Announcement

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:02 PM

Day 1 – Getting there.

We drove from Brisbane leaving at just after 7am to get on the 12:30 ferry. It’s about 320km to the Hervey Bay ferry at River Heads. Google Maps said about 3 and half hours. Prado GPS said 5 and a half. I allowed the 5 and a half thinking it’s better to be early.
Ended up bang on 4 hours with no stops or road works.

We checked in at the ferry office and picked up our boarding pass. It was a Friday and all the ferry spots were booked up so if you miss your spot you might be spending the night in Hervey Bay on a busy day.

Being a bit conservative on the trip time was OK because it meant we had time for lunch at River Heads.

Just out of the Ferry car park, the police had a RBT unit vehicle checking and breathalysing everyone coming off the ferry, us included. The cop asked me “How was Fraser?” and I said, “Mate I haven’t even made it to the island yet!”

If you’re looking for lunch, the IGA just back from the ferry makes awesome burgers.

I lined up first in the boarding queue thinking of the barge at Inskip Point where you drive through. This one is different though. On the mainland, you reverse on and off the ferry, on the island you drive on and off.

Passengers get out and you reverse the car in.

The ferry trip is about 50 minutes.

Don’t deflate your tyres as the landing each end is bitumen (or wood on the Fraser jetty).

Arriving on the Island
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2404.jpg

Kingfisher Bay
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2414.jpg

The accommodation was good. We had a 2 bedroom apartment with a kitchen and deck. Plenty of room and the kids loved the bunk beds. It was under $200 a night for a week.

We brought all our own food which was a great idea as the Kingfisher prices were expensive. A few examples (none of which we bought):

Club sandwich by the pool $23
Chips by the pool $9
Dinner at the bush tucker type restaurant for 5 about $500
Tour prices, $160 adult, $110 child, $495 for 2 adults 2 kids, so $605 for us with our 3 kids – glad I’ve got a Prado!

There is a servo at the end of Cornwells Road only about 400m from where the sand track starts. Really handy for air. If you need fuel it was about $2.10 a litre. I didn’t buy any. The Prado had enough fuel to get us up and back with plenty of range to spare at the end. Two days after we got back I still haven’t filled up.

Our friends hired a 4WD in Brisbane from Andy’s Auto Rentals and were slated to get a Patrol but one of the brake lights was out so they got a GXL turbo diesel Prado with only 5000km on it.

The other guys who do 4WD rentals in Brisbane that I know of are Fleet Crew.

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:03 PM

Day 2 – Lake McKenzie

First trip was to Lake McKenzie. We figured this was a short trip and enough to get a feel for the tracks and driving etc. We got to the start of Cornwells Road where the bitumen ended and let our tyres down to 16psi. I left them like this for the whole week.

Except when we were on the beach I kept the suspension raised. It isn’t a big amount but every bit helps.

There had not been any significant rain for weeks on Fraser and the weather was hot. The inland tracks were really dry rutted and very soft in parts.

I left traction control on and drove in second speed most of the way. If we hit an easy section of track I would shift to third but otherwise just left it. There was a few times when the DSC would beep and kick in but it didn't cause me any grief.

Even though the posted limit is 30, most of the time you can’t get even remotely close to 30. There were lots of ruts, roots and rocks to slow you down constantly.

What I learnt over the week (or brought with me):

With an auto keep it in second where it is difficult. If the transmission changes down when you are on the verge of hitting trouble, that little bit of wheel spin can be enough to get you stuck.
No sudden braking or sudden turns in soft sand.
Keep your thumbs outside the wheel so they don’t get injured if the wheel turns suddenly.
Your brakes are way less effective in soft sand. If there is something up ahead you need to slow down for you need to let the sand slow you down in time to just roll through it.
Look ahead and plan your route. Hitting a deep rut faster than you should is a great way to damage your vehicle.
Try to keep your momentum up in the ruts especially if they are filled with soft sand. There were plenty of these from where other vehicles had been bogged. They were in the worst spots and then filled with fine sand. The idea is to roll into it with enough forward momentum to just roll out the other side then accelerate out.
This tip was from one the rangers at Central Station. In the soft, your tyres are still creating a packed track in the sand. If you stop moving forward, you can try reversing and then moving forward again with more momentum. I tried this on the softest sand I could find. It worked really well. Even though I was really struggling to move forward, I could roll back with no problem at all. On restarting, I rolled on through and going further forward was a lot easier.

