Advertisement
Published: April 11th 2007
Eli Creek
Swimming down Eli Creek on Fraser Island. Some of our Swiss friends in the background Wednesday 28th March
This morning we caught a Greyhound bus (an experience we are becoming well accustomed to) from Noosa to Hervey Bay. This is the place you had to head to in order to catch a ferry to Fraser Island. On arrival late afternoon at our hostel we headed straight to our group meeting to be preped for our Fraser Island camping experience. This gave us the chance to meet our fellow group members who we would be spending the next few days with. Our group was made up of nine people - Marc and Andreas (friends from Switzerland), Lynne (a lady from England), Manon (a swiss french student) and Asgar (a medical student from Denmark). After a bit of introductory "banter" we headed into Hervey Bay to do our group grocery shopping. The evening was spent getting to know our group better over some drinks in the hostel bar.
Thursday 29th
We were up early at 6.30am today to give our camping gear the once over and load up our 4 by 4 with all of our stuff. We all got very excited seeing the jeeps that we would be using to get around Fraser Island parked
Fraser Island
Lake Mckenzie at the resort, and our excitement only grew as we drove to catch the ferry over to Fraser Island. As Andreas drove us off the ferry to Fraser Island, it was clear this was going to be a unique driving experience as there were no made roads, only sand tracks due to it being the largest sand island in the world. The weather today was gorgeous - not a cloud in the sky, so we decided to take advantage and head straight to Lake Mckenzie, a natural fresh water lake in the south of the Island. The lake in its surroundings were stunning, a perfect location to relax on the white sand and swim in the crystal turquoise water. After a picnic lunch at Lake Mckenzie we took a very bumpy jeep ride north to Lake Wabby, another fresh water lake, this time surrounded by deep sand dunes. The only way down to the lake was to roll down the main sand dune and join the turtles and fish for a swim at the bottom. As the sun began to set that evening over Fraser Island we drove up the beach to set up camp before the tide came in.
The Whitsundays
The Pride of Airle We had a group BBQ that evening, however because the sun sets at around 6ish, it was difficult to see exactly what we were eating with only a torch light between the group. Lots of fun was had that evening through playing a series of very amusing drinking games.
Friday 30th
Heading further north today along the main beach towards Indian Head (the highest point on the Island) we stopped off firstly at Eli Creek, where we swam down the fresh water creek, letting the current carry us to the bottom. The famous shipwreck on the island was our next port of call, another great photo opportunity, and our final stop was Indian Head, the furthest point north of the Island in which you can drive to. By waiting around on the cliff top at Indian Head we were lucky enough to sight a group of eight dolphins riding the waves and some sharks swimming in the cove below. It was incredible to experience. Again, we camped this evening on the beach with our group. It was a very memorable evening as we were joined on our camp site on several occasions by the local dingos. Although we felt
The Whitsundays
Staying on South Mole Island pretty intimidated at the time, looking back it wouldn't have been the same if we had left the island not seeing a dingo.
Saturday 31st
Before catching a ferry back to the mainland today we managed to visit two more lakes, Lake Boojamin and Lake Birrabean, followed by a walk in the Islands rainforest at Central Station. Back at Hervery Bay, well needed showers were had by all before heading out to dinner with the "Swissies" of our group making a perfect end to our Fraser Island Experience, and what an amazing experience it was!
Sunday 1st April
After a very relaxed morning by the pool at our Koala resort, we caught the Greyhound mid
afternoon to Seventeen Seventy, a small town, home to a very chilled out and relaxed youth hostel called Cool Bannanas, our home for the next couple of days.
Monday 2nd
We had been recommended Seventeen Seventy for cheap surfing lessons so that morning we headed down to the surf shop, all very excited to book a surfing lesson. In enquiring about a lesson we were all laughed at by the shop owner who told us we couldn't surf due to a pretty
serious Tsunami warning along the East coast of Australia, and that the whole beach line was on red alert!! Thinking at first that he was joking we waited around a while and luckily for us after about half an hour the warning was cleared. We spent the afternoon surfing the waves or at least attempting to. That evening we caught an overnight bus to Airlie Beach.
