Thursday, 9 September 2010

Self-Drive Tour of Fraser Island

In the early hours of the morning we tiptoed around the girls' apartment getting ready, then walked the 10 minute walk to Southern Cross station. From there we got the skybus to the airport, where we flew to Brisbane. At Brisbane we had a couple of hours to wait til our coach. Not able to go anywhere because of all our luggage, we both passed out asleep on the airport seats for about 2 hours, oblivious to the hustle and bustle around us.
Finally on the coach, we slept for most of the journey, and had to be woken up by the driver wandering up the aisles calling our names when it was our stop. Quite embarrassing infront of a coachload of people, but lucky that we didn't wake up hours later, hundreds of miles from our destination!
By 5pm we arrived at Rainbow beach, and it was safe to say we were fully rested. Sometimes when you're backpacking, the only real rest you get is when you're travelling from one place to the next.
We checked into our hostel, then had to get together with a group of 18 people for a briefing. This was mainly to go over the dos and don'ts, and rules in general of the next few days.

Let me explain....The only reason to ever come to Rainbow beach, or Hervey Bay, a few hours up the coast, is to use it as a departure point to get to Fraser Island, the world's largest sand island. Both towns are full of backbackers either going to, or having just come back from, this popular part of Australia.
The hostels organise everything for you - food, transport, 'accommodation', all you need to do is remember your credit card!
This trip is a 2 day and 2 night tour of the island, which stretches to 123km. The hostel takes your drivers licence details, tells you about the huge 4WD you'll be driving, give you an itinery and a map, and send you, and a group of strangers, on your way.

The next morning we had to be up at 5am to load both trucks with 9 tents, sleeping bags, 2 cookers, utensils, crates of food, all our alcohol, the small bags of our limited belongings we were allowed to take with us, and finally ourselves.


Our group was a mixture of Germans, Swedes and Danes, with a couple of Irish thrown in. And funnily enough, a guy from Romford, who we took under our wing. Also amongst our group was one of the most annoying women I've ever had the misfortune of meeting - Norma.



Norma was 66, a retired accountant, who spent 6 months at home with her husband, and 6 months travelling. She'd been almost everywhere in the world, and boy did she like telling us about it!! Don't get me wrong, travelling is one thing we all had in common, and it gives us something to talk about if ever the conversation runs dry (which lets face it, doesn't happen very often with me around)! However this old witch had an amazing ability to talk forever about herself and only herself. God forbid anyone dare tell a tale about their own travels! Not that it mattered because no doubt Norma would have been there, done that and got the souvenirs to prove it. Because of Norma, our 2 day trip on this beautiful island felt like we were being supervised by a school Headmistress.


Anyway, on day one, we were told to go to Lake MacKenzie. This lake is quite spectacular, even moreso I imagine, if we had clear blue skies, which of course, we didn't. The sky was grey and overcast, and the air was damp and muggy. The lake has the bluest water I think I've ever seen, far bluer than the sea up at the Whitsundays. The water is still and calm; it's like a small corner of paradise (or it would have been, had it not been the school holidays and therefore loads of families - with kids - everywhere).

We spent the morning here, relaxing in this beautiful part of the world. Anna and I managed to separate ourselves from the group, which was probably the best idea we had for the whole 2 days.

Following our itinery down to the minute (thanks to Norma) we left Lake MacKenzie, enjoyed a picnic lunch, then drove on to find a spot to set up camp. We drove along the beach and found a place called Happy Valley. There was a small verge that was slightly back from the beach, so as not to get washed away when the tide came in, that could fit all our tents. There was 1 tent between 3, so Anna and I immediately asked our new friend from Romford to join us, for fear of being stuck with the old witch. After my many months of camping whilst fruitpicking, I'm now an expert at putting up tents, so I had ours pitched to perfection in under a minute, so the 3 of us could sit back with an ice cold beer and watch the others struggling. This became a habit over the next 2 days, the 3 of us sitting back and watching everyone else get stuck in whilst drinking a nice refreshing beer (not so refreshing after all the ice melted and they were luke warm, but better than nothing).

After everyone was finished, we took one last drive up the beach to the Maheno wreck, a ship that was being towed from Melbourne to Japan to be used as scrap metal, before being caught in a cyclone and ending up washed up on the coast of Fraser island, before we had to head back to camp.

We were given strict instructions when we left as to what times the tide came in, and when we could drive our 4WDs. If we didn't pay attention, we'd get stuck and have to pay a fortune to get help, and also to fix the damage that the sea salt does to the engine.