It is about 15km to the lake and took us about 40 minutes. Lake McKenzie, is quite brown now. In the 2011 floods, the lake was filled to overflowing which cleaned out all the stuff in the lake from tourists. But when the lake went back to its normal level, it drained in extra tannin from the surrounding bush.

First thing we saw as we parked was an empty water bottle on the ground and an empty stubby on the fence post. Down at the lake, there was a stack of empty cans and butts. You see that and just think “What the heck? Why would you come here to enjoy the beauty of this place and leave it looking like a garbage dump.”

I picked up some of it and binned it later. I made a point of carrying some empty garbage bags in case I saw this kind of thing again.

The lake itself is great for swimming. The water temp is refreshingly cool. Our friends had a new GoPro Hero3 with a head mount and the kids were swimming around like crazy videoing everything that moved or didn’t move.

When we arrived at about 10:30 in the morning we had the lake pretty much to ourselves. After a couple of hours it was pretty busy so we decided to pack up and head back.

Lake McKenzie
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2385.jpg

There was an onshore wind blowing from the east but I think if you got there early in the morning or in winter with a westerly wind the lake would be glassy this side and you would get some pretty amazing photos.

I have a Canon 40D and 2 L series USM lenses, a 24-70 and a 70-200, both f2.8 and decided I would choose a lens for the day not swapping out in the back of the car or on the beach.

Of course, when I preview my first photo I notice black spots in the image from dust or grit. I couldn’t see anything on the lens and it ended up being a bunch of crap on the sensor. A job to sort in Brisbane but it means a bunch of extra work in Photoshop removing black dots from the sky.

On the trip back, we hit our first track trouble. We were about 2km from Kingfisher and there was a Santa Fe blocking the track. I headed off to the right up a sand ramp and our friends tried to get off to the left but ended up on top of a mound of really soft powder. They weren’t going anywhere.

There was a bloke in a diesel Landcruiser with a lift kit who managed to get past the Santa Fe and snatch it out.

When he got to our friends he asked me “Have you got a snatchie?”
“No mate. But I’ve got MaxTrax.”
He said, “Those won’t be any good, the sand’s too soft. I’ll snatch you out.”

I didn’t personally get a chance to see if he was right or not over the trip but thought I won’t be here again without a strap.

The section where this happened had no tree cover and the sand was a dirty brown so it was just baking away there all day which was why it was particularly dry. Just as a bonus, when you stepped out in that, it was bloody hot! There were a few of us out doing the recovering in our safety thongs and we were all hopping around and swearing about the sand.

He gave us a hand to snatch out our friends’ Prado. We were all on our way but I reckon that Santa Fe would have had some trouble getting back home.

I am not sure what it is, but why are the least prepared people the ones who also help the least when they get stuck? I am not sure if the Santa Fe put their windows down but they definitely didn’t get out.

Some stuff is really obvious in hindsight. You don’t get stuck in clean white sand, you get stuck in dirty, fine sand or mud. So I realised I need a bag for my MaxTrax or that carry bag to put them on the back of your spare. Once they have been used I definitely don’t want to throw them back in the car with my camera gear. Also once I’m out I don’t want to be stuffing about putting them on roof racks. I want to be on my way and letting the other vehicles through.

The rest of the afternoon, the kids spent around the pool and that night we put together a BBQ and salads. There might have been a couple of beers and maybe a bottle of wine there too.

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:04 PM

Day 3. Central Station

We left about 8am to get to Central Station. It was a hard sell to the kids to go at all.

“So what’s there?” they asked.
“A creek” I replied.
“Can you swim in it?”
“No.”
“So what are we going for?”
“Well sometimes you just have to go places that you can’t swim but they are still good to visit,” I explained. “And I want to go there so we’re going. Get ready.”

