Fraser

Well, eventually, i left Brisbane, and headed towards Rainbow beach, in order to get my fraser trip on its way.
This meant waking up at 6am to get a bus, which as you might understand, ain't one of my favorite things to do, but as you see, i'm willing to sacrifice my well being and my sleeping hours so you'll be able to have something to read :)
Once i reached Rainbow beach i was happy to discover that the backpacker place is about 26 steps from the bus station (and if it isn't, just shoot me). Checked in, saw a movie about Fraser island, some basic security things (don't feed the dingos, don't sleep with the fishes, don't get the 4x4 in deep sea water ... you get the point), and then they split us to groups of 10-11 people per group.
Our group consisted of: 7 swedish (4 girls, 3 guys), an english couple and your humble servant. This is where some dark foreboding sensation began to creep in on me. I know what you'll say. 4 Swedish chicks, you can't complain. Well ... unfortunately, i can, i am, and i was right, as you'll see.
Once we got together, we gave them our credit cards, "just in case" something happens to the cars, and then we headed to the bottle shop to get some beers, wine and supplies for the trip.
We had a 5$ dinner, and headed to sleep rather early, since the next day started at 7 am.

Day 1:
7 am wakeup & breakfast. Now, let me tell you about breakfast. It consisted of pancakes. I had one with sugar, and one with peanut butter. Then i discovered another weird and interesting thing about different cultures. It seems they eat their pancakes with lemon juice and sugar!. I was shocked at first, but after eating crickets, maggots, kangaroo and crocodile, some lemon and sugar would not stop me. It is good :) .
The weather was shitty. It was overcast and raining, and this is how we got our briefing near the cars, and packed them. At least the weather isn't cold.
Once we were done, we headed out towards the island. Since karma tends to throw me in the line of fire, i was the first to drive. The drive to the island wasn't much of a story, besides the fact it was on the wrong side, according to the best down under tradition of driving. Then we got to the ferry. 7 minutes on the ferry, and we're on fraser.
We had to drive some 20km on quite a bumpy road since the tide was high, but eventually we recahed the beach.
Driving north, on a narrow strip of sand that disappears in the rainy horizon, a sand wall on our left, and a choppy sea, grey and green and white, on our right.
It's quite the experience.
Our first stop was Lake McKenzie. We're speaking of an amazing sweet water lake, deep blue in the center, turquoise near the shore, surrounded by white sandy shores, and a grin forest around it.
The water was amazingly clear, and we ran into the lake oblivious of the rain. The only thing i regret, is not having my scubadiving mask with me.
Once we finished, we had something to eat, and then headed north again, in order to find the aboriginal camp. A couple of hours later, and after running in circles over and over because it wasn't were it was marked on our map, we managed to find someone who knew where it was, and discovered it was some mere 500 meters to the south from the place we seached.
It was getting dark, still raining a bit, so we got there, late, and got a lousy camping place since all the good ones were busy, and everybody else was already preparing dinner in the good spots.
We set camp, and went to prepare dinner. This is when the dark foreboding feeling from the previous day started to manifest. The swedish were to busy speaking swedish between themselves, and some the girls were acting like true jewish princesses. So, i took charge, cut the salad, prepared the potatoe salad, and they managed to get the steaks done.
Dinner was quite nice but rather noise, since all the other groups were drinking and chatting and playing the aboriginal instruments (well, they were actually just making loud annoying noises).
The next few hours passed drinking beer, wine, finding a poisonous snake which was killed by the aboriginals, and chatting to random people in the camp. I planned to go to sleep early, and ended up staying late, drinking and learning yet another useless phrase in German, but it was quite a funny night all in all.
When i got back to the tent, i was informed by my english partners, that even though we paid for sleeping bags, it seems one of the swedish said he paid for one and didn't get one, so he just came in, took mine, and went to sleep. I was too tired to fight about it, so i told him he can have it tonight, but i'm having it tomorrow, and just crashed on the tent's floor and fell asleep eventually.

Day 2:
Late start, the swedish were busy being slow and unuseful, so i ended up doing the the dishes, helped by 2 nice english girls that wondered where the rest of my group was. I told them there is no "group" in "I", and then helped them do their dishes.

