Fraser - Day II

Surprisingly we got up as early as we wanted ;-) had brekky, packed our belongings into our 4WD and went dish washing. Then we decided to head south.

Our first stop that day was Eli Creek and it was, once again, amazing. Eli Creek just leads from inside the island towards the ocean. And the coolest thing, you can just jump into eli creek and let yourself flow down the stream. Absolutely amazing.



Furthermore Eli Creek was kind of a "Party Zone". Meaning a lot of Travellers met there, listened to music and had a great time...

After some time there, we went further down south and arrived at our next parking spot. From there we had to walk for about 40 Minutes through the Forrest (saw a really big lizzard) until we reached Lake Wabby. Another beatiful spot on the biggest sand island of the world. The most impressive thing at Lake Wabby is the sand dune right next to it which is about 45 degrees steep and which provides one with a sureal view, once one climbed it. On one handside there is Lake Wabby with a very green and huge forrest behind it and on the other side, there is nothing - but sand. It really looks like one just arrived in the dessert. With one dune behind another...





After having a great time there, we walked back to our car and went to our next campside where we met another group. This time we had Pasta for dinner (once again thx to Matty boo boo) and went to bed...

Fraser Island

We had to check out at 6:30 am. Put our backpacks in a locker and met at 6:50 at the common area of the Palace hostel in order to get our instructions for the next 3 days. We saw 2 intro videos. One for driving on sand, the other for camping on Fraser Island and staying Dingo safe ("but in a case of emergency, defend yourself aggressively..";-) )...then we got to know our other group members (Leo, Alex, Erika (Germans) Matt, Joe, Adam & Michael (from the UK). And off we went to the garage where we swapped the cars and packed all necessary things in it (tents and all the other camping gear). After finishing this we went to woolworths and did some grocery shopping. After finishin shopping in time we went to the ferry and made our way to our 3 Day Fraser Island adventure.

After arriving Fraser, we stopped at the station, reduced the tire pressure and then started driving inlands...on sand. mate. what a feeling. the first part of the inland track is called "roller coaster" and it really felt like one. amaaaaaazing ;-) it really took some time for the driver to get used to the way driving on sand works. and then, all of a sudden, there was a car coming straight at us...the first really exciting part of our adventure. it was quite hard to pass the other car and not to fall over. but somehow we managed to succeed and continued our way towards our first designated aim - the beach.

About 2 hours later we arrived at the beach which is the "highway" on Fraser. So there we had the chance to go a little faster (up to 80 k's are allowed). Was quite cool to cruise on the beach so close to the ocean. After some minutes of driving along the ocean we made our first stop. At the wreck "Maheno". It's an old ship wreck, that just lies there...nice :)



Then we continued our driving on the beach and passed "colored rocks" (some rocks colored in red and white. nice!) and stopped at "indean head". We climbed up to the top of the head (matt without shoes!!! ;) ) and had a marvellous view. on the lefthand side there were some dolphins, on the right hand side you could see sharks and on the horizon there were some whales. sounds quite strange, but mate, we've seen it :) Later on we walked back to the car and waited for Matt...and waited...and waited...;)

Our last stop for this day were the "champagne pools". They weren't that cool as expected (because of low tide, I guess) but Leo and Alex went for a swim anyway. While the two where swimming at the pools the others of us were lucky enough to see another whale out at the ocean...

Then we went back to our 4WD and started looking for a camping area. On our way back on the beach we also saw our first dingo. He was really running straight onto our car and after we passed him, he started following us...strange....Mike afterwards came up with the theory that he did this, because we didn't stayed dingo safe while sitting in the car ;-)

After some more minutes we found a cool camping spot at the beach, set up our camp,

had a little barbie (thx to Matty boo boo who was a professional chef) and a nice night with a great view at the stars with no civilisation next to us...

Hervey Bay

Well. This day we arrived at Hervey Bay. And when we first entered the "city" we where slightly shocked. It's only kind of a huuuuuuuge shopping center. That's all. Nothing else to see. After arriving at the hostel and checking in, we thought of going to the beach....it took us quite a long time since there weren't any signs and after arriving we where shocked for the 2nd time. It's completely different to the nice beaches we saw before. There is simply...nothing! So we passed it quite quickly and hoped it would get better. But it didn't. So somewhen we came to the point where we arrived that morning and met, once again, our german (from eastern germany) courtesy bus driver. He told us that here in Hervey Bay there is nothing more to see. Cool ;-) So we wen't back to the hostel (where we finally got a double room instead of a dorm) and started cooking. After that we wen't to bed quite early since we had to get up early the next day...

