed together in the dark, for three hours while the wind howled.  He said it was totally horrific.

Harry's bird friend 

We are leaving in an hour or so, heading, I hope, for Whitehaven Beach – Harry would love to see a turtle or two.  (So would I…)