One Fish...Two Fish...

Hello all!

As many of you know I have just returned to Sydney from my 10 day 'spring break' adventure in northern Queensland, Australia's tropics. I arrived back in Sydney safe and sound, though my extreme adventure trip provided many occasions when this may have not turned out so...

My trip started in Brisbane, a one-and-a-half hour flight north from Sydney, ten days ago. Sean, Steph, Richie and I (the Marist group here in Sydney) arrived in Brisbane the night before we were to meet up with our Extreme Adventure Tour group. We arrived in Brisbane at 10 p.m in the evening and hit the sacks right away in our hostel for the night. We had a very early meeting time at the Brisbane coach terminal to meet the group the following monrning.

Day One:

7 a.m arrived and we made our way to the coach terminal via the free shuttle bus from our hostel. Unfortunately this 15 minute shuttle bus ride was the only opportunity we had to get a very brief glimpse of Brisbane, a famous Australian city in its own right. I must go back some day; I did not feel too upset about missing out on Brisbane since some even spectacular places awaited us.

When we got to the coach terminal in Brisbane we met our tour group: 60 kids, all pretty much Americans studying abroad at various places throughout Australia! I had not expected our group to be so large, and at first was a little dissapointed. How were we going to see all we had to see in ten days when we would constantly have to wait for 60 people to get their act together each morning. However, to my great surprise and relief, the trip ran incredibly smoothly, and if anything, the larger group added to my amazing experiences.

Our two tour guides for the trip came and met us at the terminal, then led us to our bus for the trip. The guides, after introducing themselves as 'Doggie' and 'Baz', introduced the 61st member of our group for the trip: a blow-up kangaroo that was to accompany us on all our endeavours on the trip. Indeed, we were not to go anywhere or do any of our activities without taking him along. After he had been passed around the bus, signed, drawn on, and christened 'Wangaroo', our trip finally began.

First stop: the Australia Zoo.

It was only an hour drive to the Australia Zoo, home of the Croc Hunter Steve Irwin. As our entire trip ran on a very tight schedule, we had only two hours to walk around and explore Australia's most famous zoo. So we had to prioritize: we made a bee line for the 'Crocosueum', designed and built by Stevo himself to showcase his favorites: the crocs!

Crikey! The show, during which Steve's partners exhibited the crocs and fed them, was very cool. After checking out the crocs, we headed in to the free-range paddock, home of the 'roos and the emus.

All Australian zoos are very open, lots of space, and most zoos here have these 'walkabout' paddocks in which zoo visitors can just walk around with the animals, pet them, pose with them, etc.

Very cool experience. But watch out for that renegade emu! Foreign visitors absolutely love the 'roos and emus, but Australians generally hate them: apparently they are like a plague here, and so Australians try everything possible to thin the population of both animals. And so, they eat them. In fact, Australia is the only country in the world that eats the animals depicted on its coat of arms. Hmm...

We saw many more cool animals but before we knew it, it was time to hop on the bus again and head out to our next and final destination for the day: Hervey Bay.

Hervey Bay is a beautiful coastal town, well-known as the gateway to Fraser Island. This was to be our destination the following day. But first, the Booze Cruise! Our tour had arranged for our group to have a BBQ dinner and open bar extravaganza on a privately chartered cruise boat for the evening, during which we would roam around Hervey Bay's famous waters. The weather unfortunately was a bit chilly but nothing could but a damper on our fun that night at getting to know the other kids on the tour. Awesome night! The cruise was over too soon, but we had to head back to our hostel for the night; another early morning awaited us the next day!

Day Two:

7 a.m. and 60 hung-over kids have already eaten breakfast, put on sun screen, packed their bags and boarded the bus to the Hervey Bay marina. We may not have been smiling or even had our eyes all the way open, but we did it!

At the marina we boarded a ferry that took us to Fraser Island, the largest sand island in the world, and home to the beautiful Lake MacKenzie and the world's only rainforest growing entirely out of sand! To see all this we boarded multiple smaller, 4WD buses that were to take us around the island for the day. Once on the bus, we were informed by our driver and tour guide for the day that seatbelts were not an option: they were mandatory. Now all bus drivers tell you this, but no one really heeds their advice. Well, those who did not buckle up when this diver first told us to did so after about a minute once we got underway: suddenly we found ourself riding a roller-coaster!

