'Off the road, KILL THE LIGHTS!'

  Fraser Island, Australia
Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Fraser Island sits just about ten clicks off the mainland and is composed purely of sand which has been swept up over thousands of years from lower down the coast. In fact famously it is the largest sand island in the world and has zero sealed roads, so as Molly is not exactly equipped for off-road terrain we left her behind at the car rental yard and hired a meaty Land Rover Defender. We had two days to explore the 123km long island so caught the 7am ferry over and on landing uttered the immortal words into the imaginary camera just outside the drivers window "LETS OFF ROAD".
As it was my first foray into 4 wheel driving, Nicholas took the first stint and we started forward, piercing the dense, tall rainforest on the single track, bearing towards the centre where there are a number of freshwater lakes to swim in. Once behind the wheel I quickly came to understand the nature of the beast. You must leave behind most of your on-road training experience, along with any notion of conventional driving. Trying to drive on constantly shifting, deeply rutted bone dry sand is a little more abstract. At first you panic because you feel like the vehicle is out of control, the back end is all over the place and the occupants are all bouncing around the cabin like ping pong balls as the car lurches from one trench to the next, but then you learn that as long as you keep momentum and your nerve, remember that the concept of 'control' is relative and the sand becomes your friend. It's like an enormous interactive roller coaster ride! Seriously good fun, flying round the corners out of control, continually over adjusting to avoid skidding into the trees and throttling up for the bone shaking straights. The vehicles themselves are amazing, they can handle anything and it urges you onwards with gusto.
At length we came to a sign for Lake Birrabeen, spun off down the track, and ground to a halt. We came through the trees and beheld a special sight. The 3 mile square lake is fringed with the ever present ancient rainforest and shored with perfect bleached white sands. The crystal clear water begins as a light turquoise in the shallows and as it deepens changes to azure, navy and dark blue in a captivating series of steady grades. It's like being in your own ideal swimming pool, the sun refracting the patterns of the ripples in a mad tapestry on the pristine sand, and Kerry and I liked it so much we decided to swim across it. So enthusiastic we were that it was only when we reached half way that we became suddenly paranoid about the possible proximity of fresh water crocs. So every small crest where the light wind caught the water became a croc nose breaching the waterline and we swam in a slightly more panicked way the last few hundred metres. It was a georgous swim though and we dragged ourselves out the other side and walked back round along the deserted sands through the sparse reeds, exulting in the unspoilt beauty of the place.

Laje Birabeen #2

We got out of the fierce sun and back in the Defender driving through the forest for a couple more hours and stopping for lunch at another stunning lake. We talked about how strange it was that the island was made completely of sand but there was so much forest and creatures like Dingos had inhabited the island in such large numbers. We really couldn't see them swimming from the mainland!
So we did pretty well with the driving and Nick and I had a lot of fun bouncing around the place until we came across another vehicle heading the opposite way which had become stuck in the deep dry sand. We tried to tow them out and, you guessed it, got dug in ourselves. It took another bloke in a small but powerful jeep to extricate us and we made it down onto the only proper highway on the island, the beach.
The 95km beach runs all the way down the Eastern side of the island and is the easiest way of traversing up and down. It actually is regarded as a highway by the government and holds a 80kph speed limit. It also doubles as a runway and you must always be wary in case you you are on the flight path of small planes landing. It's a different driving experience again. You can go faster because the sand is not as deep or dry but there are new dangers. Freshwater creeks that run into the sea at regular intervals are hard to judge and may be up to 2 metres deep. The vehicles are good but not that good as I discovered when we launched into a less than shallow one and were catapulted out of the other side by the powerful back wheels.

Thankfully we chose the accomodation option instead of camping and slept in a hotel room. The morning after we drove 32km straight up the beach, took a look at some interesting sand formations called the Pinnacles along with the awesome Maheno Shipwreck.
There is an eerie, haunted atmosphere surrounding the wreck as it squats resolutely on the sands facing inland. However this is unjustified not only on scientific but also on a factual basis as when it ran aground in 1935 as it was being towed as scrap metal to Tokyo, not one person was harmed.
It is the feeling that we lay over it that makes it so enigmatic but it's just as compelling nontheless. We spent an hour snapping away and taking in the rusted, barnacle encrusted gnarliness of it. Amazingly 70 years after it's demise, some of the wooden decking still remains. Wow.
We continued onwards to one of the largest Creeks, Eli, and walked inland so we could let the current take us back to the sea crawling and floating like otters in the shallows glancing up through the reeds.
We drove inland to take a squiz at the largest lake: Mackenzie which looks a lot like Birrabeen but it was overcast and became cool so we drove to the ferry terminal and waited for our transport to the mainland.
It was a thoroughly enjoyable trip if not only for the driving which I was well impressed with. We stayed a couple more nights in Hervey Bay, sunbathing and eating, and then pushed North towards Rockhampton.