The photo I've posted here shows the state of the "roads" we were travelling back to the lodge on yesterday, what a mess!
We spent pretty much all of today travelling. I had been warned about it though, so I made sure I squeezed in a quick run before leaving Fraser Island this morning. It was still drizzling when I woke up, but seemed to be brightening up a little. There's a walking track through the rainforest that begins just along the road from our wilderness lodge. In one direction, it leads to a creek, which I'm sure would have been a great track to take, but it involved going out of the dingo fence so I gave that a miss! People are rarely attacked by dingos but all the warning signs around have scared me off. The track I did take wound gradually down a steep slope for no more than a kilometre and then out to the beach and along a jetty, so I just went down and back up four or five times, watching out for snakes and leeches along the way. It felt like really hard work due to the humidity, but I was just grateful to be getting some fresh(ish) air.
We then got a shuttle to the jetty, a ferry, two buses, a (very slow and delayed) train and then another bus, finally arriving at Emu Park at 9pm. It was a crazy day, although I suppose I should be grateful that I didn't have to organise anything myself, just follow the group. A petition was sent down the train by some fellow passengers who were disgusted at Queensland Rail - it turned out that although we were aware that the train would have to go slower due to a recent derailment, most others hadn't been informed and were very angry about it.
Tonight was supposed to be the most "memorable" night of the trip, sleeping under the stars in a swag at a cattle station. We were all dreading it as the rain was torrential again, I've never seen anything like it. However, this cloud certainly had a silver lining: the cattle station was flooded so we were taken to Emu Hostel and Backpackers Resort instead, where we had the nicest accomodation of the whole trip! No bunk beds, only four people per room with a balcony overlooking the pool and an ensuite bathroom (and millions of mini jumping frogs but we've managed to keep them out of the room so far!) They even did a big barbecue for us when we arrived and the owner is one of the most hospitable people I've met on my travels. We are very pleased to be out of the rain and in some very comfortable accomodation, even if we do have to leave at 7.30 in the morning...