It's a rainy Sunday morning here in Brisbane. We have had a mixed bag of weather since arriving here in Brisbane although it has only slowed us down a bit. Yesterday Glen, Mark, Mary, Kate, Karen and I headed to the ocean to go 4x4 ing. It was a very interesting day for sure. We had hoped to hit Fraser Island but we did the next bext thing which was to drive the sandy beaches just a few kilometers south of there. We could see Fraser Island when we hit Rainbow Beach. We drove to Noosa on the M1 and then worked our way to Great Sandy National Park. We took a small barge across the Noosa River and drove right on to the beach. The tide was rising although there was lots of hard sand initially to drive on. We drove to Red Canyon about 15 km away, went for a hike on a massive sand dune and then headed to Rainbow Beach which was at least another 15 km down the beach. Now imagine driving 30 km down a beach in a 4 x 4. The sand near the ocean was rock hard and we could drive 60-70 kph. People were bush camping in designated areas and there were fisherman with ocean rods that were 15 feet long casting between the two lines of breaking waves. Aussies love their beaches. Families were on the beach fishing, surfing, boogie boarding down dunes and 4 x 4 ing. On the way back the hard sand on the beach was gone because of the rising tide so we had to drive the loose sand. Now that is a blast. I quickly learned that momentum is the key to not getting bogged down. It is a lot of fun. I think every bone in my body was rattled by the 5 hours of beach driving. Kate collected colorful sand on the dunes. She will truely have a rainbow of sand. We all appreciate Glen's efforts to borrow his son's 4 by 4 for us.
It took us about 90 minutes from Brisbane to get here along the M1 down the Sunshine Coast.
We were driving Toyota trucks that were called Hilux which is basically the equivalent of a Tacoma back in North America. I was driving a 91 Hilux. It was lots of fun shifting gears with my left hand. Everything is backwards. You wouldn't believe the number of times I turned on the windshield wipers while driving in Brisbane instead of the signal lights because everything on their vehicles is on the other side. Left hand driving in a big city can be stressful especially when you hit round abouts with lots of traffic.
You can see Cooloola National Park. The island immediately to the north is Fraser Island which is the largest sand island in the world.
Karen almost to the top of the dunes at Red Canyon. Two steps up and slide one step down until you get to the top. I figure the dunes were 300 feet high. Amazing!
Mark, Mary and Kate goin' up.
This picture gives you some perspective about how BIG these dunes are.
Very cool! I need a close up of the Blue Bottle though.
ReplyDeleteThose are nasty creatures and they make a popping noise when that bulb explodes.
ReplyDelete