And so we were stuck here, with nothing to keep us entertained aside from the droney voice of Norma, telling yet another story about herself. We opened our coolboxes and started to prepare dinner, on the tiny little table, and with the tiny little cookers that we'd been provided with. It took a long time to cook dinner for 18 very hungry backpackers. For the whole trip, meals consisted of bread, with burgers or more burgers. That's about it. For someone who doesn't eat beef, it left a lot to be desired. But it was either that or starve, so I smothered everything in ketchup and imagined I was eating something else.

There's no artificial light on Fraser island, so from about 8 o'clock onwards, we sat in darkness, with the moon and stars our only form of light, and drank beer and chatted amongst ourselves until we eventually dragged ourselves to our tents, where we slept with only a sleeping bag, nothing beneath us and no pillows.
We woke up to the sound of rain running down the side of our tents. We knew immediately that the day would be a washout. Peering out of the tent, the sea was rough, waves crashing, and was a horrible brown colour. Not that you'd ever go in the sea here as it's full of sharks. We were warned not to go anywhere near the sea, not even to dip your feet in.
Despite only being the crack of dawn, we were the last ones up. When we went to make breakfast - bread with jam - we were told that one of the cool boxes had been left open and the dingoes had got our burgers....


On our itinery for the day was Indian Head and the Champagne Pools. This was a long drive right down the other end of the island. You time it right, so that you spend most of the day there, while the tide comes in. When it goes out again, it's safe to drive back to camp.



Well, this was a huge disappointment. The rain didn't ease up in the slightest the whole day. We got to the end of the island and had to park up, then walk about an hour to Champagne Pools. Walking in soft, wet sand for that length of time is exhausting. And we were getting soaked. But we kept ourselves going by thinking about the beautiful rock pools we were soon to be coming across. Except they weren't. We got there, drenched, and climbed down the boardwalk to horrible, slimy rocks. There were no pools, just waves crashing, covering us, making it impossible to even attempt to appreciate how amazing this might look had the sun been shining. What a waste. So, after taking the obligatory photos 'here's me having a great time at Champagne Pools,' we made the dreaded trek back to our cars, where we were now stranded for about 4 hours til the tide went back out.



In that time, Anna and I mostly slept in the car, and the boys..... well the boys dug a hole.


So that was it - day 2. A total and utter washout.
We left as soon as we could to go back to camp and just started to drink straight away. It was the only thing we could do to keep ourselves occupied, except for sleeping.
The next day, feeling very hungover, we woke up last again. In fact when we got up, at 5.30am, everyone else had packed up their tents and started to load the van. Oooops! Taking our time, the 3 of us eventually took our tent down and packed up. As it was still grey and miserable, we'd all agreed that rather than attempt to cook in this weather, we would save the bacon and eggs and cook it once we got back to the hostel.
Our last stop on the itinery was Lake Wabby. We had to walk about 20 minutes to this lake, and unfortunately it wasn't really worth it. It was nothing like the first one we went to, Lake MacKenzie. But, we got in and had a dip, and 'cleaned' ourselves, as we'd had no showers since 2 days earlier. The only thing at this lake that was worth mentioning was that we saw turtles swimming in the lake. That's about it.

So on we went, homeward bound, to make the journey back to where we'd get the boat back to mainland. And of course, as we drove, the skies cleared and there was bright blue sky and beaming sunshine. Bloody typical. I mean, it had rained, really rained, non stop for 2 days. We'd had to cook under leaking tarpauline, camp in dripping tents, and trek miles along a beach, getting soaked to the bone. And while we parked up and wait for our boat to arrive, it was beautiful.

At least the last glimpse of Fraser Island I had at that moment was seeing it as it's supposed to be seen, this huge vast beach as far as the eye can see, lined with trees swaying in the sea breeze. As we waited, we saw dolphins swimming in the ocean. This was what I'd expected! Typical....

Once we got back to the hostel, the others checked into their rooms and got cleaned up. Anna, myself, and our new friend from Romford, helped ourselves to the breakfast we should have had earlier, in peace and quiet, away from yet more of Norma's tales.

That evening, when most groups would all sit together and talk about the adventures and sights of Fraser Island, the 3 of us drank what was left of the alcohol from the trip and chatted about what a let down of a trip that'd been.
Unfortunately, when you book a trip like this, there are 2 things you can't control: the weather and the people. And I can easily say we had the worst of both. We had fun and entertained ourselves, but I have to say that's one trip I need to make sure I do again one day. I'm sure it can be better than torrential rain and moany old 66 year olds.