Day 68: Fraser Island

For those who don’t know about Fraser Island, it is a large sand island (about 100 km long and about 40 wide) just off Hervey Bay (north of Brisbane) that is covered with rainforest and has an eighty mile long beach on the ocean side.  You need to catch a ferry to get there, and whilst it is definitely a tourist attraction, it is not overly commercialized, mainly because it caters mostly to the four wheel drivers, serious campers and the Aussie tourist trade instead of the overseas market.  We decided that this would be our last big adventure on long service leave, and it was the perfect exclamation point to a wonderful ten weeks – full of beauty, excitement and adventure (without being overwhelmed by overseas tourists).

We were up bright and early and waiting for the 8.30 am ferry over – the weather is variable – which is a nice way of saying that rain squalls come from time to time and it is on the ‘cold side’.  Not to be deterred we enjoyed the sporadic sunshine on the very calm 40 minute trip across to the island, drove off the ferry straight into the deepest sand I have seen for a very long time (Rich was in his element of course).  The idea was to drive up over the island width wise, check out some spots along the way (a fresh water lake, a place called Central Point) and then down the other side to the ocean side beach along which you can drive for the full eighty kilometers.

 Well, Rich is a fantastic driver – we only got stuck once – and some lovely people behind helped us extricate ourselves - our vehicle is a smaller type of four wheel drive and the sand tracks are very deep on either side of the middle bit, so it is easy to get ‘tummy stuck’… high and dry in the middle with wheels spinning on either side.  Our little car was valiant and there were numerous times it would be thrown around from side to side, with Rich wrestling the wheel and me squeaking with my hands over my eyes – okay, I know, another area where I am a complete woos!  To start with, we took an hour to drive about fifteen kilometers, and after we got stuck, Rich got wiser and drove with the wheels on the middle sand when it was deep, and this made all the difference! (Except to my squeaking of course!)

It was great fun – even I will admit – relatively safe really because all you are dealing with is soft and very deep sand.  At the top, Central Point Station, we went for a bit of a walk along the creek and were absolutely stunned at the clarity of the water – in fact you will see from the photos that you can be tricked into thinking it is a dry river because the water is so clear you can’t even see it.  Also it was pointed out to us that as it flows almost exclusively over sand it is silent – and indeed it was!  The trees too were absolutely stunning – huge, straight and so very impressive.  

Along this creek was a type of fern only known previously in fossils and that uses just water pressure in its tissues to hold it up (i.e. no woody fibre at all – if it has no water it falls over).

From there it was down to the beach which was an education all in itself.  Apparently the police actually speed trap on the beach – we have decided that Queensland drivers are the worst in Australia – they drive fast and dangerously and being able to drive on the beach invites the best of the worst!  The speed limit in the bush is 30 km/hr which you would struggle to exceed, but on the beach it is 80 km/hr which is quite easy to exceed. If the cars and four wheel drive busses were not enough, we came across two airplanes that took off along the beach too!  Wow!  That was unexpected.  By this time the weather had deteriorated significantly, so we picnicked in the car, took a short, wet walk down and in another beautiful little river, and finally started back for the ferry again.

The trip home was much quicker, due no doubt to Rich’s more aggressive driving and we finished up with a lovely coffee at the jetty whilst waiting for the ferry.  All in all a wonderful ‘last adventure’ to end our wonderful long service leave.

Tomorrow we start the ‘dash for home’.  Over 2,000 kilometers in three days – sounds like fun hey!

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