Tin Can Bay Qld

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After delaying our visit to Tin Can Bay due to severe storms in the area, we finally packed up at Hervey Bay, and headed south. The weather was stifling on arriving at the Tin Can Bay Tourist Park, and after setting up our caravan, we headed for a cool swim in the park pool. We were up early next morning to visit the Barnacle Dolphin Centre located at the Tin Can Bay Marina.

Volunteers run the dolphin feeding, and for $10 each, you get to see the dolphins come near the boat ramp, hear a good deal of information about the dolphins and to get in the water and feed the dolphins. The dolphins are Australian Humpback Dolphins, and there are only about 1,000 of these type left. How they started coming in for feeding at Tin Can Bay occurred around fifty years ago, when an injured dolphin came near to the boat ramp, and was fed over a period of weeks by local fishermen whilst it recuperated. It left when it was healed, and brought it’s mates along in the coming weeks, and they and their offspring have been coming every day since. The volunteers do a great job, and they are very careful with the type of fish fed to the dolphins along with the amount of fish each one receives. On the day we visited, seven dolphins arrived for the meet and greet, including two young dolphin calves. One of the dolphins, Harmony, had a large chunk bitten out of her back just behind the dorsal fin, along with huge teeth marks on her side, probably from a Bull Shark, one of their major predators.

One of the older dolphins, Patch, thinks he is an eco-warrior, and each day will bring in plastic or glass bottles and hand them to a volunteer in return for a fish. His daily record is 23 pieces of marine rubbish. They balance the rubbish on their head and bring it to shore. A few years back, one of the dolphins named Mystique brought in a pair of sun glasses, but left them floating in the middle of the inlet. The volunteer refused to give Mystique a fish reward until she brought in the sunglasses. As she picked them up again, the arms of the glasses unfolded and fitted on to her head, becoming the coolest dolphin in town. The story and images went viral around the world, and Mystique (and the Barnacle Dolphin Centre) became world famous.

We spent the rest of the day in and out of the caravan park pool, due to the Queensland heat.

We headed out the next day to Rainbow Beach, the main launching pad for visiting K’Gari (Fraser Island). As we have visited the island twice, we decided not to return to the island on this trip. We first visited the Carlo Sand Blow, which lies directly above the main beach at Rainbow Beach, including the coloured sand cliffs. We enjoyed fantastic views up to K’Gari and down the beach to Double Head Point. It had been around twenty years since our last visit to Rainbow Beach, where we stayed prior to heading over to Fraser Island. The town has really changed a lot in that time, and now has quite a modern looking main street, with lots of eateries and clothes shops. While we were there, we drove down to Inskip Point to watch the Manta Ray Car Ferry (still operating after all these years), ply its trade of cars over to K’Gari and back.

After a fine lunch in Rainbow Beach, we headed down to the beach for a swim, and then walked along the beach to the coloured sand cliffs. Still pretty amazing. As we were driving back to Tin Can Bay, we started receiving weather warnings for a powerful storm approaching Tin Can Bay, Rainbow Beach and K’Gari. After having a quick dinner meal, we looked out the sky and there was this ominous cloud bank moving towards us. We ran out of the van and started winding in the caravan annexe, only to have the wind whip up and catch the annexe, snapping one of the lugs off one of the annexe struts. Fortunately the wild storm, which had already smashed Gympie, passed over us with only bouts of heavy rain. Again, we were looked after well.

During the day time whilst we were staying at Tin Can Bay, we heard constant booms and explosions. There is a military training ground just near the town, that is a live weapons firing facility. A little unnerving with the threats of conflict and actual wars taking place in Ukraine at present.

I purchased a new lug for the annexe strut in Maroochydore on our way to our next adventure.

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