World Australia Queensland Fraser Island

Ryans around the world 08/09

Fraser Island Dec 25, 2008

Slightly fuzzy head (me not Martin…he’s far too accomplished at this drinking lark) as we have to be up at 5.45am to catch the flight to Hervey Bay. Groan. The girls are brilliant as ever, bouncing out of bed and cheerful about whatever transport we are about to put them onto. Brief flight, and then we have a 2 hour wait on the dock at Hervey Bay, waiting for the ferry over to Fraser Island. The girls and I explore what little there is to see while we wait, while Martin tries to add some more photos to the blog – painfully slow… This stretch of water is a great place for watching migrating humpback whales from July to November, so there are amazing photos everywhere. Oh well – next time.

Beautifully scenic ferry journey – for 5 minutes and then to Martin’s excitement (??!) the ferry breaks down and we limp back into port to offload onto another boat. We finally reach Fraser Island and The Kingfisher Eco Resort an hour late, and then have to wait 2 hours for our apartment. Our well behaved children are starting to be less so. Don’t blame them – they get grumpy with us and I get grumpy with the hotel manager and we finally get to our room and are reunited with our bags – so we can get our swimming togs on and get out and enjoy what’s left of the day.

Our apartment is up the hill from the hotel, has 2 bedrooms (always a relief) and has a big balcony that looks out over the rain forest. The noise from the insects is deafening. Really wonderful sound.

The next morning we have booked ourselves onto a tour of the island on 4 wheel drive coach. We have to bring the girls’ car seats as we are warned the ride is very bumpy. They’re not wrong! The island is the largest sand island in the world (the highest dune is 244 metres) and is a World Heritage Site. Outside of the resort the roads are pure sand so the going is tough. We have to move Rosie to a seat away from the window as she cracks her head against the window so hard a couple of times as the coach lurches about. Poor thing! Most of the time they giggle at the bouncing around though.

The rainforest is beautiful and it’s amazing the difference in what trees and shrubs grow in the different parts of the island. Eucalypt forests are found over most of the island, but no koalas live here. Rosie and Tara are delighted though when our guide shows us a tree where some joker has nailed a toy koala high up in the tree – that’s the sort of thing Martin would think to do!

Apparently there are around 200 dingo (wild dogs) on the island but we don’t see a whisker of one. Maybe just as well as apparently they like small children.

The whole east coast of the island is one massive length of beach – all 75 miles of it. (It’s called 75 Mile Beach…). It’s like the main highway and we race along past other 4 wheel drives, with the waves rolling up to the coach wheels. Fab! The Island is like a massive sponge and when the rain water reaches the bedrock it seeps down to sea level. This means there are lots of little creeks running down onto the beach – so we stop to paddle in one. The water is gorgeously cool and Rosie is thrilled to see a prawn!

We see a 6 seater plane sitting on the beach and our driver stops and asks if anyone wants to do a 15 minute flight. Me, me!! (Martin got to dive for a day...). Really exhilarating. No safety talk or life vest demo – the pilot just brushes the sand off my feet and starts the plane rolling along the sand before I even have my seat belt on! So lovely to be doing something spontaneous! The views are incredible. The island is beautiful and I can see the massive dunes and how they are rolling inland with the wind engulfing parts of the rain forest (they move approx. 1 metre a year). There are large inland lakes, and the view of 75 Mile Beach is breathtaking. The best bit though is flying so low over the shallow sea water that we can see stingrays in the water, and I can even see a shark in the surf! Must tell the guys not to go swimming in the sea!

Off in the coach again to see the wreck of the Maheno, which was an ex-luxury cruise ship built in 1905. It was being towed to Japan to be scrapped in 1935 when a cyclone hit and it was washed ashore. They never managed to shift it from the sand so it is now almost buried on 75 Mile Beach.

1 of the inland fresh water lakes, Lake McKenzie, is spectacularly blue with white sand and we get an hour to swim there. Gorgeous.

7.5 hours later we return to the resort - iced donuts kept the girls smiling right to the very end.

So - Christmas Eve. Very strange feeling, that you are all doing the traditional Christmas at home without us. We feel a little sad not to be with you, but it doesn't take away from the fun of our adventure. It just isn't really Christmas here. Try telling Rosie and Tara that though...

We have been counting sleeps for days, playing Christmas carols on the ipod speakers, and the girls wrote their letters to Santa today to remind him to leave the 'big' present at home for their return.

After dinner at the hotel Santa arrives to sing a few carols and then chats to the children. Rosie asks for a dog (a REAL one...), and Tara asks for a 'pink present'. When pressed she says it needs to be a pink star, as she was so upset earlier that the hotel Christmas tree didn't have a star on the top.

6am alarm call from Tara - Happy Christmas!!! Daddy sneaks into Tara's bed to sleep on with Rosie, and we finally have to wake them at 8.30 as we need to see if Santa found us! We spend the rest of the day by the pool, just chilling out, and have cheese and tomato toasties for lunch...not quite turkey and all the trimmings. We get our best frocks on for buffet dinner at the hotel and then call home to the family throughout the evening. Your Christmas Day is just getting under way and we are thinking of bed!

We miss you.

Then another early start. Our luggage is collected at 6.30am, we grab a quick breakfast then hop on the ferry at 7.40am back to the mainland for the flight from Hervey Bay to Brisbane. Really thought this was the flight we would miss (don't want to jinx us but logistics so far have been unbelievably smooth...) as we got to Hervey Bay at 8.20am, transfer 15 mins to the airport and the flight was due to leave at 9.10am! Oh well - no point stressing as at least we were on the mainland and not stranded on the island. The cab driver assures us that the flight waits for the ferry - and sure enough they do.