The trip out was pretty tame though we did keep up the speed at the tough spots from the day before. The tracks were if anything tougher but both our vehicles got there without issue.

On my first visit to Fraser Island about 20 years ago we saw Central Station and I took a photo of Wangoolba Creek. It was pretty badly composed with cheap gear but was still amazing.

This was one of the highlights of the trip for me to get back and do that photo again properly.

Wangoolba Creek only flows because the island at that point is below the water table. The creek comes out of the ground and runs about 9km. It has a pure white sand bottom and is surrounded by lush rainforest. The water is so clear it is very difficult to gauge its depth.
There is a boardwalk that runs next to the creek before allowing you to get down to the bank. There were some great spots for photos up and down the creek. I had my tripod and the 24-70 lens with a remote shutter release.

Wangoolba Creek - 0.25 second exposure at f/22.
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2450.jpg

On the way back to the car I spoke to a ranger at Central Station who had been on the island about 20 years and he said the tracks were about as bad as you got on the island at the moment. The first 4.1km from the resort is amongst the toughest driving conditions as the sand is extremely dry and all the traffic including the big tour buses funnels together and churns up the sand making sure any moisture gets burned off.

He said that most of the recoveries he did were by getting in the car and just driving them out. That was when he talked about reversing and pushing through which I tried on the way home.

They usually run their tyres at 20psi but by later in the week were dropping them to 18psi which was pretty out of the ordinary.
The driest period is September and in the school holidays it is not uncommon to do 15 recoveries in a day.

I also took the opportunity to do a few shots for the next PradoPoint calendar. Not particularly confident I have a contender but we’ll see.

The ranger was talking about the lake chemistry of McKenzie. He said it was pretty overloaded at the time because of all the tourists. The pH of the water is about 4.5 which is acidic enough to take off all your dead skin cells which end up in the lake. So if your wife is talking about chemical peels and stuff, tell her that is a great reason to get to Fraser and get them for free!

If you apply your sunscreen really early in the day you don’t lose as much in the lakes as well which reduces the load.

He suggested going to Lake Birrabeen as all the other ones weren’t allowing swimming.

On the way out I made a mistake as we left the car park. Instead of turning left to get home I turned right to go back the way we came. I missed the sign that would have sent us the right way by 50m and when we hit our first turning I had the choice of heading towards Eurong or to the Barge Landing. I didn’t think that the Barge sounded quite right but knew Eurong was definitely wrong.

After a while and a couple more turns, during which the kids all swore blind we were on the same track as we came out on, we passed an airstrip. I turned around and headed back to the intersection.

I got the GPS coordinates from the Grande satnav and found where we were on the map. We had got ourselves onto Wangoolba Road about 6km south of where we needed to be and were headed for the other barge landing point south of Kingfisher.

Once I knew where we were I headed back to Central Station and saw the correct road back straight away.

With a combination of soft sand and low tyre pressure, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on your fuel if you are doing a lot of inland track driving as you use a lot more than you would normally to cover the same distance. We were using about 30 litres per hundred km on average on the inland tracks.

We got home again without any trouble but the tracks were definitely getting worse.

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:04 PM

Day 4 Eli Creek

Seeing how tough the tracks were the day before I was hustling everyone to get ready so we could get going a bit earlier. The kids were pretty good about it but it’s still like herding cats.

We had only just left when we saw three European backpackers who were walking along the main track hitching. We had no room for them or I might have helped out. I gave them an apologetic wave as we headed past.

We left later than I wanted but it made no difference as we hit our first holdup within 1.5km of Kingfisher.

The holdup was a Navarra with a canoe on the roof and city tyres that was badly stuck. Adding to that, the ranger who tried to snatch him out was also stuck and they were trying to get his vehicle out.

These guys had been stuck there for almost an hour when we arrived. I spoke to a bloke who was off the track waiting and he said he had tried his brand new MaxTrax to get the Navarra out but had no luck. He said the sand was so soft you couldn’t dig away enough to get them under the tyres. The sand kept falling back into the hole.

We’d been waiting so long the three backpackers caught up to us. They asked directions to Lake McKenzie and how far it was. I said “A longer way than you would want to walk mate. But about 15km from here.”

