“Let’s off road!!”
14 hours south is Rainbow Beach, so called because of the multicoloured sand in it’s cliffs. It’s a tiny little village, and is the closest and nicest base to explore Fraser Island from.
Another “world’s largest”, this is a huge sand island, the only two bits of rock being the remnants of a volcano at the northern tip. Covered in green jungle, huge sand dunes (obviously) and some lakes, it’s only accessible by 4 wheel drive.
From Dingo’s, a convoy of 5 Landcrusiers set off after a number of briefings (as none of us have ever driven one before) packed full with 11 people in each. We’re carrying everything we’ll need for the next three days, including our prepacked food and menu (no shopping for us!) Not wishing to appear like I don’t actually do any work, I was put in charge of logistics (which really meant I had to climb up on the roof and cram all those boxes, tents, bags, coolers on the roof rack).
Probably the hardest drive was on the sealed road down to Iniskip Point where we catch the barge – this is because the tires are overinflated for the sand and with out top heavy cars made cornering a little scary (for the people in the back, as the first driver I was COMPLETELY confident!!)
Locking the wheel hubs, and sticking the gear into second, low range 4 wheel drive we hit the soft sand. I even managed a “Let’s offroad!” in the style of Lindsey off the Fast Show (http://comedy.peekvid.com/s3566/e46696/) . But unlike him, we never got stuck anywhere.
As soon as the boat moved, I found out from the screaming of 9 girls in the back that our handbrake wasn’t very effective as we lurched forward. Only a minor problem, really.
Today it’s grey and windy, but this makes the rough sea look even more dramatic. They were right, there really isn’t anything like driving along the beach, especially when sections of it double as a landing strip for light aircraft… After an hour we do some proper offroading down the track to Lake Mackenzie, over which the sky clears for the half hour we spend there. It’s a deep freshwater lake, crystal clear, and unlike most places in Oz didn’t appear to contain anything that could kill us.
Cutting it fine with our safe driving times, we manage to leave the beach before high tide and stop over behind a sand dune at Cornwells. Here it really rains, and our tarp/rain shelter has a lot of holes in it. Still a steak dinner later, the rain has stopped and from the large number of vans congregated here it’s a bit of a party tonight. The clouds even clear and the stars are magnificent.
Sun rise is at an unholy hour of something before 5am, and the tents become unbearable around 6.
Today is beautiful, and we hit the beach at 9.30am and head to the end of 75 mile beach to Indian Head, where we don’t see any sharks or turtles as the sea is a bit rough. It’s a long walk along the next bay to Champagne Pools, so called because the waves crashing into the warm rock pools aerate the water and make it feel like you’re sitting in a vat of bubbly. I’ll have to take their word for it, as I’m so un-rockstar like I’ve never even bathed in a bath full of Tesco Value Cava! Still it was refreshing.
We hitch a lift back to Indian Head as we’re not allowed to drive this far, and cutting it very fine again make it back to the Maheno shipwreck where we will camp tonight. Discovering that enroute our gas bottle has emptied itself (we find out later that we have just enough gas left, luckily). This combined with the fire show our cooker produces from the gas pipe we didn’t really split, honest, made cooking dinner interesting.
The Maheno is a rusted wreck beached at the high tide mark, that was lost during a cyclone in the ’30s, and used for bombing practice during WW2. The wind and waves have done the rest, and it made for some spectacular photos around sundown time. Tonight, as it’s unbeliveably nearly Christmas time, we keep most of the dingos scared away (and most people to be honest) with some festive tunes. Dancing on the beach, sometimes Irish style, to songs some in German, crazy…
Again it’s a shame it’s nearly all over, making our way back south stopping off at Eli Creek for a swim in the fast moving cold water, ice creams at Happy Valley and then finally stomping across the sand blows to the slightly whiffy Lake Wabby, before lunch and making it back to the ferry just on time (thanks to some slightly over the speed limit driving from yours truly, well you wouldn’t want to rush lunch would you?)
Another excellent adventure, and unlike some people, we all managed to get on pretty well for the three days. But whatever did happen to our missing cups, plate and two forks (the perils of doing your washing up in the ocean…)
Tags: Travel
Nick