Hello again!
Ahhh, where to begin?! I have so much to tell you all! Classes are going well, as I'm sure you all know! ;-) Anyway, I am enjoying them very much. My reef fish class is great. My Professor, Dave, is absolutely hilarious. He's from Scotland, so he has a great accent. Anyway, he makes my class very interesting. We have been discussing the fossil record/phylogeny of modern day "reef fish." Reef fish, by the way, according to Dave...they do not exist. There are fish that live on reefs, but not reef fish for the fish do not need the reef, but the reef needs the fish! Interesting concept eh? Anyway, the class should be very fun. My partner Mary and I will be dissecting a "reef" fish head in order to identify all of the muscles in the skull and how the head of a reef fish works. We will then be boiling all of the tissue off of the bones and reconstructing the skull! Sounds way cool right?! I know! I'm going to be taking pictures throughout the progression of this process, so don't worry...you will all get to see the journey! My favorite thing that Dave does is...alright so let me set the story up properly. We spend a lot of lectures discussing the "family trees" so to speak (phylogenetic trees to be scientific), and while doing this, Dave goes through and attempts to tell us the important families (i.e. translating from scientific names to general common names). My favorite line he used the other day..."and this group here, the aldkfjakldfja (too much for me to spell out), you might have seen these guys...they're the silver little jobbies you see out on the reefs at times." how funny is that? I literally wrote on my paper "the silver little jobbies." hahaha.
Alright, next topic...my corals class is going well too. For this class I have a partner as well. Her name is Jess. She and I picked out a species of coral on which we will be collecting data at Orpheus Island (the field trip in May). In lab yesterday we cut a piece of coral that had been stored in alcohol and put it in formic acid. We are decalcifying it in order to look at just the tissue of the coral. Another super cool thing huh? So unlike the fish head...we are eating the bone away in order to keep the fleshy party to observe.
My conservation class...there's not much to tell you there. we're just trudging along discussing different ways in which people collect data on marine wildlife. things like aerial surveys and catch-release methods...etc etc....interesting, but not worth writing about here.
My Aussie wildlife class is getting very interesting as well. Yesterday we spent the day talking about and why Australia has so many of them. Then we discussed different families from skinks to goanas (I'm sure I butchered the spelling!). We talked about how evolution has developed so much diversity....such as the legless lizards. We learned how to tell the difference between a legless lizard and a snake...it's quite cool actually. Anyway...then we started the subject of...snakes! yes!!! snakes!! Today's lecture (in about an hour), we will finish discussing snakes and those found here in Australia. Each lecture she shows us photos of different species and tells us where they are found within Australia and whether or not we will see them while on our field trip to Moorinya National Park. I'm very excited for that trip! I can't wait to see some dangerous snakes! hehehe....don't fret mom! or dad...I know you are secretly! xoxo
Anyway....now on to my Fraser Island trip. I have so much to write here, I hope I don't take up too much space or time! I've got class to attend! Anyway...I have posted photos on my photo page, which I have just added a link to at the top of my blog page. If you look on the top left corner you will see a link to Krissy's Photos. Click it and check them out. I have added some more to my Hawaii photos, and if there is time today I will add an album for New Zealand.
So Fraser...Brendon and I took a 15 hour bus ride from Townsville to Hervey Bay where we met up with everyone else going on the self drive tour to Fraser Island. There were 44 people in total going on the trip in 4 different vehicles...this meant 11 of us per group. At first I was a little leery of my group because they were all talking about how much alcohol to buy before the trip. All in all, everything turned out for the best, and I think we had the best group overall. Anyway, so Brendon and I were sent to do the shopping for 11 people for the weekend. Yes, that meant 2 Breakfasts, 2 Dinners, and 3 lunches for 11 people!! That's a lot of food! Anyway, we got back and packed up the 4 x 4, all piled in, and headed off to the ferry to get to Fraser Island. If you can imagine, my worry at this point continued for it was 930 in the morning and my group had already whipped out the goon bags! Our group consisted of 6 Americans, 2 Swedes, and 1 Brit, and 2 Scots. Two Americans were from LA and two were from DC. So anyway, we are driving down the road drinking out of the goon bag (all but the driver anyway)...I'm not sure if this is legal here or not, but it happened none the less.
So like I said, our trip was a self drive tour...meaning we were given the equipment and an itinerary and had to drive ourselves around the island to see everything. Our first stop was Lake Wabby. Make sure to look at the photos either before or after reading about it...you can't even begin to imagine how magical Fraser is without the photos. Anyway, Lake Wabby was this beautiful green color with trees all around it except on one side...there was a massive sand dune. I walked up the sand dune only to come across what appeared to me to look almost desert like. There was just sand almost as far as you could see...the wind blowing it around. The further I walked, the more I could see trees in the distance. At the top of one of the miniature hills in the desert, you could see the ocean and forest up ahead. In order to get to Lake Wabby, we had to walk 2.3 km (approx 1.5 miles) along a trail through the forest. Here I came across some of the biggest spiders I have ever seen (check out the orb spiders on my photos). We also saw quite a few lizards (goanas to be exact), but they were all too fast for me to get my camera out and snap a photo. I hope to get some photos from other people later in order to show you. So, around 215...four of my group members are completely trashed...they've managed to drink 2 entire goon bags...that's 8 litres or 2 gallons!
We all walk back to the car and grab some lunch while heading up to Eli Creek. Unfortunately I did not get very many photos here, for I was too busy participating in the beauty of Eli Creek. Three of us girls (the 2 from the UK...the swedes were too drunk) walked up the winding creek. the current was fairly strong and the water crystal clear. We walked up as far as we were allowed, turned around, laid down, and crawled on our hands/drifted the whole way back down to the beach where the creek ends. It was loads of fun.