They had no shirts, water, food, map, sense of direction, or idea but one bloke did have a big walking stick and his shirt wrapped around his head like a turban so I thought they would be OK.

While we were all waiting, more cars were joining the queue including a brand new white Landcruiser with a couple of late teenage girls and their Mum driving. Mum was pretty aggressive and had plenty of advice on what the Navarra should have done to stop holding everyone up.

Once the Navarra got pulled off to the side of the track, Mum in the Landcruiser roared through to take the lead, at about 5km per hour.

We all lined up behind her and I gave her a fair bit of distance so I could keep up speed through the toughest bits and let her get ahead on the flat sections.

I said “I give her about 2 minutes and she’ll be stuck.”

Sure enough. She got about 300 metres and then started burrowing her way into the ground throwing up sand all over the shop.

We all stopped and I grabbed my shovel and the tyre deflators. She had the car burrowed in so it was resting on the spare wheel mounted under the body and the front stone guard was resting on the sand.

I set her tyres defalting from 25psi down to 16 then the MaxTrax guy and myself started shovelling away some sand. I told her to keep it in second instead of Drive and try and go a bit faster so she could roll through the ruts.

Once the tyres were down and we had a fair bit of the sand cleared we just got a bunch of us behind and pushed while she took off. It was a bit of a push but she was fine from there.

The backpackers passed us as we were packing up so I wished them luck.

Interestingly, when I stepped out of the car, the sand was so soft I sank up to my ankles but the tread pattern the Prado had left behind was only about 1cm deep. 16psi is a massive increase in your footprint.

We wanted to get through the first 4.1km and get on the road to Eastern Beach as quick as we could so I took off and kept our friends in sight behind us. After a while I looked back and couldn’t see them so I rolled to a stop at the turnoff to Eastern Beach.

After a few minutes they had not appeared so I thought they must be stuck. We had some mobile reception so I rang them to see what was up. They said they were stuck but they had a few people helping them get out.

We would just sit tight ‘till they caught up. This is where I realised you need a UHF radio.

As we waited, the backpackers caught up to us. I said to them “You guys should put your shirts on to keep cooler.”

The guy with the stick replied in what sound like Russian. Not sure if he said “Thanks for the advice but I will remain as I am sir” or “Bugger off, you’re not my mother.”

Either way I smiled and waved.

If I had looked more closely at my map I could have told them there was a walking track that cut to the Lake only about 2km further on that cut about 7km off the distance.

They did end up getting back to Kingfisher OK as we saw them that night and found out that Mum in the Landcruiser gave them a lift. She redeemed herself and her daughters probably enjoyed the company of some young, unattached European boys. A happy ending all round we thought.

When our friends caught up, Bec, who was driving, called me over to help out. When they first got stuck, she stopped with it sitting pretty well for an easy recovery. She suggested anyone who had some experience could have a crack at driving it out. One of the boys in the car behind who was a big Irish fella and knew ‘a lot’ about off roading said he could easily drive it out. When he said “out” it appears he actually meant to say “down”. He put it in low range and pressed every button he could see then floored it burying it to the belly quick time without moving forward a millimetre. Maybe he was trying to dig his way back to Ireland.

I reset everything and got her into driving mode again then we set off to the eastern beach along Cornwells Break Road.

This track was far easier and beautiful. Lots of white sand in rainforest. Amazing to experience.

At one point on the way out, near the beach we had a long steady descent in soft sand in a high sided cutting. I thought “I don’t want to meet anyone when we are on the way home on this thing”. Sure enough on the way home, 50m from the top I meet a Landcruiser coming down. I tried driving up into a passing bay but it was too steep and soft. I ended up going forward then reversing in downhill and just getting off far enough to let them past.

There were 5 or 6 Samoans in the car and the driver was saying he was glad I let him get past because they had been stuck three times on the flat stretch at the top (which I thought was the easy bit) just before. I reckon they were carrying about 500kg more load than me (my kids don’t weigh much) plus the heavier vehicle so they might have had a tough time coming home. Still they had plenty of hands for pushing if needed so I wished them luck.

