Fun and games on Fraser Island

HERVEY BAY, QUEENSLAND - 8th January 2009

While in Byron Bay I made a decision to properly organise my last 10 days in Australia in order to get the most out of them, and stage 1 of this was the self-guided safari tour on Fraser Island - the largest sand island in the world.

The way it works is pretty simple - a load of people book the tour with a particular hostel - in our case "Palace Adventures" - and are put into groups, who are then assigned a big 4x4 van, tents, cooking equipment, cool boxes, and basically everything you need to survive on your own for 3 days. You go shopping as a group, load up on food and bevs, and hop on the barge across from the mainland. From there, you're on your own... sort of.

With 30 of us in total, we were divided into 4 groups and, in general, stuck together for the duration of our trip. Furthermore, our prep talk back at Palace included a recommended route based on the tides - and tides play a more crucial role on vehicle transportation on Fraser Island than anywhere I've been with the notable exception of l'Île de Noirmoutier's Passage du Gois on the west coast of France. The reason? Fraser Island does not have roads. It has inland tracks that are at best bumpy, and at worst giant bogs of sandy muck that are wholly unnavigable to all but the best drivers or hardcore 4x4s. And, it has the Eastern Beach.

The Eastern Beach, a.k.a. "75 Mile Beach", is unlike any other stretch of sand you're likely to see wherever you go in Australia, or anywhere else. For one, it is 75 miles long. It never ends. You can see the horizon of sand straight ahead, but you'd have to repeat that process about about 20 times to get from end to end. Secondly, for the most part it's straight. Dead straight. The map of Fraser Island to the right doesn't lie - from Indian Head in the north-east right down to Eurong, the distance as the crow flies is identical to the distance as the 4x4 drives. Which leads nicely to the third, and most unique thing about the Eastern Beach: it is both a highway and a runway. For the four hour period that covers two hours before and after low tide, the sand of the beach is broad enough and compressed enough to allow 4x4s to cruise up and down it - and being both long and straight, it's by far the quickest way of getting anywhere. All normal highway rules apply, with one difference: you must give way to any landing aircraft...

Our trip took us first to Lake Wabby - a patch of inland freshwater that is gradually getting eaten up by an ever-expanding "sand blow" - an image that can be seen fairly well in the picture I found online to the left. Fraser Island is the primary victim from the theft of my digital camera, so this particular blog is going to be missing several of what were some of my best photos from Australia. For shame.

Like every other vehicle in this part of the world, the license plates on our 4x4s proudly declare themselves as being from "Queensland - Sunshine State". Apparently at least 300 days a year are sunny... so with sod's law being what it is were always gonna get a couple of those other 65. Light drizzle while we were swimming around in Lake Wabby wasn't too big a deal - one of the girls was soundly berated for complaining about getting wet while head deep in water. And, unlike the crappy English drizzle that forms such an integral part of our national psyche, this stuff is warm. You just lay back and imagine having a nice shower while floating in a bath!

A couple of hours later and we were setting up camp - erecting tipi-like tents, assembling BBQs, all sorts. Thanks to a tidy purchase of some high quality meat from a butcher on land, our BBQ lamb burgers and sausages were fantastic and nicely accompanied with fresh salad. Eating was followed by a solid group get-to-know-one-another session with beer and cheap wine flowing and my little iPod speaking pumping out some massive choons well into the early hours.

The inland tracks through the sandy rainforest that sprawls across the middle of the island are seriously slow progress - the you occasionally find yourself having to power the vehicle up on top of a 2 foot tree root, only to have it crash down into a 2 foot deep puddle of sandy muck on the other side, all the while descending a hill and a 30 degree gradient. Pro driving is needed, and for our group that was
Dan - a 26-year-old Swede who spent a couple of years actually working as a driver - and yours truly. Dan drove for the afternoon on day 1 and the final morning, while I had the whole of day 2; I think the best description of my stint would be "rain affected". And that would be one whopping great big understatement.

Our overnight camp had been set up to the southern end of the Eastern Beach near a famous freshwater stream called Eli Creek - famed for you ability to jump off a bridge and let the vast current of the water wash you all the way down to the sea along the sandy riverbed. However, when we arrived early morning after packing up camp, there was more than enough water thumping down from the skies to make anyone want to soak themselves in the creek - so instead we powered across it all the way up to the top of the island - the fantastic views out to the north from Indian Head, and the amazing gushing waters of the Champagne Pools. The latter was particularly unique - rocky outcrops enclose an area of sea water that - as the waves crash into the rocks as in the photo on the right - is filled with foamy, frothy bubbles à la champagne. The rocky enclosure means it is the only bit of sea around Fraser Island you are allowed to swim in - the open waters are infested with jellyfish, stingrays, sharks - and January is breeding season. The pools won't be forgotten by me for some time not just thanks to memories - they're left a lasting mark on most of my body thanks to an ill-advised decision to climb atop of the border rocks; the sea crashing down to my left, the wind and rain battering down from above. Covered in sea urchins, oysters and all sorts of damn sharp shells, the rocks are not a hospitable place to be, and I came off spectacularly worse for wear after getting wiped out my a colossal wave crashing behind me - feet, hands, arms, legs and back were all sliced and diced as I was sent crashing into the salty water, soon creating my own mini-pool of leaking red blood from every side of my body. It looked worse than it was, but by God did it sting later that day... all over.

Once the tide had gone back out over lunchtime, we bombed it back down the full length of the Eastern Beach - checking out (and generally fooling around in) the awesome iron shipwreck parked half way along the coast (don't let sunshine in the photo on the right fool you - for us it was grey skies and rain) before setting up camp in a cool little clearing just inland from the beach. More food, more drinks, more partying... a few cameo appearances from the native dingoes to keep everyone entertained - an all round classic right...

...and then it was the morning - packing up, and straight inland to Mackenzie Lake. This is the stuff dreams are made of - the pictures you see in brochures that look unreal. Blazing sunshine, white sand, clear blue fresh water. With good weather, it is a little piece of paradise surrounded by jungle in every direction - and was where all sorts of fun and games went down in the 4 hours or so we were there before departing back to the mainland. The photos on my camera were, annoyingly, rather good - but as a few of other people's have appeared on facebook, some idea can be guaged from the below.