Our trip to Rocky was meant to be purely ‘business’, and not meant to be a vacation, nor should it involve any kind of ‘fun’. But the 3 days ended up with at least 1 full day of pure fun on the GREAT KEPPEL ISLAND. It was recommended to us by the Harcourts real estate agent the previous day, who happened to have went to the island the previous week. Situated a boat throw away from the mainland, it was a $35 return trip, which took about 0.5 hour each way.
The boat was suppose to leave at 10:00am from Rosslyn Bay, and was expected to be there by 9:30am. We left our Rocky holiday village unit at about 8:45am, which was a bit late, as it we got there at exactly 9:35am. I was still deciding whether to go Scuba diving or not, which I finally decided to give it a miss, since Marissa will miss out. So we did a coral tour instead.
After a bit of delay, we the ‘Freedom Cats’ finally took off. As the captain was reversing the boat, another was busy talking about ‘safety procedures’ to us. A minute later, *WHACK*.. we reversed straight into the other ‘Freedom Cat’ that was parked next to it. That definitely was not a confident start to our day!! It left a hole in the other boat, and our boat seems to be fine. (You can check out the photo in the Photo Gallery).
Anyway.. after a bit of ‘checks’, all was good, and we left for the island. Once there, it was a simple beach landing, right in front of the resort. We were greeted by hell of a lot of people at the resort.
The day started with the coral viewing trip on a glass-bottom boat. The corals that we were seeing were so called ‘Fringing Coral reefs’, just off the middle island. As expected, the corals were rather dull and colourless. Marissa almost fell asleep looking at it, as it was getting rather ‘repetitive’. But soon, a little ‘splash’ suprised us from a distance. It was a apparently some fish jumping out the water. Another minute later.. the reefs turned into schools of small fish. And soon, the schools of small fish turned into a school of BIG fish! And not only that, there were schools of different big fishes. Marissa, now standing up, was definitely awake and alive again. The tour guide throw a few baits in there to lure the fishes closer. We were definitely looking at fishes up to 1 metre long coming to the surface snatching little baits. That has to be one of the most impressive sights I have seen!
Once we got back, we had a bit of lunch, consisting of a rather unhealthy chips/calamari. The cafe seems to be run by Asians. JB would definitely love the ladies here. I was impressed, but did not voice my opinions in front of Marissa.
After that, we decided we would go swimming at one of the many beaches on offer. We began making our way to Shelley’s beach, which is a small & more private beach. It has a very exotic feel, as we had to walk through a hilly bush track just to get there. The water was clear, calm and crystal blue. There were only 2 other girls on the beach sunbathing. Just how Marissa likes it. As I only had one set of snorkels, I started exploring the nearby rocks for a bit of fish. As expected, there were plenty of small fishes to see. I eventually sucked into Marissa trying it out in the shallow ends. Her reactions turned from, “Not gonna try it.. it’s scary”, to “THIS IS SO COOL!” I can definitely tell she’s enjoying it. She even said she’ll go invest in a pair of snorkels.
Anyway.. we were fast out of time. We definitely will have to come back here again, to explore the rest of the island. 1 Day simply isn’t enough. There were countless other beaches, and water activities, as well as bushwalking tracks we have not seen. This is definitely one enjoyable experience that rates as highly as our Snowboarding trip a few months ago.
