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Published: January 16th 2007
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I made my way up to a little place called Hervey Bay (think Wasaga Beach). Its essentially a gateway to the worlds largest sand Island, called Fraser Island (someone once told me that it holds more sand than the Sahara dessert, however, I'm not convinced). Over here there are dozens of travel companies all looking for your backpacking business. They all offer things like free internet and free nights accomodations to lure you to sign up with them. In Sydney, it was raining for a few days in a row, so I took a few hours out of my day going around and getting the best price (15% off) for this trip and the next one I'm about to embark on as well (a sailing trip in the Whitsundays). I figure this is just a warmup to practise my "haggling" skills prior to southeast Asia, where apparently you can talk them down 90%....to be continued...
Anyways, here in Fraser, you go for 2 nights and 3 days in a big offroading 4X4 with 10 of your closest friends. You are randomly put in a group and I was put in one with 7 Irish people (5 guys, 2 girls), a young
The ship wreck
This guy (Johnny) is the Irish twin of my cousin Mark! Italian couple and a crazy Norwegian. At first I was skeptical about the group as all 7 Irish were best mates since they were 6 years old and many times groups of people just talk and make decisions among themselves. However, this was not the case. They were all about 5 years older than me and tonnes of fun. The most outgoing guy was this redhead guy called Johnny. I knew he was going to be crazy fun, not because he looked like Carrot Top, but because he looked just like the Irish version of my cousin Mark (see picture). He told the craziest stories and had the best Borat accent that I've ever heard. Essentially after every beer went down the hatch, the "I LIIIIIIIIKE's", "Myyyy WIIIIFE's" and the "SEXXXXY TIMES" could be heard all the way down the beach as we all did our best impressions.
We took a 30 minute ferry ride across to the island and our adventure began. There are no roads on the island, just sand trails and the beach (which is luxury cruising, compared to the inland driving). It was obviously a standard, so I did none of the driving myself and
Our whip
we named her FRANCY sat in the back with 7 others just having a grand time joking around (aside from the 2nd and 3rd mornings, when going up and down for 45 straight minutes, with very little shock absorbtion on 3 hours of sleep and 12 beers still in you isnt the best feeling in the world).
The one thing about Fraser is that there are heaps of Dingoes on the island that have become quite domesticated. Infact it was just a couple years ago that a group of them attacked and killed a young 8 year old boy. Well, the first night we had set up camp in a place that we thought was quite nice. Unfortunately, the camp ranger (a 30 year old brunette with glasses) disagreed with us and told us to move. While she was giving us all a lecture, a couple people yelled "DINGO!!" and it picked up one of our bags and started running off with it. The park ranger instinctively starting chasing after it but had to run by one of our tents that had been set up. The fly had a little (almost fish line type) string that strung about 2 metres from the tent that the park ranger didnt see. She tripped over the first one but actually stumbled and impressively maintained her balance.....juuuust long enough to reach the 2nd fly string, where her balance was no longer any help to her....she did a full out face plant into the sand in front of 22 of us campers that she was just lecturing. When she turned around and looked back at us, due to the perspiration that had accumulated on her face, the sand stuck to her face and she looked exactly like Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire, when he puts his head in the pie and the whip cream sticks to his face and he lifts his head from behind the fridge door and says "HELLLLLOOOOOOO". Needless to say, we didnt really listen to much that she had to say after that and more importantly the mischevious little Dingo gave one last look back (and I swear smirked at her) then got away with one of our bags of ice.
(Unfortunately for anyone reading this, I dont have an editor and I can go on big tangents like this, which I'm sure should be cut out...ah well).
On the island, there was the most beautiful freshwater lake that I've ever been to, called Lake Mackenzie. Where the sand is so white and hot that you couldnt walk on it without sandals. We spent our 1st and 3rd days here as you couldnt swim in the ocean here @ Fraser. This is because of the Rips and because it is a breading ground for Sharks. Fortunately, on the 2nd day we made our way out to Indian head, where you could see a wonderful lookout and I saw my first shark in the wild. I've loved sharks all my life and thought it would be a much bigger deal than it was....the shark didnt put on much of a show for me, so dophins are now officially my favorite fish....mammal! Whatever....
After spotting a few dolphins and stingrays we took off down the beach to set up camp. Here we had huge BBQ's and a big pasta dinner. The Irish dont put the pasta sauce on pasta however, they put them on "Spuds" (potatoes obviously). They explained to me that they were all raised on spuds and a stew called Coddle (maybe Cuddle, my memory isnt as sharp as she used to be) where its just anything that is found in the fridge is thrown in. The nights were spent listening to alot of U2 music and just telling stories untill the Norwegian passed out and was mooned by many with many photos taken.
There are many funny things about the Irish. First of all, they burn in the sun in about 30 seconds. As soon as the shirt comes off, its like someone has taken a paint brush and painted their skin with the color "SUNBURN". Secondly, no matter what conversation you're having with any of them, it somehow always makes its way back to beer (usually Guiness). The first time we met and I mentioned I was from Canada, they all said "Ooooh, such a lovely place...." (then there was about a 3 second gap, where they wanted to hold it in, but just couldnt before they said "but, fuck, nobody there knows how to pour a damn Guiness!!!!" And boy did they say it with passion. But God bless the Irish, they're all wonderful people and I have nothing but great things to say about them.
To all my older relatives- the word "fuck" was used to maintain the authenticity of the story...we all know what happened with James Grey and Oprah, when he strayed from the truth in his book.
Numbers Game
3-Number of times I've watched Top Gun on my Ipod (and everytime I watch it, I just ask myself what happened to Tom Cruise...geez....and even Val Kilmer)
4- number of times I've watched Good Will Hunting on my Ipod
5- number of Sunglasses that I've gone through already
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Angie
non-member comment
vicarious traveler- so so jealous
Hey I'm Angie, just a random girl who found your journal while researching my own Aus adventure. You sound like you're having such an incredible trip, I'm so jealous and so excited for my own! Keep writing! Angie