Day 8 - Wednesday, 2 January 2013

Early wake up today … 6.30am to pack up and leave for our Fraser Island travels. We stopped at Bundaberg for some shopping as we needed to be self-contained for 5 days. It took forever but we bought heaps of fruit and vegies and even managed to get Hannah a couple singlets from the local mall. We spent $264 at Woolies - maybe Mum thought we would get stuck on Fraser… but a competition on the UHF's shortly after proved we weren't the worst spenders!!

We filled up on petrol at Hervay Bay and travelled the short distance to River Heads to catch the ferry across to Fraser Island. Everyone (except Peter) had to reverse their trailers onto the ferry, then we were allowed on, some parents barely got their feet on the ramp before the ferry pulled away. It was a lovely boat ride with the kids enjoying all the jelly fish floating past, the different levels and of course moggie that cat!

We got to Fraser and all sprayed up as locals said the sandflies and mozzies were pretty bad. You should see all the bites Mum has already, they are huge and itchy! We aired down our tyres ready for some serious sand driving and off we headed straight across the Island. Although it was slow travelling we got to the East Coast in good time with no cars getting bogged.

It was then beach driving to our camp site up North. This was fun and we could travel faster. The inland roads had speed restrictions of 30km whereas the beach you could travel at 80km. Another competition, well deal… if we got to camp before 10pm Darren would be peeling the remainder of the prawns for dinner! But we made good time pulling into camp around 7pm, it was getting dark and we finally found our group campsite to see someone was already camping in our spot - unfortunately given the space restrictions they offered to move so by the time all was organised it was setup in the dark!

Lovely campground, green and private. The area was fenced off to keep the dingos out but the huge spiders were freaking me out! We worked out the resident spiders and had a plan for every toilet visit… walk left for the first one and walk right for the second one…

Day 9 - Thursday, 3 January 2013

This morning I thought I woke up quite early, but everyone was already up… no daylight savings up here means it gets light before 5am! We had a surprise when we woke up… Goanna! Mum was happily reading after her early morning wake up, yes 6am… bit early for Mum! When a huge Goanna came happily wandering down the tree 2m away! It was huge and freaked her out and came walking through the park - Harri was in his element! It wandered around camp for a while certainly not worried about us!

We left camp at 9am to start our Fraser adventures by driving along the beach before heading inland for our first destination which was Knifeblade Sandblow. It was a lookout to all the sand dunes. It took forever to walk there but the walk was amazing. Fraser is awesome! The vegetation is so amazing and the trees are so big. Some of the trees had vines wrapped around them and some of the fallen trees had heaps of moss on them. It looked amazing! We kept saying we couldn't believe how many times the vegetation changed along the way.

Our first stop was Lake Allom and I got bitten by something in the car park before we even got there, I think it was an ant. It burnt so bad!!! We walked down to the lake with our tubes and snorkelling gear. The lake had a deck with stairs for entry and was very inviting, even though the water looked much like coke! We jumped in and it was cold at first but then I got used to it. It was really weird because there were cold and warm patches everywhere, if you just laid flat it was so warm and relaxing. We swam around the lake adventuring with our floats for support and some snorkelled but couldn't see past their hands! When we finished we waited at the steps to see if we could see some turtles. After a couple of minutes their little heads started to pop up. They were only small but they were so cute and there were heaps of them. It was so cool! We walked back to the car for lunch and on the way we passed a sunbaking turtle on a log in the water. We had lunch and then we were on our way to Boomerang Lakes. This lake certainly didn't have the appeal of the last one so it was just a quick visit and muddy shoes for some … Hannah!

Our next stop was Garawongera Lake. There was a bit of foam at the water's edge that may have been created by the tiny waves. Our last stop, finally it was time to enjoy Eli Creek. After all the hipe about this creek and seeing it on the covers of local brochures, it really was awesome! There was a board walk that went up the creek for 400m and you laid on you boogie board (in the water) and the currents took you down the creek that joined up with the ocean. We went down twice and then played in the water. We finally got back to camp after a long day and finished with the normal procedure! This was not including happy hour which we have not been able to fit in yet!

Day 10 - Friday, 4 January 2013

This morning we were going for a drive to explore the North of Fraser Island. Before we left a baby goanna came visiting along with some of the bigger ones, just all part of the day now really! We left at 9.30am and drove along the beach to Orchid Beach where we stopped for toilet and ice-creams! We travelled west to Wathumba Creek. It was so beautiful, such nice scenery and beautiful blue, blue water. We swam there with our boogie boards and tried to stand up. I stood up but then quickly sank down to the bottom. A couple of our people in our group got stung by some mysterious thing that we think were stingers… but anyway. We had lunch and then went fishing for a little while before we left. Byrno caught a small brim but had to let it go because it was too small. Some of the kids enjoying climbing the Mangrove trees and some more swimming not being put off by stinging creatures and some even got to read a few pages!

We headed back across to Orchid Beach before heading up north to Sandy Cape. Peter jumped in with us and Mum hopped in the back with Teslyn and I. Bits of the way up were hard because you had to go over rocks and go through soft sand. We finally got to the very top of Fraser Island. The waves were really choppy and it was very windy but quite spectacular, a great wide open space of beach going out to a point. We drove around the tip so more North of the Island and it wasn't so windy and the waves had settled down. There were heaps of people camping at the top which would have been very nice compared to camping anywhere on the East coast so you would be out of the constant wind which has followed us the whole trip!

We found a giant sand dune around the corner and out the boogie boards came and we were climbing up that sand dune. It took forever and was so tiring! When we finally got up to the top we went on our boogie boards and raced down the dune. It was so fast and fun! I did it again and again. Later I just jumped down the dune, even the bigger boys had some long jumping competitions just to prove they are still champs!

