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To be honest the overnight bus from Airlie Beach was not half bad and passed quite quickly. The seats did not fully recline like those in Asia but they did show an English speaking movie. The premier bus was slightly late picking us up but made good time and we arrived at Hervey Bay at 5 am. Luckily a bus from the hostel (palace backpackers) was waiting to pick us up and allowed us to check into our room and grab a few more hours kip before heading out to explore. We treated ourselves to a fish and chip dinner on the sea front and bought a pizza to cook in the hostel. This was the first hostel in OZ that had offered an oven to cook in, we couldnt wait. That night we popped the oven on to heat up and i put the pizza in. A few minutes later cockroaches started to appear from the oven. Talking about this now is giving me the creeps. The roaches were not in the oven so me and Craig swiftly got the pizza out without going near the little mingers. In the end we had a microwaved pizza that was edible but
not enjoyable. lol
The next day started with a 7am meeting for our Fraser Island trip. We rocked up and realised that there were 50 Canadian students also going at the same time, oh the joys what could be better than annoying Canadian,....... annoying German girls (now the fact they were German had nothing to do with it but i cant really remember their names so "the german girls" will be what i use to identify them) . We ended up with 9 travellers in our 4x4, fortunately non Canadian. Craig and Matt wanted to be the main drivers and i was happy with that decision. Matt went to do a sky dive so Craig was in charge of the vehicle. After a long briefing and safety video we headed to pack up our equipment and then to the supermarket to buy our grub. The German girls tried to take over the shopping and buy things that werent needed but i soon put an end to that. We bought the most important thing which was our goon (wine in a box) and rushed to the ferry. Making it just in time along with the million Canadians we boarded the
ferry. A few Canadian lady drivers could not reverse onto the ferry or pack their 4x4 properly but Craig was an expert and did it without hesitation.
After exiting the ferry we were told to stop and let down the air in out tyres as we were now driving on sand and fill up our water container. With all the excitement we missed this station and made it half way up a very steep sandy hill before we realised so we stopped in the middle of the road and let down the tyres. Now we were ready for the very bumpy journey across Fraser Island. We stopped at lake Wabby lookout and the view was amazing. We walked down to the lake and went for a swim. The lake is drying up and will not be around in ten years so i felt very privledged to see this. There was nothing but sand dunes all around and the sun was shining. It was perfect. Their were fish swimming around us and ducks in the distance, at one point i paniced and thought i saw a fin but it turned out it was just a ducks butt up in the
air. That night we set up camp in a designated camping area on the beach. The boys cooked a BBQ and we chilled out. With no lights apart from Craigs head torch we could see the stars and i spotted a dingo really close to our camp so we scared it off. I had a decent nights sleep in our three man tent which we shared with Tim.
The next day we set out to Indian Heads and Champagne pools. The weather was not great and even rained from time to time. We could not see a great deal from indian heads apart from a few stingrays so we headed up to champagne pools to have a dip. They call it champagne pools as the sea waves come over the rocks and it looks like when you pour champagne. At this point i had realised that neither me or Craig had our camera so i began to panic. We were almost sure that we had packed it up in out tent but i needed to check asap. After driving down the beach we stopped at Mahino wreck, an old boat the wasrusting away on the sand and on to
Elih Creek. Here is where i made Craig unpack the 4x4 to get to the tents in the very back. Matt a guy from England helped us. We opened 2 tents and found the camera in the second. I was sooo happy. We packed the truck back up and went for a float in the creek much to the annoyance of the German girls. The creek was cold but all you had to do was lie and float and it carried you down stream. It was fresh water so we got a quick shower not using any soap as it was still part of the national park and soap was not allwed. That afternoon we set up camp and myself, Craig and Matt went for a drive to get fresh water and supplies. On the way back the guys said i should drive and i did. It was so much fun but im glad i didnt have a full load as it was bouncing all over the beach. I didnt do too bad if i dont saw so myself. Back at camp i started to make spag bol for tea. Boiling the pasta took forever so Craig started a little game of cricket. It was toilet roll for the ball and a shovel for a bat. The game came to an end when the toilet roll got stuck in a tree and was shredded all around our camp. Dont worry we picked it all up so the camp was clean.
That night the rain began to fall and we huddled in the 4x4 and talked and drank our soggyness away. The rain stopped and we went to bed to be awoken buy a flood in our tent. I was soaking. Craig was fine, Tim was fine, so just me sleeping in a puddle and getting rained on. I had to run out in the rain and put the window down, when i got back i was dripping. Nice!!! We got up to more dark clouds and headed to Lake McKenzie. The water was an amazing blue colour and if the sun was out it would have been perfect. Their was a slight wind and when you got out of the water it was cold. I spent an hour in there but the boys were gossiping and when they got out they were completly pruned. We drove to the ferry port hours early and huddled under a cover and played cards till it was time.
Back at the hostel we were all put in the same flat. That night everyone packed their bags and Matt drove his camper to subway to get us tea. Everyone was going in their different directions the boys were heading north and me and Craig were chaging to a better hostel for one night. Matt dropped us off at Next Backpackers and we said our goodbyes. Next backpackers was really nice and clean. The kitchen was fab and they had an awesome tv room with hundreds of movies to choose from. It was here that we received an email from Niki offering us a job. We were so releived as our funds needed topping up.
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