Australia, Day 30

Day 30, Friday, March 5 2010
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Around half past six everyone started to get up, I didn’t have a watch on me, so I relied on the rest of the group to know when I was supposed to get up. Everyone got there stuff together and then shortly past quarter to eight Cameron, our tour guide to Fraser Island, showed up in massive 4WD bus which could seat about 20 people.

Cameron took us to his headquarters where everyone hat to pay there national park fee of $18. Once this was accomplished the Cameron road to the barge which would take us to Fraser Island. The barge is situated on Inskip Point which is on peninsula north of Rainbow Beach. The trip on the barge took about 20 minutes and then we had arrived on the beautiful, 90km long beach of Fraser Island which is called 75 Mile Beach. The first thing we did was to go to the Euron resort where we would spend the night. At the resort we got tea and coffee and some muffins, which sadly were not vegan.

From the resort we drove to Central Station where we then learned about the Dingoes, and that one should not feed them, or even let them get hold of some food in any way as that would mean the dog would become a nuisance and in the end need to be put down.

At central station we then walked along Wanggoolba Creek which means Whispering Creek. Because the creeks bed is made of only sand you do not hear the creek at all, as there is no water going over stones and rocks. It was a very nice walk indeed. Halfway along the walk we came across a treee which had fallen into the path and made us stop. Thankfully a little bit of searching made us see that we could get around the tree by leaving the path going down a little slope and then on the other side climb back onto the path and carry on along it.

From central station we made our way back to the resort, where we had lunch. After lunch we got back onto the bus and headed off to the Pinnacles Colored Sands. The colored sands there are quite a view. It is said that there are over 72 shades of color. The color comes from minerals in the sand which are in different stages of bleaching and oxidation. My eyes could only cound a couple of shades. I was actually quite disappointed as I did expect more colors to exist, but the colors only varied from a dark brown to a very light yellow.

Further north we arrived at Indian Point which is a beautiful cliff up in the north from which one has a fantastic view of the ocean and the surrounding beaches going back south and still further north. We enjoyed the view for about 20 minutes, before going back to the bus and then heading down to the Maheno ship wreck.

Eli creek is probably the biggest creek on Fraser Island. There is a wooden platform which follows the creek about 80m inland and then allowing one to enter the creek there and follow it back out to the ocean. At Eli Creek there was a very skinny looking dingo looking for food. The dingo had a green tag on its ear which said that this was a problem dingo which has already been a nuisance and if further problems would arrive a ranger would tranquilise the dingo and then kill it.

Afterwards we drove on back south and arrived at the resort to check in and then eat dinner and spend the night. I turned in early, reading a book and then enjoying a couple of hours more sleep than usual.