Week 3: Sunshine Coast and Fraser Island

…the adventure rolls on. With the skyscrapers, fireworks, roller coasters and small parking spaces of the Gold Coast in the rear view mirror, we rolled straight past Brisbane and onto the Sunshine Coast….where Daniel was stopped in his tracks, for, having acquired a taste for surfing on the perfect Right off Byron bay, he happened upon a new concept: STAND UP surfing.

Can’t say no to this face!
#myfirstsurfboard

…’going left’.

Obsessed by this new hobby though he was, the kids had also become totally hooked by the show 4WDAction, with Shauno and Graham household names for us….and so the kids were very aware what was up next: Fraser Island.

We picked up my mum (Grandma Sue-Sue) in Hervey Bay, drove our not-long-out-of-the-showroom Landcruiser onto the ferry , and were on our way.

Captain Ga-Ga

No real view on what we were doing, and certainly no 4WD experience other than that imparted by Shauno and Graham (‘needs a bit of right boot’, 4WDAction.com) we were straight into these fabulous soft sandy tracks winding through pristine rainforest.

It takes nearly an hour to cross from one side to the other, with the kids and adults alike grinning from ear to ear the whole way…and then suddenly you burst out onto 75 mile beach:

Time to put that leather interior with walnut inlay and optional moon roof through its paces:

King off the road.
That’s a good looking rig!

So enamoured with this new concept of driving on a beach, before we had time to stop and think we had done two hours, and had made it all the way to the end and beyond 75mile beach. With the tide coming in and the sun going down, regretfully we had to turn around, with lightening stops at the Maheno:

…and then the spectacular Eli Creek. Very hard to get the kids away from this place. Impending darkness and a high tide encroaching on the ‘road’ forced our hand.

Celestial movements now concluding the day to be over, a dash to the car for some emergency driving back down the beach, with waves and Dingoes nipping at our wheels, and a brief storm hammering us from above.

Phew! Day 2: Having spent an entire day 1 hammering up and down 75mile beach at 80km per hour, day 2 was a change of pace as we set out to explore the interior. For the green thumbs, Central Station has the most impressive Staghorns I have ever seen.

It also has the most pristine river that you can barley make it out, never mind photograph it.

Then there are the lakes:

Why no waves???
With Grandmother Sue-Sue

Lake Wabby (day 4) would have to be my pick of the bunch. The island was largely deserted almost the whole trip. Wabby was completely deserted.

Again, this place is almost beyond words. So clean, so beautiful, so completely remote and deserted….and soo much fun! With sand and salt in every crevice, sore cheeks from smiling so much and a head full of great memories, it was time for a final cocktail, then back on the boat to reunite with our van. Thank you Fraser – outstanding.