On Wednesday we had a thankfully short amount of driving to do, heading north from Airlie Beach and arriving in Townsville at lunchtime. We got the ferry over to Magnetic Island, so called by Captain Cook because his compass acted strangely when he passed it. It turns out that the island doesn't actually have much of a magnetic field at all even though it has a huge granite core, so he must have just had a faulty compass.
Once we had checked into Base Backpackers, we headed out on a walk around the hills on the island. The 'forts' on top of the island's hills were used in World War 2 to observe and defend the coastline and the passage between the island and the mainland. The forts are meant to be one of the best place to spot koalas in the wild in the country, but being shy and reclusive creatures, we didn't manage to spot any.
So after a nice, relaxing day, we settled down in the evening and I got ready for my four day Open Water SCUBA diving course that would start the next day.