Tuesday 3rd
Arriving in Airlie Beach at 6.30am meant we had to kill a few hours before checking into our hostel, Magnums. We spent the day by the lagoon doing a bit of sunbathing and swimming. The evening was spent going out for a bite to eat with Ben and Pete (the two guys we met in Surfers Paradise) and then a few drinks with Shadz (a friend from Bedford) and the Swiss crew from Fraser. It is amazing how often you bump into the same people of the east coast. We set sail on the Pride of Airle, early the next day. There were two boats and we were on the blue one with a group of Irish guys and girls we met again in Surfers. We knew it was going to be a fun few days. On the way to Southmole island, where we were to stay that night, we started on the Goon and began socialising. This carried on into the night where we took advantage of Happy hour and had a good ol' boogy.
Thursday 5th
Day two on the Whitsundays took us to Whitehaven beach, we chilled out of the beautifully white silica sand, swam in our sexy stinger swimmer suits (these were compulsory to wear, as we were in peak stinger season) and took part in some organised beach games eg tug of war, boys vs girls - the girls winning of course but the guy to girl ratio may have had something to do with it. This trip took most of the day so back on Southmole island that evening we participated in the P-party, dressing up with something beginning with P. Sarah was a pimp with Ally, Micky and Kim as her Pink Ladies! We also dressed our two male french room mates up as a pin-up girl and a Pinapple using out own clothes. Best costume however came from the oldest member of our party boat, 78yr old Pat. She was bought on this trip by her grandson and was unable to make the second day sailing due to drinking too much on her first night and because of this, dressed up with a goon box on her head being Piss-head Pat - Genius!
Friday 6th
This day was spent snorkelling. Unfortunately this was a little bit disappointing due to strong tides the water was pretty murky so we couldn't see a great deal. Back on mainland Oz, Airlie Beach, we decided to send Ally off in style by going out for a delicious slap-up thai meal. We then made our way to a pool party at Koala back-packers to meet up with people we met on the trip, the Worchester lads, the swiss and the Frenchies.
Saturday 7th
The day had come for Ally to leave us. We put her on a bus that would take her to the local airport, where she would fly to Sydney, then to Hong Kong and finally home. It was a really sad send off as we have had such a fantastic four weeks together and it has just gone too quickly. We miss you Ally!!! Soon after her send-off we jumped on the Greyhound north to Townsville, where the next day we would catch a ferry to Magnetic Island.
Sunday 9th
After taking a very rough ferry ride across to Magnetic island and getting pretty wet, we caught a local bus to our hostel Magnums. It was a big complex with a lively bar, shop and a pool so that afternoon we finished the day off soaking up the sun and swimming in the pool. We knew quite a few people in Magnetic island such as the Irish group who have travelled up a similat route to us from Sydney, so that evening after making ourselves tacos we socialised and had drinks at the bar. The
Monday 10th
The next morning we met up with Kat (from Wales) and organised hiring a car to tour the island in. It was an open top barbie look-alike car, which as you can imagine us four girlies were very excited about. Unfortunately only Kat could drive being over 21, but with the music blasting and the roof down, we set off to our first stop. This was Horseshoe Bay where we funnily enough bumped into another set of friends, the Swiss from Fraser. We spent some time chilling on the beach with them before setting off to our second destination, which was forts walk. This was Magnetic islands national park walk where we were warned to watch out for snakes, koalas and wallabees. Having been to many national parks and not seeing anything, we didn't have very high hopes, however, heading back to the car, a grey creature was spotted in the tree alongside the path and on looking closer we saw it was a Koala fast asleep. Micky got snappy happy once again! We hopped back into our barbie-mobil and made our way to Picnic Bay. This beach was beautiful, overlooking mainland Australia. A few more Bays were visited before heading back to our hostel for a game of volley ball.
Tuesday 11th
Our last morning on Magnetic island has filled us three girls with great excitement as we have now booked a camper van to tour New Zealand in after finding a brilliant deal. Our accomodation and transport is now sorted. We will look the bees knees driving around N.Z. in our very own camper van and best of all we will be living one of many dreams!
Hope everyone is well, its lovely to hear your comments!
Kim, Micky and Sarah
xxx
Advertisement
Tot: 0.816s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 12; qc: 56; dbt: 0.0495s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Mattie
non-member comment
All of your photos look absolutely amazing. Everything Ally's told me and shown me has made me very jealous indeed. I am sorry to read that you guys all miss Ally-gator now she's back at home, but you guys had her for long enough thank you very much! Jokes. :-) All the best! Mattie xxx