Fraser Island

Day 58

Well... what's here at Rainbow Beach? Nothing! Obviously there's a beach, but not a lot else! Typically we spend some time at the beach, and not a lot else!

Day 59

Yup we're here for more than one day... so we don't do a lot again! At 4pm we go to see the Carlo Sand Blow though, and let me tell you – that was definitely worth the boredom!

The Carlo sand blow is a massive sand dune on the town side, ending in cliffs to the sea side. Our guide tells us the Aboriginal story of its creation, which goes something along the lines of:
There was once a beautiful woman who sang, every night, to a rainbow which came across the sea to visit her. An evil man from another tribe saw her beauty and stole her to be his slave. He had a gigantic killing boomerang, which was his pride and joy, so she was scared to run away. One day she got the courage, but running along the beach she heard the terrible boomerang chasing her, she fell on to the ground in fear and covered her head. The boomerang did not reach her though, her faithful rainbow came to rescue her, and met the killing boomerang with a terrible CRASH!. The boomerang was instantly killed, but in the process the rainbow had been broken to pieces, and lies strewn across the beach, which is what created the colours of the sand and the cliff.

Rainbow beach is so named because the sand is not only sandy coloured, but also white, red, black, orange and brown – when we were walking along it the colours would come up through the normal sand and leave swirly footprint patterns – it's beautiful! The story goes that Aborigine women bathe their hair in the sand to bring them good luck!

Anyway we spend a few hours up there, learning how to throw boomerangs, sand surfing and watching the sunset. It was a very nice evening!

Day 60

We move on to Hervey Bay today, to the nicest hostel so far (yey!) where, at dusk, thousands of massive fruit bats fly past on their way out to a nights foraging! Amazing to see, the sky literally goes black with their bodies!

Day 61

We move to a different hostel in readiness for our Fraser Island self drive 4x4 trip today – all you can eat mexican here, which is TASTY!!!

Me and Charlie go to investigate the beach today, and amongst the coral and the shells, see lots of weird patterns made up of tiny balls of sand.

Day 62

FRASER ISLAND! Part of the Great Sandy national park, this island is made entirely of sand (with rainforest growing right out of it!) and is home to the purest strain of Dingoes left.

Into our pink toyota land cruiser and off we go! Our first stop is lake Mackenzie, and it's worth looking up some pictures of it... Its absolutely stunning. Crystal clear water, not a trace of dirt, warm as a bath... really it is fantastic, if ever you get a chance to go there, take it!

Day 63

I get a go driving today, and it's great fun! Bouncing around on the sand tracks all the way down to the beach shop where 'zombie' refuses to go into 2wheel drive (naughty car!), and I let mark have a go. Beach driving looks quite difficult, the swathes of dry sand are like automatic breaks, and if you stop.... your bogged!

Luckily, or thanks to marks driving, we don't get bogged, but another group, happily beeping as the overtook us, got stuck right by us (hehehehehe). Slow and steady wins the race!

We get to the Moheno Shipwreck no worries, and take a few snappy snappys with this immense iron skeleton of a boat – no one knows how it got there, but its an absolute wreck – very impressive looking!

After that its off to indian head (a rock formation which 'looks' like an indians head...) to enjoy the view of the island and the sea (although we don't see any sharks :-( ) And then onto Champagne Pools, a set of naturally sheltered pools, where if you sit on the edge you can get sprayed by waves crashing over the rocks, just like champagne! Its gorgeous, and very very refreshing after the hot hot hot walk there!

Camping is at Eli creek, which has a year round constant temp. of 16degrees – ooo chilly!

Day 64

Wake up to some weird noises, sounds like someone's pretending there's Dingoes in our camp... Oooo there is! Right outside our tent howling at the sunrise!

It's awesome to see some Dingoes up close, and we get to see the remnants of a beautiful sunrise too (the downside being it's 5.30am of course!)

The morning is spent at lake Wabby. Not as nice as Mackenzie as the water is more like a pond and less like evian, but it's cool to swim with catfish, and Shaun has fun running down the massive sand dune to jump in!

P.s. After this trip I realised just how great showers really are!

Day 65

Back to 'Next' (the really nice hostel) today... and that's about it! I make a case for my Didjeridu, and we peruse the local book shop.

Day 66

Watch a few films, walk along the beach, look in a few shops... just nice chilled out things in this nice little town!

Mark sees the best thing though, he walked to the beach in the evening only to see 1000's and 1000's of tiny sand crabs running around! The videos make it look like the whole beach is moving! Awesome!