Always remember the Sunscreen in Australia

I sat there watching the beach. ‘Oh, it’s so beautiful. No wonder, it is one of the most photographed beaches in the World‘, I thought. I was at White heaven beach, one of the most amazing places in the world. I was visiting Whitsunday islands for a long weekend and just the previous day, I had taken a sea plane to see the Heart Reef. And from the sea plane, I had seen the Whiteheaven beach. The Whiteheaven beach looked milky and stunning from the top with crystal clear blue waters.

About Whiteheaven beach

Whiteheaven beach is along the Whitsunday Island in Queensland state of Australia. The beach is 7 kilometres long and is known for its white sand and pristine blue waters. As the sand is white, it does not absorb heat from the Sun, which makes the beach very comfortable to walk barefoot, even on a very hot day.

For a detailed travel guide to Whitsundays, read my post “Guide to a heaven called Whitsundays“.

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Always remember the Sunscreen in Australia

And the story starts…

The day cruise that I had taken from Airlie beach to Whiteheaven beach had dropped us at the beach. We were dropped at around noon and unfortunately, that day was very hot. I had about 1.5 hours on the beach, to myself. After clicking some pictures (selfies mostly) and building a sand castle, I had a brilliant idea, I thought why not bask in the Sun! Everyone does, but they either apply a sunscreen or they bask under a shade. Of course, I didn’t do both.

I started reading a book that I had carried with me, slowly sliding on my back and resting my head on my backpack. With a book, a lovely beach, cool breeze, and on a holiday, the day slowly turned into a pretty relaxing day.

After about an hour, I was disturbed and woken up from my sleep. Irritated, I looked up and it was a lady whom I had never seen before.

She spoke quickly “You really need to go to the shade”.

And then, without a pause, she immediately said, “How can you not realize? Are you not feeling anything?“

‘Hang on Soldier!‘ thinking to myself, I asked in my sleepy eyes, “What happened?”

She replied, “Your arms and your face look really very bad!”

After she had said is when I realised that my arms were burning (‘fortunately, they were not on fire yet’) and it had turned red (‘I mean literally red, I didn’t know that was even possible’). “Ah, it hurts!” I cried out loud. I had slept under the glaring hot rays of the Sun for good one hour. The rays were so harsh that it had burnt my arms and my face (‘Come on man! Why do things happen only to me?’). For the first time in my life, I had been sun burnt and roasted.

Closing Notes

Repercussion of my unwanted adventure in the Sun? An hour long lecture from my mother, one whole month to recover, with a very bad burnt face, an entire tube of Aloe Vera gel and two face massages. And I had learned that it is important to apply sunscreen in Australia as the sun is really harsh.

Unfortunately, I do not have pictures of my burnt hands and face.

Have you had any such experiences where you have completely lost track of what was happening and then got into trouble? Let me know in the comments below!