In the meanwhile, the rest of the group managed to get a start on breakfast, and this and the fact that some blue patches appeared in the sky, warmed us a bit.

We left camp around 10am, instead of 8 as planned, and headed north, toward Indian Head. The swedish continued speaking swedish, so i just plugged my mp3 player, and started ignoring them.

On the way up to Indian head, my hat flew off, and i had to heroically perform a rugby jump and tackle to save it.

Then my flip flop broke up, so i had to continue barefoot. On the way back, my hat flew off again, this time over the edge of the cliff. Yes, i know, some of you are jumping up and down, filled with joy, thanking some gods, and throwing candy in every direction. I was even admiting that karma was dealing me a tough handw and made peace with the fact it's gone. But then, since we learned that we can't leave the injured in the battlefield, i went on a brave rescue mission, and got it back :).

In case you think this is where the bad luck ended, you're wrong, since i managed to loose one of the headphones tops on the way down too.

So, even thought the sun was out, and the day was better than the previous one, my mood was as foul as the wind that blew that day.

We headed toward Wabbi lake next. Once we reached the parking, we decided to have something quick to eat, and got the wrappes and the cold meat out. For a moment, i saw the girls in the car chopping up vegies, and thought that finally they got the team spirit right, and started helping, just to realize that it was every man to himself, and they got their food, and proceeded to eat, instead of preparing more for the rest.

The english couple and myself had enough, so we got some food, told them we'll meet them later, and headed up leaving them to waste their time as they saw fit. The funny thing is that they got to the lake the same time as us. I'm still trying to figure out how that happened.

Lake wabbi. Another amazing lake, totally different from the previous. This one was nested between yellow sand dunes, and it was green instead of blue. We hanged around for an hour or so, untill the setting sun and the need to find someplace to camp at night drove us out. We - and here it was the english and me, being fed up with the slow decisions of the swedish, and the waste of time - decided where we'll camp, and sat in the front and drove there.

When we got there, it was dark. Pitch black, like a half moon clouded night in the middle of a forest can be. We set camp, cooked dinner, had to hear the swedish chatting in swedish again, and headed to sleep early, since we had no lights, and no mood. This night, i had my sleeping bag, and a whole tent to myself, since two swedish decided to sleep in the car. Thank god for small mercies.



Day 3:

Some assertive help, and we left camp early for a change. We headed back to Lake McKenzi, had a quick breakfast, and hit the water again. This time, the sky was mainly blue, and the sun was out most of the time. We gave up on the swedish, and hanged out by ourselves, not caring anymore.

We left the lake late, since the swedish said we can be 40 minutes late anyways. I had to get them moving so we'll be on time even with those 40 minutes, and we ended getting there on the last moment, after getting into rather deep sea water since the tide was up by the time we got there.

The rest of the day was used for washing my clothes, dinner, speaking with the english couple and packing my stuff.

All of the sudden, around 9, one of the swedish girls came into the room, saying they were looking for us for ages, and if we don't mind giving them our cameras, so they can have our pictures, especially my pictures (i showed them some good pictures of their group i took on the lake on the way back).

Interesting i thought to myself. You don't have the decency of speaking english most of the travel, nor trying to make us feel part of the group, but suddenly you want our pictures?

I took their emails, and sent them some of the pictures today, along with a mail about what i thought about their behavior (I wonder if they'll answer).

Gladly, i got rid of some of my stuff i was carrying around, and ended up sitting with them once i finished packing. They still spoke swedish, up until the last half hour, in which we spoke about movies.

Went to sleep around 2am, to wake at 7am again to head south to Noosa.

So, as you can see, i'm quite short on sleeping hours, but, like the french will say "C'est la vie".



Well, i'm sure most of you died during the reading of this post, but for the few who managed to get this far, you can see some pictures from the Fraser trip here .



Also, you can have a look at this link, for some funny stuff about the english language :)



I'm out, need to get some food, and finish my book. I hope to have good weather tomorrow so i can go hiking in the parks in the area.

I have some more things to write about fraser, but i'll do it in the future, if i'll have the time and be in the right mood :) .