Agnes Water & Seventeen Seventy

Sunshine at last!

After a journey on the night bus in wet clothes (Airlie Beach gave us a send off storm as we walked to the bus stop), it was nice to arrive in sunshine at Agnes Water and check into 1770 Beachside Backpackers.

Cycling to Seventeen Seventy

We had a good room with a small shared kitchen, so we stocked up at the shops and made some nice home-made grub.

Gorgeous sunset in Seventeen Seventy

After nearly a week of rain, we were delighted when the sun finally revealed itself. Abandoning all rain-related activities, we headed straight to the beach!

There, we watched the local surf school. It was a relief to see the beginners looking exactly as I imagined I would: not actually standing on the surfboard! I decided I would give it a go, so James and I signed up for the following morning's class.

Feeling energised by the sun, we hired bikes and cycled to Agnes Water's twin town of Seventeen Seventy. After taking in some gorgeous views over the sea, an unusual caravan park wedding and a sunset (which meant we had to cycle the last forty minutes in pitch black), we enjoyed a relaxing night after the eight mile cycle began to take its toll!

A broken man after his crushing 21-15 defeat

The next day, we decided to keep our sporting mood going with a table tennis challenge. I hammered James in the first game (his tale of events is of course different) so, infuriated by his defeat, he demanded a re-match. I have never seen him take anything so seriously; he was not prepared to be beaten (again) by a girl. After an intense match, James evened the score - leaving us with the prospect of a decider. We set a time for the re-match, however, when we arrived later in the day, the table tennis table had been taken away!

The windy view point

Our final day in Agnes was surfing day. We slapped on the sun lotion and ready to go. When we got to the surf shop, though, we were gutted to find out that the day's lesson had been cancelled due to a swell in the sea. I could tell James was disappointed (surfing was more his thing than mine, anyway) so there was only thing for it... a trip to the local pub 'The Tavern'.

After sitting down with his first pint, the smile began to reappear on his 'I just wanted to surf today' face: we realised he had smashed Dad's 11:41am holiday beer record by clocking in at an impressive 10:10am!

Caught in a downpour!

Determined to get a little bit of outdoors for the remainder of the day, I persuaded James to come for an afternoon walk along the beach. It was just our luck when, halfway through our walk, the heavens opened and we got absolutely drenched - oops! James was not very happy!

Despite a few minor hiccups, we left Agnes Water on a high after our three days here. We caught a reasonable o'clock bus and were excited about arriving in our next destination - Hervey Bay and the highly recommended Fraser Island!

Pam