…And on the eighth day God created Queensland and He saw that it was good. And he doth made the miracles of Fraser Island, the Great Barrier Reef, and the Whitsundays, for he needed somewhere to rest, and created a perfect 1700km of beaches and barbeques running from Brisbane to Cairns, then founded Oz Experience to take me on the pilgrimage, and lo! I was a believer.
…And on the eighth day God created Queensland and He saw that it was good. And he doth made the miracles of Fraser Island, the Great Barrier Reef, and the Whitsundays, for he needed somewhere to rest, and created a perfect 1700km of beaches and barbeques running from Brisbane to Cairns, then founded Oz Experience to take me on the pilgrimage, and lo! I was a believer.
If the big man does indeed live in Queensland then he weekends in Cairns. It has more wow factor than anywhere else in Australia with its beaches, nightlife, and the R and R of the reef and rainforest, and is the ideal place to start, or finish, a trip along the Queensland coast. Even the ungodly 7am start was a small price to pay for a ten day trip that boasts more highlights than a season of Dallas reruns.
Happily the bus was large and comfortable and allowed me to sleep through northern Queensland’s stunning scenery all the way to Babinda Falls National Park, home to the deadly cassowary and the God-sized Golden Orb Spider, which boasts a web so strong that boffins are researching its use for bullet-proof vests. Gulp. And no visit to the north is complete without a near croc experience, so we stopped at the spectacularly fun Johnstone River Crocodile Farm where crocs have reason to be nervous as they’re farmed for bags, belts and barbeques, and lie stacked in tanks like a bizarre pub-raffle meat tray.
Mick, the charismatic yet cranially challenged owner, amused us by climbing inside a cage containing a five metre croc with naught but a rake for defence, then after buying a croc claw key-ring, taking the obligatory ‘snake-down-the-trousers’ photo, and handling baby reptiles, I was bitten by a snake; a snake, admittedly, that was toxin-free and smaller than a pencil, but a snake all the same.
Still nibbling on my croc kebab, we passed through carpets of cane and bananas to Mission Beach, suicide attempt capital of Australia, where thousands of people a year hurl themselves from aeroplanes attached to little but a rather large hankie. The township has a pristine beach, rafting on the nearby Tully, and the chance to see wildlife on feral pig tours, but if its sun drenched perfection you seek, then Magnetic Island has a far stronger pull.
The island was named by Captain Cook after his equipment went awry as he passed by many centuries ago, and since then little has changed. Maggie still receives an incredible 320 days of sunshine a year, has one of the densest concentrations of Koalas in Australia, and is, quite possibly, where God decided to plant his deckchair. It’s the sort of place you visit for the day, then after a few beers and the odd wreck dive, you check your watch and find it’s already next month and your plants are in desperate need of a watering. I, alas, had but one night, so took advantage of Base Backpackers’ rubber-armed bar staff who generously helped me dodge sobriety, then after a hazy 2am plunge in the ocean, I woke feeling like it wasn’t just Captain Cook’s instruments that the island made spin. I dusted off the cobwebs walking to Picnic Bay and was rewarded with amazing views over the granite boulders and cobalt blue of the island’s splendid bays, before regretfully hopping the ferry back to the mainland and headed south to Townsville.
We followed the tracks of the cane train, the largest privately owned rail system in the world, through some of Queensland’s most fertile pastures, where its possible to extend your visa by killing a few months picking fruit, or you can save wear on your muscles and continue south to Airlie Beach to party the night away and head off on a cruise round the amazing Whitsunday Islands.
If ever there’s a photo to make your buddies jealous, it’s the one of you lying on the deck of a yacht, beer in hand, sailing on a perfect blue ocean surrounded by nothing but isolated verdant islands and babes in beach togs. I had booked my berth on Hammer, one of Oz Adventure Sailing’s super-fast Maxi yachts for a 3 day cruise heading wherever the will, and wind, took us. Smiling like a fool, I grabbed my goon (cask wine), ditched my shoes, and set sail into a perfectly sunny afternoon.
The Whitsundays are surprisingly compact with 74 islands squeezed into 100 nautical miles, so with three days to explore you can see an awful lot. We headed straight to Whitehaven, one of the most beautiful and photographed beaches in the world, arriving before sunset to see the impossibly white sands shimmer. Back on board the drinking games began, but the thrashing splashes from the dark ocean around us made sure no-one went overboard, although many went over the top.
