A dingo took my veggie burgers!

Hello again! I know I haven't written in a bit, I apologize. It's hard to get internet sometimes, and I read in the newspaper that Australia has some of the slowest internet for the developed world. So it's not just my imagination!

Anyways, Fraser Island was awesome. I ended up not driving at all cause the "roads" were just dirt ruts and I thought I'd probably end up killing us all if I attempted it? One guy Tobey ended up doing all the driving and even though he's experienced there were some hairy moments; it's really fun though, bouncing up and down and getting stuck in the sand in the beach. You have to wade through water channels on the beach to make sure they're not too deep for the van to get through. We took a ferry with everyone's vans across to the island in the morning. It's interesting to think about how many vehicles are on the island, you can access it any day of the week, yet it's a World Heritage site. It's protected but it still seems pretty bad too let so many people visit, although there are restricted areas for regeneration. When we got there (we were two vans of 8 people and 10 people from the same hostel) we drove to Lake McKenzie, a gorgeous freshwater lake with white sand and the water is in several shades of turqoise. It was really beautiful, and I love lakes so much more than the ocean. We camped that night in a fenced area because of dingoes (wild Australian dogs) and I saw a dingo try to steal a pack of toilet paper from some guy's car! I didn't know dingoes used TP.

The next day we drove all the way up the eastern beaches (and got stuck in the sand), and saw an awesome shipwreck from 1935. My group was really good, as was the second group although at the end of the second day there was a big argument about where to stay and very funny yelling: "God, I'm sick of you wingeing all the time! Wingeing is Australian/British for bitching. That night we all hung out around a fire and actually played Truth or Dare, which I don't think I've done since I was age 16? It was very funny. Some people even went in the ocean a little even though you're not supposed to because it's a breeding ground for SHARKS! I put my feet in but was crapping my pants. We left one of our coolers out overnight--with the lid locked in place--but somehow dingoes managed to get in and took all the leftover meat plus all our veggie burgers and like 5 packs of stirfry mix! They are crafty little bastards.

When we got back to the hostel that night everyone was still hanging out and reminiscing about the trip, it was really nice. We saw a bunch of people from our trip when we got to the Town of 1770 because we had to make an important exchange: Lauren forgot her passport in Hervey Bay and we accidentally took the Swedish girls' entire pack of travel vouchers! I wish I could laugh, but is absolutely only a matter of time before I leave my passport somewhere...you know it's true. 1770 was beautiful, a little farm town that apparently only got electricity in 1998! It's becoming a more popular tourist spot for surfing and diving. We did the scooter tour that some Israelis told us a while was a must, and it was so much fun! I was really scared as a result of a bad burning incident on a motorbike in Thailand, but I got back on and it was so awesome to cruise through beautiful country on my own little scooter. (See above "sexy scooter" pic Lauren made me take). Lauren unfortunately had an accident and has colorful bruises to prove it, so near the end of the ride we rode together on my bike and I managed not to kill us! Yay! Although at one point I was on the totally wrong side of the road. Part of the tour is watching the sunset at the marina which was lovely.

Now we're in Airlie Beach after a 10 hour overnight bus ride, we get on a boat this afternoon at 2 to sail the Whitsunday Islands, should be fun! Lot's of love to all!