Girraween National Park

Bold Rock Creek Camping Area

We took a long weekend off to go to the Girraween National Park. Girraween is part of a huge area called the Granite Belt with a spectacular landscape and massive granite boulders everywhere around. The National Park is about 250km south of Brisbane at the border to New South Wales.

You can easily get access via the New England Highway between north of Tenterfield and south of Stanthorpe. We camped at the Bald Rock Creek camp site the first camping area on the left hand side when you come into the park. We did not need to worry to find a nice camp spot. At this time of the year it was not busy at all so there was plenty of space and just a bunch of people.

The camping area has got facilities, hot showers, tables and fire places, but be prepared and bring your own fire wood. There is also water available but you need to boil it before you can drink it.

Fringe Myrtle

The Girraween National Park offers a couple of good walking tracks and we did two of them. The first walk to the Junction where Ramsay Creek joins Bald Rock Creek was a walk along the creek side. Big rocks and boulders are dominating the landscape. Due to the spring season everything was blossoming. Along the walking tracks where lovely native bush flowers. It was kind of an ocean of yellow, white and red flowers.

The Arch

The second walk we did lead us to the First Pyramid and the Arch. The Arch is a natural rock formation which looks like some giant put them together like a card house forming a natural arch. The walking track to the First Pyramid is quite challenging because its steepness. Unfortunately we did not get to the top of the Pyramid because it was just to steep and we did not feel confident to climb to the top. Besides I am affraid of heights and that did not help either. At least we both passed the chicken rock and we definitely going to attempt that one again next time.

Moreton Island

I know this is an old post I started more than a year ago but I just could not find time or the mood to finish it off. This is all I got and some parts I recalled.

Near Ben-Ewa Campground

Moreton Island, this beauty of an island is just a bit more than an hour away with the barge from Brisbane. Before the heavy rain through the entire December 2010 we had some days off and spent five days on Moreton.
We have never been there before and all we knew is that the island is similar to Fraser Island, just a bit smaller and not so busy. You can go there for a nice snorkel trip between the wrecks just off the beach and there are lots of good fishing spots along the beach. Swimming with turtles and dolphins is also possible.
... all that came true.

Luckily a friend of ours made his last stop on his Australia Work and Holiday trip in Brisbane and we all went with his 4x4 to Moreton Island. The island is only accessible with a 4x4.

We pitched our tents for the first three nights a couple of hundred meters north of the Tangalooma Wrecks at Ben-Ewa campground. Fortunately the school holidays had not started at this point so there were plenty of campspots available. Mind you usually you have to book in advance.

Tangalooma Wrecks

The last few days we went to the eastern part of the island. The ocean site is a bit rougher but we found a nice camp spot behind the dunes. We tried our fishing skills there again and cast our rods off the rocks this time where we had a bit more luck than the days before. Self caught fish for dinner is always the best.

After the last day snorkelling between the ship wrecks at Tangalooma and sun bathing we had to go back to the mainland.

One thing is sure we want to come back.

First Geochache - Pioneer

Finally after several shots and dieing GPS-devices we could find our first Geochache. I must admit it was an easy one for the start, but we still had a lot fun. We found nothing really special. It was a green box some sort of old rugged ammunition metal army box. Lots of little useless things were in it. ;) A couple of little cars, a dinosaur and the log book itself.
You should never expect some real fancy treasure that's for sure. It is all about fun and being out in the nature. We loved it and looking forward to find another one.

This is the location of the Pioneer Geochache.


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4WD Training Course

Driving a 4WD is not easy at all there are a lot of things you have to be aware of if you go 4WDing.

