Hello!

Though it was time for another one of these while i have five minutes! I think last time i left you i was in Noosa...with rain. Well guess what....we got more rain. After a small break in the clouds we headed to the national park to do a walk and look at the beaches, but about 30 mins in the heavens opened and it absolutely chucked it down. Even with our umbrella's (used to protect our cameras and not much else) we got drenched so had to head back! So although we could see that Noosa was a lovely place we didn't get to enjoy a lot of it.

After only the 2 nights there we got right on another coach up to Rainbow Beach. We had a slight panic we would miss our Fraser Island trip as we had a meeting to be at and the bus was late. The one time we actually needed to be somewhere at a certain time as well!! But we were only an hour and a half late and they waited for us.

Here we checked into Dingo's the hostel and hub for Fraser Island (FI) trips. It is great here. The staff are lovely, rooms are nice, there is a free bus ride up to this huge open sand dune and it is a short walk to the beach. You also get free pancakes for breakfast heehee. So after settling in we all went to our introduction meeting where we were put into teams for the trip and briefed about the trucks. Normally they send off about 50 people at a time but there was only 22 of us so 11 in each team (truck). I was in Team B with Toya and a lovely bunch of people. Team A was also great though and we all got on really well. The dude that briefed us was hilarious. Luke - was full of one liners e.g. "turn your frown upside down" "don't destroy what you came to enjoy" "Arrive alive" etc etc. It was an early start the next day to be up, packed, and full of pancakes by 7.30 so we could load the trucks. Luke was rather impressed with Team B's alcohol supply....we certainly weren't going thirsty as you can probably see from the pictures! We were very efficient though and ready to leave by 8.20 wooo! And onto the ferry and over to FI!

FI is basically a huge sand island...and boy did we get sandy. We ate, slept and wore sand for 3 days. Nobody showered, and the bushes were the toilets! Good old out back living. I had never looked forward to public toilets and fresh water lakes so much!!! The lakes themselves were amazing...soooo beautiful. Especially Lake Makenzie with white sand and clear water...the minerals even made your hair soft. Throughout the 3 days we saw a stingray at the lookout point, champagne pools, Lake Wabby, Eli Creek and the Maheno wreck (me and toya got up at 5am to watch the sun rise behind it too). Too much Goon (wine) and beer was consumed for the 6am starts but a truly awesome time.

We then got an overnight bus up here to Airlie Beach. We were supposed to be on a 3 day sailing trip around the Whitsundays on an amazing trimeran boat. But the owners stupidly changed the leaving day and only told us and the company the day before...idiots. So we had to cancel that..find some accomodation and book some day trips. All good though. Yesterday we went out sailing on a cool boat and saw Whitehaven beach. Today we went sailing to the great barrier reef and snorkelled on it and stayed on a pontoon!! Great fun and actually sunny yipee! Tomorrow we are chilling at a lagoon before we move on again.

So i will keep you posted.

TTFN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx