Be dingo safe and keep a smile on the dial!!
Trip Start
Nov 24, 2008
1
26
92
Trip End
Apr 13, 2009
Where I stayed
Camping in our tents by the yellow top!!
Fraser Island, Queensland, Australia
Thursday, January 8, 2009
So yes we had to pack up all our gear on to our vehicles, check the food, the equipment, state of the truck etc. seemed all quite regimented (yes even with the help of Luke!) until we saw everyones mountains of alcohol stacked by the back of their truck! it was very funny, (and no surprises when most of it actually got drunk!) No joke tho, this part of the packing seemed the most important, toss the food out of the eski's and fill them with beer instead! Good thinking guys!
1. A few rules: Don't drive in the sea (you'd be surprised!)
2. Don't role the truck (ditto!)
3.Look out for the washouts! (these are little 'walls' of sand that form when the water on the hills runs down to the sea creating little streams, however some of them are bigger than others and it can be like driving this very heavy truck off an extremely high pavement, drive over them slowly if you want to avoid point 2!)
and yes they were all the rules we were given, this bunch of inexperienced 4WD drivers and they didn't even check we had licences!
So we're all packed up and we get another breifing on the the island with yet aload more of lyrical genius from Luke!
then all the drivers get their turn (and altho Steve wasn't driving he listend in too just to remind me of the finer points!!)
So all briefed, packed up, alcohol in and ready to go! EEK!
So we 'arrived alive!' and we all (convoy of 6trucks) bombed along the beach for about 5mins untill we got to a corner which is impassable in high tide, well we were under the impression it was low tide but it looked pretty high to us, but just to make sure we watched the first few trucks go through, when the tide hit them covering their wheels, we decided to take the long way round, only looking back to see if the yellow top was floating in the sea, it wasn't, they're fine, onward Team D!!
Well it turned out not quite to be the long way round but definately not the easy route, Jeannie had to check us all for concussions when we next stopped, altho for the sake of our bank balances,check that there were no head shaped holes in the roof! ........
to be continued, (it was a very full 3 days!!)
Thanks for your patience, your viewing is very important to us...... : p ok so ...........
So we survive the newly named 'Death Road!' all alot happier to see the ocean again, so we roll along, Graham taking the wheel first, a very good driver, then we hit soft sand and the wheels don't do what you want them too when you hit soft sand, apparrently its also the same when you hit ice, something you all at home could identify with more! :p hehe! So the yellow top come to a stop (needless to say we're no longer in a convoy!) So its just us, out we all get (except Graham, obviously!) and 1......2.......3.....PUSH! GO! COME ON! [chug, splurt and sand spray!] YAY!! It's going again.....HOLD UP GRAHAM WE NEED TO GET BACK IN......STOP!
So after that little hiccup, a very funny one at that!, we surge on to the first stop....LAKE McKENZIE!
Again not a very easy road to drive up and we were all very thankful that this was pre-lunch! However we happen across another hiccup, but not ours this time, another car has got stuck, blocking the road, but if you're gonna come onto Fraser Island in a 2WD Toyota what do you think will happen (she the expert over here!!) So we're all out of the truck again while the boys go push and the girls signal to other oncoming vehicles to slow down (we're all very practical!!)
Ok the silly unprepared people are free!! WOOHOO! On to Lake McKenzie! YEAH!!!
Although the story would have been funnier if something else happened, we actually made it this time!!
Lake McKenzie is absolutely gorgeous, the sand was so white and the water so clear and safe to swim in as its a fresh water!! (Mike only later told us about the freshwater snakes!)
AND........we had a visit from a Dingo! actually sniffing round our bags, we were in the lake so were quite safe but we did the recommended motions anyway!! (I think more for our entertainment! We were quite the comedians!)
SO that pretty much filled up our day!! We headed to the campsite, we say campsite it was a large sand area, so pretty much just found a suitable spot!