Once we hit the beach, and even though the beach crossing is noted on the conditions report as being soft and difficult, we found it extremely easy going. We headed north to Eli Creek and I got up to about 60kph.

The problem with having your tyres down is that big side belly increases the heating by hysteresis on the side walls. (You can tell I’m a mechanical engineer

) Just like when you bend a piece of wire back and forth it gets hot. If taken to extremes you can blow a tyre. I kept thinking about this and didn’t feel like taking it to 80kph with mine at 16psi.

The beach road is great fun. Be careful of the creek crossings in case there are washouts. I took the bypass roads around the coffee rock at Yidney and Poyungan as the tide was coming in and the bypasses looked fun anyway.

Take it slow over the coffee rock. On the way home at the north entrance to the Poyungan rocks bypass I had the choice of two ways in. The first one I chose was looked easier but left me on three wheels and going nowhere. I just reversed and went the other way but I think here is where I should have engaged my centre diff lock so I could keep going.

Arriving at Eli, we parked on the soft sand near the boardwalk up the creek.
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2561.jpg

Make sure you take something that floats with you for Eli Creek. I took a couple of the kids pool toys that don’t keep you right out of the water but allow you to kind of relax in the water and just float. The idea is you walk up the boardwalk a few hundred metres then float down in the creek to just short of the sea.

Floating down Eli
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2527.jpg

Eli Creek is cold and my wife doesn’t like cold water. The kids threatened to drag her in by force if she didn’t go voluntarily. She chose voluntarily.

Everyone floated down the creek while I took photos then I got in. It felt great. Cool but not too cold. I didn’t know why everyone was shivering and complaining until about my seventh trip down when I realised I was freezing.

We made a snap decision to leave and beat the tide back to Cornwells Break Road so we loaded up and headed back south. I would have liked to head a bit further north and see the Maheno wreck but that will be next trip.

Going was a little slower on the way south as the tide was higher so we had to stay in the softer sand when the waves came in then get back on the firm stuff as they receded.

Lots of people have mentioned this but it is worth saying again. Driving through huge sheets of spraying seawater like you see on some 4WD car ads is the best way to rust out your vehicle. Don’t do it.

Once we got to Cornwells Break road we headed inland and stopped at the Stonetool Sandblow lookout for lunch.

The trip home was tough but without problems. There wasn’t much oncoming traffic. We, and especially Bec, got a good bit of speed in the last 4.1km to Kingfisher. She led the way and left me behind on the way to the resort.

Another trick I saw on YouTube for getting a bit more traction if you are struggling in soft sand, especially in a climb, is to move your steering wheel side to side about a quarter turn pretty quickly. I tried this to see if it worked but I really wasn’t struggling enough to notice a difference.

When we got back, the kids went swimming for the afternoon because a couple of hours swimming at Eli Creek is barely enough for one day.

At the BBQ that night, I figured we had visited the big three on my list; Eli Creek, Central Station and Lake McKenzie.

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:05 PM

Day 5 Take it easy

Today, no one was interested in driving anywhere and it was really hot so we spent the day by the pool. The kids stayed in until their hands swelled up like prunes.

I ran into a few of the people we met on the track and swapped stories about how we got on. Everyone agreed it was pretty tough conditions. One bloke said the rangers were reducing their tyre pressure as well.

That afternoon at about 5pm we walked around the small resort lakes near the beach with zoom lenses and found a bit of wildlife.

There were dozens of Lewins Honeyeaters and they were very tolerant of people. Keeping quiet you could easily get within a couple of metres of them.

This is a white cheeked honeyeater.
They were a lot more skittish than the Lewins so they needed a little more patience.
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2694.jpg

A whipbird hopped across the path in front of us but it was too quick to photograph.

It rained pretty steadily most of the night and I was keen to see how the tracks would be in the morning.

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:06 PM

Day 6 Lake Wabby

We did the trip to the Lake Wabby lookout today on wet tracks. It was raining off and on the whole day. Completely different driving experience today. The driving was very easy by comparison to the previous few days.

The scenic drive to Lake Wabby is worth the trip taking you through lush rainforest.

