CAY-TRIPPING! Sailing into a Wildlife Documentary on the Great Barrier Reef
The two destinations in this video – Sudbury Cay and Michaelmas Cay – are the reason we set sail up the North Queensland Coast in the middle of a La Niña summer.
Our goal was to see if instead of the howling southeasters that have prevailed over the last of Australia’s three consecutive La Niña years throughout the ‘typical’ cruising seasons, we might find calmer conditions for accessing less sheltered parts of the Great Barrier Reef.
Spoiler alert: there are no glass-outs here – but we definitely found magic. ✨
In fact, I’m still pinching myself that we were able to visit the places we did, and particularly Michaelmas Cay, which is one of the most important seabird rookeries in the southern hemisphere, with up to 20,000 breeding pairs recorded.
This is the sort of place you might actually expect to bump into David Attenborough and a BBC Wildlife film crew.
In their absence, I give you the ‘Brilliant II’ crew. 🤪
It’s a privilege to be able to share this video with you; I am grateful for my little family, who are doing this journey called ‘life’ with me, and for our ‘Brilliant’ boat, that takes us to places like these.
Enjoy!
💙 @shazatsea (IG)
Additional Resources
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Maps/Satellite Imagery - https://earth.google.com/web/
https://www.portsnorth.com.au/cairns-marlin-marina/ - Marlin Marina
https://rustysmarkets.com.au/about-us/ - Rusty’s Markets
https://www.ausarmour.com - Tank Museum
https://parks.des.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0031/165649/michaelmas-cay-raa.pdf - Michaelmas Cay rules for visiting
https://www.tropicalnorthqueensland.org.au/real-urban-jungle/ Cairns
https://www.australia.com/en/places/cairns-and-surrounds/guide-to-cairns.html - Travel Guide to Cairns (Tourism Australia)
https://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Attraction_Products-g255069-d2179510-Michaelmas_Cay-Cairns_Cairns_Region_Queensland.html Trip Advisor - tours to Michaelmas Cay
https://www.template.net/editable/clipart - IG logo
Additional Clips sourced from YouTube
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https://youtu.be/cyOreCmoR_M - Experience Cairns & Great Barrier Reef - TTNQ
https://youtu.be/wBG_AvZJt7Q - BE Immersed highlights 2021 – TTNQ
https://youtu.be/GXuRCszmP9E - Salt House 10th Anniversary – Cairns – Dexter Gross Films
Music via www.storyblocks.com
👇🏻
Media Music Group / Cinematic piano and strings dramatic wonder
Humans Win (formerly Lance Conrad) / Explorer
OKO / Midnight emotional inspiring energy
Danail Draganov / Gentle Documentary Piano
Unknown / Glass 01
Jabameister / Magical Adventure
Tchaikovsky / Dance of the reed pipes
Music via www.epidemicsound.com
Luwaks / Into the Blue - https://www.epidemicsound.com/track/FdhMx1Fqcj/
The Sailing Adventures of Brilliant II
Join the Smallwoods - Sharon, Julian, Josh, and Pepe (the Blue Burmese) - aboard Sailing Vessel Brilliant II. Brilliant II is a Kelly Peterson 44, built in 1978. Julian and Sharon bought the boat in Phuket, Thailand, in 2005, and sailed her slowly back to Sydney, Australia. Over the next five years they lived aboard and sailed the coasts of New South Wales and Queensland. They are currently based in the Whitsundays, Queensland, where Josh was born in 2010. In 2021 they began a refit of the water-damaged interior (which had needed doing since the start!), while continuing to sail on mini-adventures north and south of their home port. Sharon is a photojournalist by trade, but realising YouTube is a thing has started creating videos too. You can also follow their adventures on Instagram at @shazatsea.
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CAY-TRIPPING! Sailing into a Wildlife Documentary on the Great Barrier Reef Locations
- Great Barrier Reef (-18.2870668,147.6991918)
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