The next morning we returned to Whitehaven for a healthy dose of beach games and sunburn, then raised the sails and headed to Border Island to snorkel in Cataran Bay. The multi-coloured hues of the fish and coral was a fantastic way to end the day, and the last night on board was spent much like the first; devouring the buffet and fighting off would-be pirates attempting to smuggle the goon bounty from within our Esky treasure chests.
The drive out of Airlie is the longest on the trip, but is broken in Sarina to play the deadliest sport known to man; lawn bowls. Although the name spreads fear throughout retirement homes across the globe, one suspects the triple-digit average age of the bowl playing fraternity is more likely the reason for this statistic than any bowl/cranium interface, but still it was with relief that, still breathing, we headed inland to Kroombit cattle station and a true taste of Australiana.
The coast is the main reason backpackers make the pilgrimage to Queensland, but no trip to the Sunshine State is complete without a trip inland. Tackling a goat muster on horseback is the most fun you can have in Australia without being arrested, and add to that a bar, open-fire meals, and the chance to see who is the mother-bucker of the group with rides on the mechanical bull, it is easy to see why those Brokeback cowboys are always smiling.
Back on the coast we continued south through Rockhampton, Australia’s beef capital and surely the only city in the world where the local council has had to nail bollocks to bullocks after tipsy locals stole them from the fibre-glass cows lining the streets. As we left the tropics the air grew cooler, and we stopped in towns lined with Queenslander houses to pick up new travellers and drop off old friends; the hop-on-hop-off bus being, for me at any rate, a great way to meet new people and try that chat-up line that has failed so many times before.
Rainbow Beach is the nearest settlement to what is quite simply one of the highlights this planet has to offer; Fraser Island. Local Aborigines were right when they christened it K’Gari (Paradise), and the island’s superlatives are well known. At 122kms, it’s the largest sand island in the world, took over 2million years to form, has half of the world’s perched lakes, and must have taken God a full day to create.
Not wanting to find myself upside down in a rapidly rising ocean on a self drive trip, I booked onto the Fraser Explorer 2-day guided tour and checked into Fraser’s Eurong Resort. Once on 75 Mile Beach, Fraser’s main highway and the longest airstrip in the world, we headed inland to the emerald green Lake Wabby, one of Fraser’s deepest (and coldest) lakes, then to Central Station, Fraser’s former logging industry HQ, where I walked beneath 60m-high Satinay trees growing miraculously out of the sand, and followed the impossibly clear Woongoolba Creek back to the beach.
After a great buffet lunch we headed to Lake Mackenzie, the postcard perfect lake you see in the glossy brochures, to find that, wow!, it really does look like that. Chemistry nerds tell us the sand is 99.9% silica, good for cleaning jewellery and 8 days worth of backpacker grime, and with no pollutants other than sun-screen and toe jam, the lake is amongst the clearest on God’s green earth and the perfect place to while away the sunset before hitting Eurong’s cheap and lively bar.
The next morning I skipped the sunrise in favour of braving an airborne hairdryer for the optional flight over Fraser. We flew low over the beaches and lakes, scattering fisherman like dice in Vegas, then landed amongst the jeeps and sea spray on 75-Mile beach and drove north to Indian Head. Once on top, the wind deposited my cap in an ocean foaming with rays and sharks, but if its safe swimming you’re after, the nearby Champagne Pools are the safest place to play and grab that ‘waves-crashing-behind-you-in-slow-motion’ photo. The highlight of the east, however, is the gentle, mellow float down Eli Creek; a crystal clear stream that discharges enough water every day to erase Brisbane’s drought woes. But after a few photos of the surf crashing on the ridiculously photogenic Maheno shipwreck, it was with regret we headed back to Hook Point and the ferry to the mainland.
From Rainbow Beach it is an easy roll through the über-cool resort of Noosa and the ethereal Glasshouse Mountains to Brisbane, the Sunshine State’s relaxed capital city, where the sun shines, the bars hum, and the Gold Coast’s famous beaches lie agonizingly close. And it was here, sipping a cold beer on the banks of the Brisbane River, that I realised what 4million laid back locals and a constant conga line of suntanned backpackers already knew; Queensland really is God’s country.