The lake itself is quite spectacular. I haven’t seen it in 15 years and it is significantly smaller than I remember. The Hammerstone Sandblow created Lake Wabby by damming up the water which would have run to the sea. As the sandblow advances it is slowly swallowing the lake by about 1m per year. Lake Wabby is 11.5m deep at its deepest point and has 12 different types of fish.

Lake Wabby
http://atcbiz.com.au/images/mark/IMG_2730.jpg

When we got back to Kingfisher the kids needed to go swimming.

I was talking to someone by the pool who said the police were really active on 75mile beach that day. They were enforcing everything on everyone going past.

Mark.Brisbane · 16-12-2013, 10:06 PM

Day 7 Getting home and clean up

We packed up in the morning and headed back to Brisbane on the 10:30 ferry. The trip home was a bit longer as we stopped for lunch in Gympie.

As soon as we got home and emptied out the car I set to cleaning it.

I have read a lot of the discussion on beach driving and cleaning and rust and here is my take on it as an engineer. I had some experience designing seawater cooled marine exhausts which is about as tough an environment as you get.

I am not a big fan of spray on or paint on rust treatment applications for a few reasons

Unless you cover everything evenly you leave pockets where rust can start.
Gunky coatings catch the stuff that on a clean surface will just wash off.
Inside members like chassis rails, an uneven coating can act as a dam allowing corrosive solutions to build up.

When your Prado was built, it was rust proofed. If you get salt water on your car it will rust if left long enough. Salt is easy to remove with water. Just use lots of it. You don’t need to get rid of all the sand, it won’t rust your car, but you do need to get rid of the salt.

If you do get rid of most of the sand, the salt will all be gone.

Before starting, I park my car on a slope. Doesn’t matter which way, you just want the chassis rails to drain out.

You don’t need a high pressure cleaner. You just need lots of water at a reasonable pressure. We aren’t getting rid of mud, just sand and salt.

I start by hosing into every grill and opening I can see from the outside in every direction I can reach.

Do the wheel arches and brakes thoroughly getting into everything you can see.

Then you need to get underneath with the hose and wash the underbody. Just start from one end and work your way back or forward then switch to the other side.
Feel the water that is running off. If it has any sand in it keep hosing.

Pay particular attention to the chassis rails and cross members.

I put the hose into every hole in the chassis rails and give it a good flush out.
All the guards need doing too. I flush them from the top by putting the hose into the gaps you can see between the underside of the rail and the top of the guard pan.

Also shove the hose in the drain holes in the guards to wash both what they are guarding and clean the pan itself. There are loads of holes for this.

If the water coming out the drain has no sand in it you are done with that spot and can move on.

Do the same with the cross members. Hose in every hole you can see in every angle you can until the water drains out with no sand.

There is a cross member that rests on top of the front two stone guards. It needs a lot of flushing. You can get in from the ends inboard of the suspension and there are a couple of holes on top under the engine you can flush it with.

The stone guards themselves will be full of sand too.

I used about 900 litres to clean the whole car and by the time I was finished there was a 3 inch deep sand bar at the bottom of the driveway.

I service my Prado myself and unlike the service guys who say they inspect the engine I take the guards off and actually inspect the engine. I will check to see how thorough my clean was next time I do.

Anyway, that wraps it up for this trip report.

Fraser is one of the most amazing places I have visited or seen. Make the trip if you can. It is well worth it.

Clackers · 16-12-2013, 10:25 PM

Nice write up Mark, thanks for sharing. Fraser is definitely a place I want to visit and explore.

geograzza · 18-12-2013, 07:43 AM

Nice report. Sounds a bit tougher than when I was there Easter last year. We never had a scrap of trouble on the inland tracks - the only soft stuff was the beach access tracks. I had my tyres at 20 the whole time, and only got stuck twice - once while towing my mates Prado because he had holed his radiator and had to make a stop/restart to give way to someone on a soft steep incline on one of the access tracks. Using the weight of my mates car pulling me backwards, and a bit of a push from the other bloke in our group we were able to get clear, go back and have another crack. The second time was when in a lapse of concentration I took a very bad line at low speed while attempting to leave the beach onto Wathumba Rd. I had barely stopped when a passerby in an 80 cruiser had a snatch strap hooked up and yanked me out backwards at a phenomenal rate of knots. Don't ya just love the "experts" on Fraser tho - when I got stuck the driver of the 80 was telling me how Fraser was no place for the "toy 4wds" like Prado's. Yeah mate, it's just a toy, that was able to tow another 2.5t toy effortlessly from the west coast to Eli.

r4ndll · 18-12-2013, 10:16 AM

Nice write up. Very thorough. I've been twice to Fraser, & can't wait to go back next year.

