Fraser Island (Day 10)

Anyway back to Australia.

Those of you who are good at arithmetic will notice that I have skipped a day, Day 9. The reason for this is because we spent most of the day travelling to our destination Noosa. Noosa being the departure point for our visit to the third World Heritage Site of our trip, Fraser Island. Take a look at the sign post below, it will give you an idea of just how far we had travelled from our first destination Cairns. (1700km). Although we were still in Queensland we were now in the Subtropics having passed the Tropic of Capricorn.

Although we have no photo's of Noosa we really enjoyed the evening we spent there and wished that we had a bit more time to explore the area. It is surfer's paradise by all accounts and it is not unusual to see people walking down the street, or maybe that should be dripping down the street, donning a surf board instead of a hand bag. We would learn later on, during our tour of Fraser Island, that you can even get camel rides on the beach, I kid you not!

Contrary to popular belief the next pic is not of New Zealand's South Island but Fraser Island, but to the unfamiliar eye they do look pretty similar. Fraser Island , with an area of 184,000 hectares, is the largest sand island in the world.

As if we hadn't had enough early starts in Cairns we got picked up in Noosa at 6.30 am! It was beginning to become a recurring theme. The tour was due to bring us along rainbow beach to the ferry at Inskip Point, but the tide was unfortunately not permitting. Here's a pic of us outside one of the two 4WD's, that were part of our tour group, waiting for the ferry and one from the ferry coming into Fraser Island.

We disembarked the ferry at 75 mile beach, actually 63 miles long, and headed up its length to the village of Eurong. Again depending on the tides, weather etc. the journey on the beach can be curtailed but, fortunately for us, it wasn't the case this time. The beach is officially a highway and a speed limit of 80 kmh applies. When meeting oncoming 4WD's you head for the left hand side of the "road." Unfortunately the weather was not great the day we arrived, it was raining. Here's a pic of the beach and the off road terrain that we used to head to our next destination, Central Station.




Central Station used to be just that, a central train station when lumbering was popular and allowed. The Satinay Tree was felled extensively on the island due to its properties in water, and was used in the building of the Suez Canal and the London Docks. The station is abandoned now but there are some interesting sights none the less, like the ephiphytes pictured below. (That's a plant that grows on another plant, we were to learn!).



Fraser Island is also home to another interesting animal, the Dingo. In fact due to its isolated nature Fraser Island can boast, if that's the right word, the purest form of Dingo in the world. Unfortunately due to people feeding them they have become quite aggressive and picnic areas and holiday resorts all over the island are fenced in. Here's a picture of the sign for the dingo, apparently you do the same thing as you do when you meet a Cassowary, scream your head off and flay your arms about, and again hope for the best! (Actually you stand back to back, make non aggressive gestures and slowly walk away, if that doesn't work then you scream your head off!).


From Central Station we headed on a short tramp but before we did I took a few more abstract photos.

The day was full of interesting things to see and do on the island and for that reason I will finish the post here and continue with pics from the short tramp in the next post. In case your wondering the best, in my opinion is yet to come.

Cathal