Okay, so most of us will never make the ultimate sea change, but head to the Whitsunday Islands and you can certainly experience it for a week or two. This must be Australia’s most seductive destination: the world’s largest reef, dazzling landscapes and a climate of eternal warmth. Best of all, the Whitsundays lie just off Australia’s east coast, a short flight from Brisbane or Sydney.

As your plane touches down on Hamilton Island you smell moist tropical air, hinting of spice. The airport is so delightfully small you stroll across the tarmac, and by the time you’ve ambled out of the arrivals area the baggage is already appearing. Lazy fans turn on the ceilings and women in hibiscus-coloured shirts wait at arrivals.

Of the seventy-odd islands of the Whitsundays, Hamilton Island has the largest population and is the most developed. That’s not saying much hereabouts, though, and even the airport is no larger than an urban cinema. Three-quarters of the island is a nature reserve in its natural state, cut through only by a few bush trails leading uphill to spectacular lookout points.

The rest is a tidily arranged and excellently organised resort where the loudest noise is the whine of the golf buggies that are the only form of transport. A stay here can be as laid-back or as action-packed as you want: there are swimming pools (seven of them), tennis, game fishing, scenic flights, sea kayaking and a whole host of other activities to while away the time. The more indolent can content themselves with the beach and a multitude of restaurants whose sophisticated food ranges from gourmet pizzas to Thai-style seafood and Italian specialties.

Just sit outdoors with a long cool drink and look up in the trees: you’ll soon be gawking in amazement at cockatoos with sulphur crests, shrieking like express trains and trying to snatch your bread crusts. In the afternoon, a pilgrimage up One Tree Hill is about all the energy you really need to spend. Watch the sun set over the mainland as the sea glows orange and the cocktails fizz: getaways don’t come much better than this.

You could spend a long time on Hamilton Island and never budge, but for absolute waterfront escapism you really need to take to a yacht and head to the other Whitsunday Islands, where you’ll find endless beaches without a footprint save for those left by scuttling crabs. Scuttling commuters will be but a distant memory. How? Just hustle on down to Hamilton Island’s marina and get on a Sunsail yacht, and with the pop of a champagne cork your bow will be pointing in the direction of some promising green islands and the big blue yonder.

Of course, it would help when sailing to know your starboard from your stern, how to stow something that might suddenly need stowing, and the intricacies of the fully-battened in-mast furling mainsail. Baffled? Have no fear, because those laid-back Aussies even know how to take the trouble out of sailing. Here’s the deal: a skipper to sail your 50-foot yacht, a chef to cook gourmet meals of fresh seafood and steak, a well-stocked fridge full of beer, and nothing more to do for three days than sit on the deck under the sun — or the million Antipodean stars that twinkle at night in the tropical sky.

"… the laconic Aussie answer to all your troubles…"

In short, if you want to sail but don’t know how, or just can’t be bothered, here’s the laconic Aussie answer to all your troubles. There isn’t even a fixed itinerary, leaving your yacht to wander hither and thither as the spirit (or perhaps the wind) takes you. With the Barrier Reef protecting the waters from the worst of any swell and plenty of sheltered bays to skulk in, not even seasickness is a downside to exploring the Whitsunday Islands. In fact, the rocking of the boat will rock you to sleep as if you’re a child again. Getaways don’t come much better than that.

So off you go into the seventy-odd islands of the Whitsundays, separated from each other by no more than a few nautical miles and decorated with hundreds of bays, beaches, coral reefs and headlands. (The islands were so-named by Captain Cook, the first European to travel through here when he passed up the east coast of Australia on Whit Sunday in June 1770.)

Similar in latitude to Hawaii or Rio, the water is constantly warm year-round and forms part of a protected marine park; only a half-dozen of the islands are home to resorts, while the rest are uninhabited and covered in dry eucalypt forest where birds nest, colourful butterflies flutter and monitor lizards bask in the sun.

Take the kayak off the deck of the yacht and paddle out into a bay and you’re likely to be the only soul in sight as you gaze along a coastline of scalloped rocks where shoals of finger-length fish lurk and mangroves dance above the water on long legs. Get up early and that’s when you realise what sailing is all about.