We drove back to Orchid Beach and Peter collected his car. We drove through the sandy tracks until we got to Champagne Pools. We walked down to them and walked around the rocks. We saw some crabs hiding in the rocks. Later I went for a swim to join dad and Sean B (he swims anywhere!) it was amazing with the waves crashing on the outside of the naturally formed pools. It was only a short swim because it was starting to get dark. The drive back to camp was difficult in the dark and hard to find the turn offs needed so with my suggestion that we should have a light on the side, dad promptly jumped out of the car … whilst it was still rolling mind you, yes mum had to whip the hand brake on and he moved the driving light so it pointed into the bush. Finally back to camp the dark also made cooking a challenge so dead steaks it was with pasta and garlic bread… keep your eyes on the steaks Rhonda!!

Day 11 - Saturday, 5 January 2013

Early this morning it started pouring rain. I woke up but went back to sleep, very unusual for me! Today we were doing the south of Fraser Island. We drove along the beach and our timing was just right to watch some small tourist planes take off for their scenic adventures - it was really strange to have them so close to the cars driving on the beach. It was really an open highway the beach driving, sharing the road with large 4WD buses, cars and even planes - they just put up a sign that planes are in action and we just move on over.

We drove inland at Eurong and stopped for fuel and had some morning tea, don't recommend the muffins and mum said the cream bun was very ordinary and also went to the souvenir shop. We kept driving inland until we got to Lake McKenzie. We put our bathers on and then walked to the lake - it was beautiful! It was shallow then all of a sudden it went deeper. We were playing around in the lake for ages. A bit later when we were still swimming a dingo came and stole a packet of chips from someone's bag. It was quite amazing, it knew exactly what to do, it just strutted along the beach and stuck its nose into bags and pinched stuff. Now I must say all through the brochures and signs everywhere on the Island it is extremely clear not to take food away from your car especially to areas where bags will be left unattended so this was quite disappointing to see. Also this area had a large area near the car park which was fenced with tables to have lunch. The dingo soon came back and stole a Mars Bar from someone else's bag and ate it wrapper and all! Some of the kids got really upset.

We went back to have lunch, I had two sandwiches and a yoghurt … I was hungry! We hopped back into the car and went on another long drive to Lake Birrabeen. We went for a swim there but it was getting cold but we still managed some more ball throwing in the water - again another beautiful Lake. We drove the long haul back to camp, showered and ate some yummy tacos for dinner. Soon there was news of a python at the camp kitchen so we headed off with torches in hand to visit the local 2m python just happily curled up on the grass near people washing dishes, it was happy to just lay there and yawned at us. We went back to camp and jumped into bed… I was soooo tired!

Day 12 - Sunday, 6 January 2012

Today was meant to be our 'relaxing' day but we can't sit still with so much to see. We started the day with pipi collecting with Peter, he showed us how to shake our tail feathers, digging our feet into the sand on the water's edge at low tide until we felt the pipis. We also saw some beautiful and interesting sea life on the water's edge.

We had to keep moving as our days are planned (as every day is, around the tides as driving on the beach is not possible 2 hours either side of high tide and crossing Eli Creek is not possible at more times than that). First stop was at the Pinnacles - giant red/orange sand structures, we walked the short circuit, it was lovely for those who w**** shoes … some trying to hire a pair for a few minutes! Next was the official stop at Maheno Wreck - we have driven past this old ship wreck many times over the last couple days but finally got out to look and take photos.

We then stopped at Eli Creek again to boogie board down the creek a couple of times. Eli Creek was really hot and so busy, very popular spot but heaps of beach parking meant no one missed out. Even Harri with plastic wrapped around his arm was allowed to swim - this was to be his first official swim and if it got wet it would have been fine to dissolve off by itself! But it didn't and all was fine for another day. Tessie and I played in the muddy, slimy stuff at the bottom before I had to go.

Only Peter and our car took the drive along the beach and headed inland to Lake Wabby. It was a 3km return walk and we had lunch before we left. We bought our boogie boards to slide down the sand dunes and dad brought his snorkelling gear and a skim ball. After walking 500m we got to Lake Wabby lookout. Lake Wabby is a small deep lake situated on a sandblow on Fraser Island. It was amazing!! The sand dunes, the lake - I couldn't believe we were actually going to go down there! We could see all the people walking over the sand dunes and they looked ants… actually more like spiders. It only took us 20 minutes to walk there and 30 minutes to walk back. I thought it would have taken us longer, but I won't complain. Anyway, when we were nearing the end of our walk there was a sign saying no sliding, running or rolling down the sand dunes and we were really confused because that was why we brought our boards. When we finally got to Lake Wabby we understood why the sign was there … the first sand dune was literally vertical and went straight into the shallow water. We ended up going on a smaller dune that flattened out for a bit before going into the water - really like a really cool water slide! Dad videoed me on Hannah's skim board making it all the way into the water. It was so awesome! We all had a go! We swam around in the warm water and played skim ball, some tried snorkelling but couldn't see much in the green coloured water. We walked back 1.5km up hill and I counted 108 steps on the way back. Mum didn't cope very well!! This has been the best part of Fraser yet.

When we got back near camp we started fishing on the beach. We used two of Peter's surf rods and they were really long. Hannah caught a fish on her first cast. It was a dart, but it was too small so had to put it back. I also caught a fish on my first cast, it was a dart as well but a bit bigger. It was 35cm and we were going to keep it. Peter gave the fish to me to hold whilst he got the camera. I dropped the fish because it spiked me on the hand. I left it on the ground and Peter went to fill the bucket with water. As he was doing so a big wave came past the fish, I was so scared to pick up the fish and Peter was telling me to pick up the fish… I didn't pick it up! It was the fish that got away. We went back to camp, had dinner and put our tired bodies to bed.