From here we went on to see the shipwreck on the beach...The Maheno wreck. There are lots of photos for you to see...not much to say. It was very cool to see this massive thing just sitting in the middle of the beach. From here we went on to see the Pinnacles. A big hilly/mountainous formation made from different colors of sand...again check out the photos. very cool. Since I haven't mentioned it yet in this blog, this whole time we're going from stop to stop, we are driving on the only highway the island has to offer...the beach. Yes, the 75 mile beach is the highway on Fraser Island. Very cool...photos of this as well.
Our first night as Base Camp, yes we were camping...we cooked burgers on the grill...yum. We set up our tents...my tent managed to leak the first night during the 4 hour monsoonal rain shower we had. No worries...only the sleeping bag and my jacket got wet...all else stayed dry. On Our second day we drove to Indian Head. I can't even describe to you the magic of this place...the pictures don't do it justice either. This is where I mentioned in my last post that you stand looking over the ocean trying to see the marine life. Unfortunately for us, I think we came at the wrong time of day because there was no wildlife to be seen.
From here we walked down the cliff to the other side, where we had to walk to the Champagne Pools. We were not allowed to take the 4 x 4 any farther north than indian head. It was alright...only about a 30 minute walk. The Champagne Pools were great fun! Again...this is the last I will say it...be sure to look at the photos! =D They are called this because the waves crash over the rocks into the massive tide pools creating all sorts of tiny fizzy bubbles...just like the ones you would find in a newly opened bottle of champagne. there were some neat smaller tide pools here that had tons of fish in them.
After visiting the Champagne Pools for a while, we headed back across the beach, over Indian Head and back to the car. When we got tot he other side, there was a Dingo hanging around! Way cool! We got some really neat photos of them. If you check out the photos, don't feel bad for the dingo thinking he looks too skinny. That is their natural body shape. We stayed here and had some lunch with the dingo lurking overhead.
We then went on to Lake Allom to see the freshwater turtles. Apparently the population of turtles here is very high...as we found out when we got there. There were about 30 turtles in this little area...I got a great photo of three of them sticking their heads above water all together! hehe...so cute!
Then it was time to call it a day and head back to camp where we cooked pasta for dinner and played a little Thumper (drinking game). I managed to make it to be at 9 oclock both nights. I was feeling sorry for those staying up and drinking so late on the second night, for we had to get up at 430 am in order to be packed up and on the road at 6 am. While it is cool to say you've driven on the beach as a highway...the highway is closed certain times of day due to high tide. If we hadn't have left by 6 am, we would have had to wait until 11 am to leave.
So our first stop of the day was Lake Boomanjin, the "tea" lake. It's this beautiful deep red red/orange color. We hung out here for a little while and ate some breakfast. After finishing here we headed to Lake Birrabeen, one of the blue lakes. This lake is very similar to Lake Mackenzie (which I will tell you about in a minute), but it is much quieter. There weren't very many people there at all. The only people we saw here were others on the self drive tour. The sun wasn't shining very high for most of the day, so the photos aren't as good as they could have been. Oh well, you can't expect perfect weather all the time. It sprinkled a little, but there weren't any more monsoonal type rains! So anyway, we stayed here for a bit and then headed on to our next stop: Central Station.
Central Station is sort of the gateway to most of the trails through the rainforest on Fraser. Here is where the settlers had their lodge when they first came to Fraser. You will see the building in some of the photos. We walked along one of the paths which ran along side Wanggoolba Creek. This creek was absolutely gorgeous. Crystal Clear. The sand bed was white with various areas of green sand...very cool. The rainforest was beautiful as well. Up by the lodge, there were trees that had these massive plants growing on them. I heard they were called staghorns. Very cool looking plants...they almost look like half of a lettuce head stuck on a tree.
From here we went on to Lake Mackenzie, another crystal clear lake. This one was where we spent the majority of our last day...as did apparently half the people that were on Fraser Island for the weekend! hah! It was very busy. But we made a good time out of it. About this time the sun finally started to come out. It did sprinkle on us a couple of times while here. Three of us (Brendon, Andrew and I) decided it would be a good idea to swim across the lake. If you look in the photos....I've described where we swam to. I think that was the most I've ever swam in my entire life. Once we made it, we felt so accomplished of course. It was really neat, the area we swam to had a sand bar that extended out into the lake a fair ways. Lake Mackenzie is at its deepest point 8 m so about 24ft deep. No worries...there's nothing in there that's harmful...at least not that we knew about! hah! Then we walked back along the beach enjoying the scenery and rest from swimming all that way! On our way back we ran into this massive goana...at least 4 or 5 ft long. It was just hanging out walking along side of us. We didn't seem to bother him one bit! haha. Once we made it back to the beach area where everyone was, it started raining pretty hard. At this point we thought it would be a good idea to pack up and head back to the car in order to organize things for the trip home.
We did that, made it back to the hostel where Brendon and I hung out for about two hours (with a shower) before heading for the 15 hour bus ride back home to Townsville! Overall, it was an amazing trip. I still can't believe how much diversity of landscape there is on that one island.
I am not about to embark on another adventure for this weekend. I am finally going to be scuba diving in Australia on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). You would think after being here for a month and a half I already would have accomplished this, but no, I haven't. I leave in about 3 hours to head onto the Kalinda (a dive boat) where I will be spending the next two nights out on the GBR. I promise to write as soon as I get back from my trip and post some more photos!
I hope you all are doing well! Miss you!
Krissy
xoxo
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