Hema Maps MapPatrol

We had the chance to get a 4WD Traing Course from Hema Maps.
We took one of the Map Patrols for the training which took place near Beaudesert about an hour to drive southwest of Brisbane. The MapPatrol is a little different from most other 4WDs, this is because of the data recording equipment and the complete recovery gear on board. This makes the car pretty heavy and sometimes difficult to handle. It takes a little while to get used to it.
However we drove that 'beast' through lots of obstacles and also had the chance to use the snatch strap if there is the need to get somebody out of a bog. We also were taught how to use the winch in case we need to get out of a bog ourselves.
We had a lot of fun and got more experiences in driving a 4WD and hopefully one day we will also have the chance to get out and do some fieldwork with one of the Hema Maps Map Patrols.

Fraser Island

Fraser Island

Just a three hours drive north of Brisbane along the south east coast of Queensland you will find Fraser Island. Fraser Island is the biggest sand island in the world with a length of about 100km and a width of 50km. You can get there by barge with a four wheel drive or you are a keen bushwalker and decide to tackle the island by foot. There are two locations were you can catch a barge. If you take the barge from Inskip Point you will get to the most southern point of the Island or you take the barge from River Heads and you will arrive at the west side of the island at Kingfisher Bay.

Camp Central Station

Fraser has got a lot on offer for nature lovers heaps of different types of landscapes and vegetation types. For example dry sandy and bushy landscapes, lush and green rainforest, wetlands or mangroves.

This time we stayed on Fraser for four days. Fortunately it was off peak season so there were not so many people around and it was easy to get a camp spot where ever we wanted. Every now and then we bumped into one of those huge tour coaches with a bunch of tourists driving around but that didn't bother us.

Lake Birrabeen

The first day took us straight to the sort of middle of the island. We pitched our camp at Central Station campground and decided to stay there for two days because we expected a little bit of rain and wanted to avoid packing and unpacking our stuff in rainy conditions. This campground is in the middle of the rainforest with lots of secluded places to pitch up a tent and enjoy the sounds and beauty of nature.

On the first day we explored Lake Birrabeen which was just about an hour to drive. It has crystal clear water and white sand almost like Lake McKenzie. It was only some kilometres away but because of the sandy tracks it took us that long. It was a lot of bouncing in the car because of the holes in the track. Fortunately our 4WD was in good condition. It had some big tires (also the tire pressure was down to 21psi) and it also had an extra lift kit which made it in some cases quite easy to get over obstacles.

A Welcome Swallow

The next morning we did a walk to Lake Basin. That was just an alternative walk. Originally we wanted to walk to Lake McKenzie but unfortunately the campground as well as the access was closed due to maintenance. We were quite surprised about the beauty of Lake Basin, but no equation to Lake McKenzie.

After a refresh we drove further north along the beach and had a stop at Eli Creek. A crystal clear freshwater creek with a board-walk. When we came back from the walk we were very lucky to spot a humpback whale in the distance jumping out of the water. This time of the year the whales travel from the warmer waters in the north to the south with their calves. That was just great watching them jumping out of the water and splashing back in again.

Shortly after that, just a couple of kilometres further north is the landmark of the shipwreck S.S. Maheno. The luxury passenger ship for Trans-Tasman crossings was being towed from Melbourne when it was caught in a cyclone an drifted ashore and was beached on Fraser Island.

Dingoes

We also saw some Dingoes along the beach. Dingoes were quite common on the island but due to some incidents on the island the government shot quite a few of their population.

Our day trip finished at the amazing rock formation The Pinnacles. Especially in the sun those rocks look like gold. After enjoying the last few sun beams on the beach we headed back to our camp spot at Central Station.

On the next day we packed up and moved further north. We had a look at the Champagne Pools. Those are a formation of rocks washed out of water and the waves are crashing over them. This is the only point you can have a bath along the eastern beach save from the open sea or just stroll around and look out for colourful fish trapped in these natural pools.

Our last campground was in Waddy Point. There were also just a handful of people and it was easy for us to find a free and beautiful camp spot again. We also were allowed to have a camp fire as well and had great warm night near a fireplace and recalled the last few days we had on Fraser Island.

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