Garrys Anchorage (Fraser Island)

[Kyle]Once we set anchor at Garrys, we paddled ashore for a bit of exercise and to get the blood flowing. We encountered a few sand flies as we landed in the midday heat, but nothing like the swarms we had when passing by on earlier transits. They seem to occupy only a narrow band of mangroves by the shore. Once we were inland, they disappeared. Garrys has no hiking trails, per se, but instead, there are a few closed 4WD roads heading into Fraser Island's interior. Those are nice because they are hard to lose and allow for side-by-side walking. None of the roads leading away from Garrys allows for anything less than an all-day loop, so we contented ourselves with an out-and-back on the one that seemed the steepest. We were hoping to see some wildlife, but all of the animals seemed to be in the middle of their midday siestas.

{Maryanne: Garrys anchorage is named after Garry Owens, an Aboriginal of the Butchulla Mob; famed for his tracking, apparently he was even key in tracking down Australia’s most notorious bushranger, Ned Kelly! Nestled in a side tributary of the Great Sandy Strait, the anchorage is also renowned for its bloodthirsty sandflies (midges). As for the spelling - on the charts it's spelt without the apostrophe, while ashore on the signboards it is spelt with the apostrophe (who knows?!)}

As we returned to the beach at Garrys, we encountered a group of friends all traveling together in three "caraboats". These are small, trailerable houseboats that double as caravans when out of the water. Over the last few years, the group has been to almost all of the same places we have in Australia. Instead of sailing between them, they drove, stopping at lots of far inland places as well.

As we chatted, the midges came out and started lunching on us all. We lingered just a little too long with some of our stories, which we paid for with many itchy welts later. Apparently, it's not the actual bite of the microscopic monsters that causes the reaction, it is (apparently) the proteins in their saliva they emit while doing so. That's how a few bugs can leave dozens of welts. One of the worst things is that it doesn't get you until the next day, when they are all long-gone. The next day, I decided I've seen enough of Garrys for a lifetime.

Dusk on the beack, sunset at Waru, and later the moon reflects in the calm waters at anchor

After escaping from the midge zone at the beach, we paddled over to Waru. Their first question to us was about whether we had seen the dingoes. Dingoes? Apparently, some of Fraser Island's famous dingoes got a whiff of their dog, Bosun, and they all had a howling contest tormenting each other over the water. We had missed the whole thing while we were on our hike, looking for dingoes. Doesn't that just figure?

It was Waru who had followed us through the Wide Bay Bar. One peculiar thing I noticed was that he used the word “Wilco” over the radio, which is aviation phraseology. When I questioned Warwick about it, he admitted that he was a soon-to-be-retired Air Traffic Controller and it just came out out of habit. When Maryanne told him I used to fly commuter jets, he asked which kind. This is the part where I usually ramble off a bunch of meaningless numbers to people and their eyes start to glaze over. Not only did Warwick know what an Embraer 145 was, he had qualified in one in the simulator, although he said he's never had a chance to fly the actual plane. He understood what I meant when I said that passengers didn't like it much, but it was a joy to fly.

Night was about to fall. The bugs were slowly edging their way out to the boats, so we both decided to call it a night and leave the next morning.

Before departing the next morning Maryanne kayaked in mirror-calm waters among the wildlife and other boaters