Treading the Tourist Trail through Fraser Island and the Whitsundays

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This severely backdated blog (it is now actually 18th May as I write this!) on what are arguably the two jewels in the crown of Australia's east coast can be blamed on a lack of reliable internet and the fact that I have been living in the far reaches of the outback for the last seven weeks or so on a constant cycle of working and boozing it up.

Travelling up the east coast has meant meeting more fellow foreign backpackers than I can possibly remember, and no matter how far up or down the coast you are, people will be frantically booking their 'FraserIslandWhitsundays' through one of the many companies offering cheap package deals to these over-visited natural wonders, whether it's 3 days camping amongst the dingoes on Fraser, or 2 nights sailing the Whitsundays on a party boat full of sunburnt, goon-guzzling Germans, Irish, Canadians, Swedes and poms like myself. But only having a limited amount of time to finish off my trip in the wake of the cyclone and prior to my relocating to the desert meant I decided to see these essential-yet-far-from-unspoilt east coast attractions by day tours.

Fraser Island is the world's largest sand island and probably one of the only destinations where 4WD vehicles full of tourists trudge through dense subtropical rainforest that grows from the sand, and stepping off the boat I was welcomed by the clearest rainbow I've ever seen. With over 100 freshwater lakes on the island, the tour guides first took us to Lake Birrabeen while the post-cyclone morning weather continued to look unpredictable, then we went for a drive on 75 mile beach but unfortunately had to miss out on the Moheno shipwreck and the champagne pools due to the damage Cyclone Hamish had done in the previous few days. The afternoon brought the highlight of the day, with the sun making an appearance and the chance to swim in the still, perfectly temperate freshwater of the amazingly picturesque Lake MacKenzie. The only possible complaint could be that the lake, like the island itself, can hardly be called a deserted paradise, with hundreds of snap-happy tourists milling about everywhere.

Leaving the island as the sun began to set to a rainbow almost as perfect as the morning one, I started to prepare for a 13 hour night coach up to Airlie Beach AKA the gateway to the Whitsundays- the 74 stunning white sand islands that would be my introduction to the Great Barrier Reef.

Lucilky the weather was perfect for a day touring the Whitsundays on the Camira sailboat, and I started a relaxing day by making some unlikely friends in a middle-aged Swedish couple who were halfway through their dive tour of Australia. Cruising around the calm, turquoise waters relaxing and getting slightly sunburnt on the crowded deck, we saw highlights such as the famous Hamilton Island resort, I got my first glimpse of the reef in the snorkelling session, and with the tour came the chance to relax on the incredible Whitehaven Beach, where tourists can even polish their jewellery in the 99.9% pure, white powdery sand. A day was easily enough to fully experience this genuine paradise, and was also enough to want to return for a holiday some day, as it's easy to see why stars like Nicole Kidman own properties on the islands.

Later leaving Airlie Beach on another painfully lengthy coach trip, this time heading for Cairns, I was happy to have had a break from the backpacker party circuit for a few days and couldn't wait to spend my remaining few days of my trip on a liveaboard dive boat on the outer Great Barrier Reef. With a couple more of the must-do's now done, I was keen to go shark-chasing and eagerly anticipating what was always going to be the true, main highlight of my east coast trip.

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