First trip was in a tour bus which was really good and I learnt a lot, second was in my old (non turbo) 60 Series landcruiser.

Always amazes me the amount of times people go straight to a snatch recovery. We saw a guy get stuck at Indian head. Immediatley everyone's running round searching for a snatch when my wife points to his front hubs and says "Are you sure you're in 4WD? Your hub's not locked". Turns out he'd only locked one hub. Locked the other one, 3 guys pushing to get him going, out he pops and away he went.

We never got stuck in the 60 series, but saw plenty of new pajeros, landrovers, backpacker troopies getting stuck. Apparently 5 secs pressing on the valve whilst on the ferry lets your tires down enough from highway pressures...

LYTNING · 18-12-2013, 11:25 AM

Thanks Mark for the great write up, it is impressively compiled and the pictures are fantastic. I haven't been to Fraser but am super keen to do so in the near future. We spent a couple of days along Teewah beach to double Island point last week which was my first beach driving experience. Luckily it was after a day of rain so everything was quite easy. Having said that people still got bogged in the cuttings but the Prado never hinted at getting stuck. Obviously picking the right tyres tracks to follow coupled with enough lift to not act like a sand plough helps. LIke you we also wondered why people leave rubbish lying around in places but put that down to them being from the Australis Bogani gene pool.

ice.t · 18-12-2013, 02:33 PM

Thanks Mark, great report..wonderful trip, wish we could back to Fraser soon next year, got our second baby due next year in May, so very struggle what is the best time for us for a trip to Fraser. We've been there 2 years ago, only rented a old Prado(most likely to from 80s) somewhere near Harvey Bay, because we couldn't find anyone else would rent us for off road use at that time..but still, we really miss that island.

Mark.Brisbane · 19-12-2013, 06:15 PM

Originally posted by LYTNING View Post

... We spent a couple of days along Teewah beach to double Island point last week which was my first beach driving experience. Luckily it was after a day of rain so everything was quite easy. Having said that people still got bogged in the cuttings but the Prado never hinted at getting stuck. Obviously picking the right tyres tracks to follow coupled with enough lift to not act like a sand plough helps. LIke you we also wondered why people leave rubbish lying around in places but put that down to them being from the Australis Bogani gene pool.

Lytning, Teewah Beach was my first crack on the sand too. I have a write up to post on that soon as well. Mate, I was pretty nervy about how the Prado would cope but it took it so easy at the beach cutting I was really amazed. We were there in such dry weather there were fire crews at the beach break managing a huge back burn to try and stop a fire in the national park to the north.

Beach · 21-12-2013, 10:27 AM

Originally posted by geograzza View Post

Don't ya just love the "experts" on Fraser... Fraser was no place for the "toy 4wds" like Prado's.

Great write up. I miss Fraser as one of the best places for a holiday.

My first trip there was in a bog standard 2000 Subaru Outback Limited, complete with 15" Geolander road tyres. People were laughing at us on the ferry. It sure looked funny amongst all those lifted and kitted "proper" 4WD's. We got stuck shortly after getting of the ferry. To much air in the tyres. After that I quickly learnt how to keep it out of the ruts and chose carefully where to go. Its funny how word spreads on the island. The first few days we were famous for being stupid enough to bring a vehicle that obviously couldn't cope. After a week people were amazed at how we managed to "that car" around the island. There was a never a shortage of people willing to voice their disapproval. In two weeks I got stuck once.

Announcement

Fraser Island: First time visit 120 Grande newbie 4WDer

Fraser Island: First time visit 120 Grande newbie 4WDer

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment