Blogs from Rainbow Beach, Queensland, Australia, Oceania - page 8

After two long days of travelling I arrived into Rainbow Beach, one of the gateways to Fraser Island. The following morning I met the beast of a truck/bus that was to take me around Fraser Island. Fraser Island is the largest sand island in the world, is full of rainbow rocks, creeks, shipwrecks, lakes, rainforrest, beaches, dingos and people. Our guide took us to see much that there was to see and morning tea and lunch were provided! Lake McKenzie was beautiful but it was absolutely full of tourists, I walked 5 minutes round the lake to find an almost deserted beach, I couldn't understand why people hadn't made the walk! The day I left Rainbow Beach, a friend and I decided to get up at 4am and do a 45 minute hike on an empty ... read more

13hrs on an overnight bus and we arrived in Rainbow beach. A nice quiet town.....but one where we felt ever-so-slightly left out - I'll explain later! The town sits on a sweeping coastline with beaches that stretch for miles - "so?", I here you say, "isn't that the whole East Coast of Australia???!!!"......Yes it is! but the difference here is the colour of the cliffs, made up of hundreds of different coloured sands....which would explain it's name then! We checked into our guesthouse and soon realised we were to be the odd ones out, and at 2pm all of the other guests were summond to a meeting......"Hhmmmm", we thought, "Why not us?"! It turns out that the beautiful little towns main purpose these days is as a base to visit "Fraser Island" - The largest sand ... read more

19th July - Jumping Sunset We got up early this morning to catch the Greyhound to Rainbow Beach. While waiting for our luggage to be unloaded, we saw Hannah (from Myella) !! So we stayed and chatted for a while until she got on her bus. Our hostel, 'Pippies' wasn't far from the Bus Stop at all. It is such a cool hostel. There are hammocks, a nice pool, the kitchin is clean, and they even have free BBQs every wednesday! We did our washing (finally!!), had lunch, then did the 30 minute walk up the hill to Carlos Sandblow to watch the sunset. It was incredible! The photos do not do it justice. The sand felt so cold but the sun was beaming down on us, casting huge shadows! People were sand tobogganing down ... read more

Having spent the night in our campervan at Hervey Bay we woke up early to make our way to Tin Can Bay so we could go and feed the dolphins that come into the bay there every morning. Unfortunately we arrived about fifteen minutes too late and only saw the one dolphin, Harmony, who is still very young and not ready to be fed by the public. Harmony's father Mystique had been fed and had already left the bay. Feeling quite disappointed that we had come all this way and not managed to feed them, we decided we would stay the night in Rainbow Beach (where we were heading next), and as it was only 20 minutes drive from Tin Can Bay, we could come back easily the following morning for a repeat performance. Rainbow beach ... read more

The further south I travel, the smaller the towns become (and Cairns wasn't exactly enormous to begin with) and the colder the nights become. Dawn arrived as I travelled on the bus and revealed large pine plantations, thick mists hung in the still, cold air and gave the forest a mysterious feeling with sunshine flickering through the misty branches. I was exhausted from my overnight journey and although I hadn't needed to spend any money on accommodation that night, I had slept very little on the bus. I spent my first day in Rainbow Beach snoozing and had an early night. If I thought that there was nothing to do in Airlie Beach, Rainbow Beach takes it down another notch. Rainbow Beach is a tiny settlement, a shopping lane about 30m long and three backpacker hostels ... read more