Tents all set up, thank goodness they were quite modern and didn't take too long to do, time to get dinner on, and as steak was on the menu (i kid you not!) the men decided to let the girls prepare the salad and sort everything out, while they played football! then like good little housewives we're to call them back to cook the steak, coz thats what men do! Also like good little house wives we packed them all off with the washing up while we drank beer, now that sounds more like it!! :) (On good authority from Steve, washing up wasn't the difficult part, it was doing it in the ocean, by moonlight, making sure nothing floated away! the girls would've went down to watch and laugh but we would have been roped into help!) What we also found out the next morning was that there are more than quite a few jelly fish around, how the boys came out unscathed we do not know, probably best they didn't know at the time tho!
Of course a round of drinking games ensued and all i'll say is remind us to tell you about the WHOOP WHOOP Glasses game!
The last notable thing about that day was that a few of us left the drinking games to the others for some peace and quiet down by the ocean, although it was cloudy(so not alot of stars which was dissapointing) everything had a dull dusky gl;ow about it and the sound of the ocean was the only domineering thing around, it was absolutely gorgeous!!
Well no need to worry about alarm clocks on this island, as soon as that sun hits your tent (roughly 5:57am) you won't be asleep much longer! if it was like a sauna or steam room id be fine, thats good for my skin, but more like an oven and we generally don't like to be cooked!
Day 2 (sorry gonna have to TBC again, we'll update everything else, then let you know when this is finished, if you still care, so sorry!!)
Ok so we sort ourselves out with brekkie, packing up the tents and the rooftop! (Some how i think we'll be experts at that by the end of the trip!)
We head to India Head, the most norhterly part that the yellow tops can get too! The weather isn't looking as great as the day before but the views are spectacular and we even saw a family of stingrays and a sea turtle(all from a great height, but still!) We had the option of goin up to the champagne pools but unfortunately the weather didn't favour our approx. hour walk so we decided to give them a miss!
So we headed back to Eli Creek, well its a creek that leads out to the sea, and thats about it, couldn't get too excited about it because it was nothing compared to McKenzie! We still walked thru the creek tho and that was an experience as everytime something hit our legs we all yelped thinking it was a snake (for the record, i was the only girl doing it and mine were definately not the loudest screams!!) I forgot to mention that i got to drive this part!! WHOOP! it didn't start too good however as Darren parked it in very soft sand, so techinically he got it stuck, not me! So everyone is out pushing, but as i was reversing and the tide was coming in i was extremely nervous about reversing a tad too far! So its all good we're on the road, i only hit one washout quite hard but it was all good! (Don't care for beach driving that much!)
We decided to eat dinner at lucnh and viceversa, so there we were, parked in the middle of the beach with our stove in the back of the truck cooking stir-fry! Oh and it was pissing it down, the rain was at such and angle that if you were behind the truck then you wouldn't know so when Graham and Lee walked round i thought they had gone in the sea! Couldn't believe the weather! Any hoo the stir-fry was delicious and our dinner was pretty uneventful-however one of the other trucks who was also cooking early not too far from us, decided to set there gas can on fire in the back of there truck and instead of just dousing it and throwing it out they started to drive, we can only assume into the sea, it was shockingly funny!(only coz it didn't happen to us!)
The rain hit pretty hard that night, which normally wouldn't be a prob, we just construct a shelter with our silver tarps and viola! Although we soon realised we were gettin more wet under the bloody - holey- thing than outside of it! Anyhoo the funniest thing about that night was our game of rounders, it was awesome considering we were using our 'shit shovel' for a bat and everytime someone needed to pay a visit, the game had to be momentarily postponed!!
Day 3
Early start yet again! The night before witnessed big talk on have omlettes for dinner, however the morning provided us with the cheese all mankey and no one being bothered to cook it so jam and bread (with sand sprinkles) again!
As it was the last day , we took it pretty easy, but headed to Lake Wabby as suggested, well we were warned it was a bit of a walk, 45 mins there and back, through rainforest and snakes and spiders were not mentioned! Most of us did it in barefoot as flip-flops were useless! We only had 20mins at the lake as we had to get back but it was still lovely to experience!
So we got back, made the ferry early, filled the van up with petrol, cleanded it all out, and we were the only group to not have lost anything!! so no extra charges!
It was an awesome trip one if the highlights in fact and i am sure i have left bits out, but if i remember them, ill right another blog!(it won't take 4 weeks this time!!)
Thanks for your patience!