We stayed at the "Palace" in Hervey Bay where we also booked our Fraser Island tour. The hostel wasn't that great, but ok. It has large "Units" in which are the double rooms and dorms. so there are about 15 - 20 people in one unit. That's quite a lot. The bathrooms aren't that great either. but, as I said, it's ok. As backpacker you don't expect that much ;-)

Agnes Water / Town of 1770

We arrived at 9:50 somewhere in the middle of nowhere where a shuttle bus was waiting for us. the shuttle took us to our hostel for the night. the "Southern Cross". Woooow. What a nice hostel. You've never seen anything similar before! Fantastic common area, incredible rooms (at first we didn't had a double, changed it later on) with ensuite. seperated toilet and shower, nice furnished, tidy, huge wardrobe and a great sourrunding. If it wouldn't be in the middle of nothing, it would be absolutely fantastic ;-) Oh and brekkie was included. Nice! :-) Some other cool things were the "common fridge" which could be used by everyone and the 2 incredible cool dogs. real cool guys :-)

After Brekkie we decided to do the "free tour" were some guys from the village showed us some nice views and told us what to do and where to go (of course they wanted to convince us to book some tours (which are unbelievably cheap down there at Agnes Water)). The funny thing about this tour: The guide was kind of a pirate ;-) and always finished his sentences with "Aye" :)

Then we did some grocery shopping, booked our next Greyhound via telephone, went to the beach (noisy sand!!!;-) ) found some purple stones and climbed some rocks.

Then we went back to the pick up place and waited for the shuttle. but instead of being picked up by the shuttle bus, the southern cross boss and his wife picked us up. cheers, mate :) back in the hostel we did some cooking and went to bed since we had to get up early the next day in order to catch the Greyhound.

Back out of Paradise

We got up at 5 in the morning at our DOUBLE (hehe) room on long island and went to the back beach in order to watch the sunset. Was pretty nice, and pretty early ;-)

Then we had some brekkie, checked out, stored our luggage at the counter and did a short island walk through mole island national park. had some nice views (which we thought not to be that cool at first) and then returned to the croc club and spent the rest of the day at the poolside. sunbathing, relaxing. life's nice :) In the evening we changed our clothes, took the ferry to shut harbour where we realized that the whitsunday cruising receptionist forget to gave us our tickets for the bus back to Airlie Beach. So we had to explain it to the bus driver who finally said "hop on" so we returned in time at the YHA to pick up our luggage. Afterwards we had dinner down at the oceanside with some pizza and garlic bread from Domino's and some chocolate icecream afterwards. a perfect ending for a great time here at the whitsundays :-) the day ended by hopping onto the next greyhound which left at 11:50 pm...

Heaven is a place on earth - Whitsunday Islands

Got up at 6 a.m. Brekkie at the terrace. Then packed our belongings and checked out. Stored our backpacks at the YHA's storage room and went down to the busstop. We've been picked up by the Whitsunday Cruising Bus @ 7:15 and went to the harbour where we could already see our catamaran because of its interesting color ;-)

Then we checked in at the counter and boarded "Camira" afterwards. We really got some cool places at the front of the boat where we had a great view on this beautiful and sunny day.

We were cruising around, passing some islands and being impressed by the clear, blue water when we suddenly realized that everyone was running to the front of the boat. So we stood up, looked into the direction everyone else was looking and there it was. A HUGE WHALE. Jumping out of the water and waving at us. How cool is this? Since we didn't pay for a whale watching tour, we didn't expect something like that. How amazing! Even after a few minutes of cruising the Whitsundays, it was worth everything. Man. Awesome! Unfortunately we do not have impressive pics of the whale since we weren't able to take some. Sometimes one simply can't take pics - sometimes you only have to enjoy what you're seeing.

After passing the whale, we made our way to the snorkel area where everyone got some fins, a snorkel-mask and, if wanted, a wet suit. Then a small boat brought us to the snorkel area and after getting the instruction from one of the crew members ("go, find nemo!") we snorkeled for about 15 - 20 minutes. Then we got back onto Camira and continued our way through the beautiful Whitsunday Islands. We got some food (cakes) and drinks and enjoyed living at it's best. And after lying in the sun, thinking it couldn't get better, there it was. The next highlight of this journey. THE most amazing beach I've ever seen. WHITE HAVEN BEACH.At first you could only see some white sand on the horizon. But when getting closer, the shining became brighter and brighter and you couldn't stop looking at it and feeling somehow special.

After stopping, we went through the crystal clear, turquise water onto the most beautiful beach you can imagine and spent some fantastic time there. The sand was just amazing. An unbelievable feeling.

Lying there, looking at the ocean...this should be called white heaven!

After spending some time in paradise we got back onto our $4 million yacht

and had a massive all you can eat bbq on board while cruising for some time until we reached daydream island. There we got off and changed to a ferry that brought us to our "hostel" for tonights night on Long Island.

But surprisingly it wasn't a shitty hostel like we expected it to be (called "Barefood Lodge"). It was part of a beach resort ("Croc Club") and we were allowed to use everything that was there (pool, spa, entertainment). Furthermore we only booked a dorm (was cheaper) but due to some luck we somehow got a double room without paying more. yeah! :-) What an amazing day.

If you want, you can check out the Whitsunday Pics here

Blue Lagoon

Our day to chill ;-)

Since our trip to the whitsundays was cancelled and booked for the next day, we had one day "off". so we got up late, had brekky at the terrace, did our laundry, went grocery shopping and hung out at the lagoon (which is a salt water pool, by the way).

then we went to the i-net-café and had pizza for dinner at the seaside. nice, relaxing day. almost felt like holidays ;-)