There are no paved roads on Fraser Island: you drive through, over and on sand. The ride was unbelievable. One minute we were on a sand beach, crusing along the water's edge at 100km/h, other vehicles passing us in the opposite direction going the same speed, the next minute we were in the heart of a rainforest! I have never seen such diversity in such a small radius. Absolutely unbelievable.

The highlights of Fraser Island day were definitely cruising along the beach highway, checking out the famous shipwreck of the SS. Maheno, going on a guided tour through the Jurassic Park-like rainforest, and finally, chilling for a while on the white sand beach of Lake MacKenzie. What an unbelieavable day!

After our Fraser Island day tour we made our way back to the mainland via Hervey Bay. There we boarded our bus that was to be our beds for the night: we faced our longest bus ride for the trip, a 12 hour overnight bus ride to get to Airlie Beach early the next morning.

The bus ride was of course torturous... (yes, that is a bag of wine, chadeaux de cardboard if you will, or a 'Goon Sack' as we like to call them in OZ...much like Wangaroo the Goon Sacks accompanied us everywhere on this trip)

Day Three:

And so at 6:45 a.m. the next morning we arrived at the famous Airlie Beach! After a quick breakfast on the water front we went on a brief walk along the beach and through the picturesque, backpacker hub of Airlie to get to the docs where our next adventure awaited us: an extreme ocean raft boat ride!!

Our tour had chartered two Ocean Thunder boats for our group to transport us to our new home for the next three days on South Mole Island, one of the world famous Whitsunday Islands.

The boat ride and the scenere were unbelievable and unforgettable!! I have never seen such crystal clear, turquoise water...and never been on such a wild boat ride! Our captain had us jumping wakes, spinning donuts, etc. Along the way we even spotted a whale breaching out of the water. You have to see these things with your own two eyes to believe the awesomeness...

Our boat then briefly stopped at South Mole, where we quickly discarded our 3-day packs we had been advised to prepare for this part of the trip (the Thunder Boats were not big enought to all of us and all our luggage). We then got back on the boat for a wild 40 minute ride to the beach named one of the most beautiful in the world: Whitehaven beach.

Again, words cannot describe the scenery. Think Pirates of the Carribean and you might be close...

(images have not been photoshoped!!!)

Here we chilled for the afternoon, playing beach cricket and rugby. The sand is so white that it never gets hot, so no worries about burning your feet!

Whithaven Beach is out in the middle of nowhere and a listed national heritage site, and so is only accessible and open to very few tourists at a time. As it were, we were one of the only groups on this unbelievable beach.

After this amazing day we headed to the South Mole resort for some pool-side relaxtion, drinks and dinner.

They day may have been over, but the night had only just begun, and we partied hardy at South Mole's only bar (which happened to be the resort bar, as the only thing on the island was the resort!).

Let's just say it was a great night, and my new found friend Christina and I somehow ended up meeting the owner of the island - that's right, the man who owns one of the Whitsunday Islands. This was indeed proving to be one excellent adventure trip...

Day Four:

...and on the fourth day the adventure tour group rested.

After so many adventures in such a short span of time, we all need a little recovery time and so lounged by the pool, walked around the island, and kayaked around on the resort's complimentary ocean kayaks. Another glorious day in paradise!

Day Five:

Our final day on South Mole Island. The early wake-up calls commenced and our group was ready to board our maxi-sailing yacht for a day of sailing the open seas surrounding the Whitsunday Islands. The vessel was a tight squeeze for 60 kids plus the crew, but we made it work without too much discomfort...

The sun was so strong and hot, we all zinced up to keep from frying. We also made frequent stop to get into the water and swim. Once the sailboat stopped and the crew told us to go ahead and get off to go for a swim; we got up from our tanning positions and could not believe our eyes: a sand bar - nay a mini island was chilling all by itself in the middle of the ocean!

So naturally we jumped right in with mask and snorkel (provided to us) to check out what we may find on this Gilligan's Island...

We were not dissapointed! Sea turtles were circling around this small island in packs! And as we made our way back to the sailboat, huge batfish decided they might like some of our leftover lunch being thrown from the boat and soon we were swimming amongst them!

Keep checking back guys...the most adventurous part of the trip is still to come!!!!!