Fraser Island

The east coast of Aus was starting to feel a little 2-dimensional, as if in contrast to the Northern Territory and Central Outback, the east coast had lost touch with its spiritual side. All sun, surf and sand does not a cultured traveller make...or something. Fraser Island with more sand than the Sahara and incredible (if not scary) wildlife changed that perception.

After a 12 hour sleeper coach we arrived in Hervey Bay which is famous for whales and elderly people. Apart from that there were few differences between Airlie Beach and Hervey Bay but at least we fitted in slightly better with the oldies than the schoolies! Checking into the hotel-like YHA Colonial Resort, we met up with Therese and Afra whom we had met on the dive boat in Cairns. After a night we dragged ourselves away from the paradise of the colonial cabins and checked reluctantly into a night at the free hostel. Yuck was not the word and we spent most of the night fending off cockroaches in 31 degrees.

The briefing for our Fraser Island self-drive tour was littered with warnings of shark-infested waters, poisonous spiders, killer snakes, deadly currents and vicious March Flies - it's a wonder any Aussies make it past adolescence! The group of 33 had to split down into groups of 11 and we surveyed the remaining 28 with horror as we recalled the fervent warning from a previous group. Effectively, you are with complete strangers in a 4WD vehicle, the type of which most people have never driven let alone on sand, on a remote island populated with more things that could kill you than if you were...um...on an island with more things that could kill you on (for want of a decent comparison). Anyway, you get the gist, the potential for disaster is high. This poor group shared their experience with a psycho who almost rolled the van, punched one of the girls and pulled clumps of hair from one of the lads. They slept with knives and axes whilst they were on the island. So it was with care that the five of us chose our fellow travelling companions for the following three days. Our strategy? Avoid the loud bunch of girls and group of 'shirtless' single lads - we are nothing if not suckers for stereo-typing. Mission achieved, we ended up with a mix of sensible looking English, German, South Korean, Canadians and the Swedish Therese and Afra. We figured that the 3 of us plus Therese and Afra would place us in the majority anyway.

Pooling our money we did a group shop, packed the gear on the roof and drove to the supermarket. We're off! On no we're not. Within 5 minutes, we were pulled over by the police for driving too fast around a roundabout. After a slap on the wrists we drove (slowly) to the ferry that would take us to Fraser Island, World Heritage Park.

Once on Fraser, Lucy, Steve and Beth took it in turns to drive through the trees on the sandy roads and along the beach (which not only became a road but unusually also a landing strip for planes). The driving was brilliant fun because to avoid getting bogged down, we had to floor the accelerator - Colin McRae, eat your heart out! Our first stop was Basin Lake, a stunning secluded stretch of blue water surrounded by golden sand. It made a pleasant change to swim in fresh water, so pure we could slurp what we wanted...hoping that the person next to us wasn't attending to the call of nature at the time of course. From there, we drove for 2 hours to get to our first night camping spot. Angling the tents on the beach so we could see the sea in the morning we established a roaring campfire. Five tinnies and a huge BBQ later, we settled into our absolute-beach front home for the night.

At 5am, our group awoke and had packed camp by 6am to head up to Indian Head, much to the other groups annoyance. They had been drinking half the night and seemed determined to see Fraser Island through beer goggles which seems such a shame when the experience was more than fantastic sober. They got their revenge however when they watched us push the 4WD from the sand for 55 minutes. Better than aerobics we rationalised. Finally making it to Indian Head by 7am, we ambled up 178m for the most fabulous views out to sea and across the coast. The point is known for its early morning glimpses of the Tiger Sharks that breed here and other marine life such as turtles, rays and dolphins. It was an ominous moment when we saw the black shape zig-zagging beneath the shallows and the tell-tale fin just potruding the surface and we feared for the turtles and manta rays but they are obviously savvy to the dangers and soon scarpered. We then walked for an hour up the beach to swim in the champagne pools, so named because of the sea water bubbling over the rocks that double as protection for swimmers from marine life and currents. Back in the 4WD we headed to Lake Wabby where we really get a sense of the huge expanse of sand that constitutes Fraser Island. Huge dunes frame Lake Wabby and made for great races down the banks into the fresh water. They also made for great photos and Lucy, Beth and Therese spent a happy hour doing Charlie's Angels impressions off them. Steve suspected that sun stroke had perhaps got the better of them.

We spent another evening around the fire and chasing dingoes from the campsite. As dingoes are likely to attack anything they see that is smaller than them, girls had to go to the toilet in groups so they didn't become Dingo victims when they knelt down to relieve themselves. A strange experience sharing such a personal act with another 10 strangers and, not for the first time, women around the camp were heard to mutter that men had life so easy.

The next morning saw an early start to the highlight of Fraser Island - Lake McKenzie - a very beautiful setting and rivals any picture of tropical paradise. The fresh water is graded in three tones from clear to turquoise to a deep blue. The sand is so white and actually contains silica providing exfoliation properties. The water soon turned murky though, after 33 grubby backpackers started scrubbing months of ingrained dirt from their bodies!

Fraser Island rescued the East Coast (south of Cairns) for us from the surf and sun culture and it was a truly amazing experience to see such vast plains of sands and so many animals like goannas and dingoes in their natural environment. We could have almost been in a David Attenborough documentary.