We heard from many people that Fraser Island was a must see, so we opted to do it as a day trip instead of a whole camping out thing.  It's described by many as an all sand island, which of course conjures many images in ones mind.  We were expecting paradise on earth, and we certainly were not met by that. Lets just say the whole day trip to the island was something we could have done without.

The nightmare of the day began at 6:45am at the transit center where we all waited around for someone to pick us up.  Finally, this wiley looking guy pulls up in a 4 x 4 that looks like it could maybe hold 4 comfortably and we're informed that all 8 of us are squeezing in to this sardine can for what would be a 12 hour day of driving.  That's the first time Jason and I looked at each other and questioned whether we should bail on the whole thing.  Then we remembered the $400 we paid between the two of us to be on this trip and thought we'd tough it out (I know, we're troopers!)

Okay, lets just say the lack of leg room in the back of this jeep caused much headache and we were all upset about it.  It took 3.5 hours just to get to the island, and we all had to constantly switch around seats so we could get some circulation through our legs.  It was soooooo uncomfortable, especially for my knees that have tendinitius in them.

We took a barge over to the island, which was actually only 10 minutes away (kind of anti-climatic when the island is that close).  When we arrived we were kind of disappointed to see that the island was actually all sand as the base, but had lots of forests, and rivers, not the "all sand" island we were picturing.  The scenery although beautiful was not that unique from many things we had experienced in New Zealand. 

Again, not to get stuck on the leg room issue, but it was definitely a problem and made it difficult to enjoy some of the experience. The fresh picnic lunch that was advertised in the brochure was actually a sloppy mesh-hall buffet, which was disgusting. 

The one highlight of the day was visiting Mckenzie Lake, which had the most gorgeous beach we've ever seen.  The water was warm as a bath, and the sand was 98% silicate making it the silkiest, softest sand we've ever touched. We gave each other exfoliations on our backs with the sand it was that soft, and also cleaned our jewelry by rubbing the sand on it.

Another high point of the day was finally getting to see kangaroos on the side of the road.  They are the cutest thing ever and it was amazing how close we could get to them.  All Jason could think about it how tasty they looked, although that was the furthest thing from my mind. 

By far arriving back home and being able to stretch our legs was the biggest relief of the day. In hindsight it's easy to say I'm glad we got to experience Fraser Island, but I certainly would not rush back especially with the tour company we were with.  You can check out all the highlights in the video clip.