We arrived in Noosa not quite knowing what to expect. We hadn't heard much about the place except that every girl we'd met previously said it was "so pretty". The weather was good as we arrived and we stayed in a quirky colourful little apartment style hostel called the Dolphin Beach House. The nearest beach was Sunshine beach and was smaller than the main one in Noosa but more deserted with just a few quaint delicatessens and cafes/restaurants and so definitely better for it. It certainly was pretty. From one end of the beach we were able to walk around the cliff's edge to another secluded beach with great views and just sat for about an hour completely on our own entranced by the huge waves crashing against the rocks and frothing up beneath our feet, absolutely breathtaking and peaceful. In fact it is true that all of Noosa and it's beaches are pretty but unfortunately we can't show you any pictures of the place because a week after we left Noosa all our saved pictures that we had taken were lost as our memory card malfunctioned before we saved them to CD. We were really gutted about this, especially as we had some great ones, and to this day, nearly 5 months later, I still don't think Gem is fully over it. I still have that memory card in the hope that someday technology will have advanced even further or stephie has some computer whiz kid friend who can restore those magical moments!
After a few nights we were ready to go off on our canoe safari, which we had booked previously in Brisbane. Again we weren't sure what we had signed ourselves up for but it all sounded good fun. And the weather was sunny! After a short boat trip across a lake, and a warning about the Bull Sharks in the water, we were left to our own devices to figure out how to canoe properly and reach our base camp for the night. Before we were left to find our way up the river we were given our tent, cooking sets and a barrel to protect and keep dry all our food and clothes. I think at this time we really didn't appreciate the value of that barrel, but we would do...
Canoeing is actually damn hard work, and there were quite a few times when I just wished we had a little motor on the back so we could sit back and relax, but oh no, there was no chance of any slacking off with Sergeant Gemma on board, and funnily enough it was always yours truly who got the blame if we weren't going dead straight down the river. So anyway, Alex thought he was Captain Jack Sparrow?*!?! Good thing someone's mind was on the task at hand.
Occasionally we would try to take pictures of ourselves passing the camera to and fro, but that only seriously rocked the canoe, which freaked me out as I was dead suspicious that any ripple we saw in the water was a Bull Shark, which is apparently one of the most aggressive sharks in the Australian waters. There is a famous story about a young girl back in the 60's who took a quick paddle in the river but was never seen again and as Gem likes to re-tell the story was "completely ripped to shreads and eaten, with the shark leaving only her hat behind floating on the waters surface"
We eventually reached our destination and set up camp with little fuss. I was the first of our group to set foot on land and as I was walking into the camp sight was pretty alarmed at seeing a huge Goanna stroll past me right through the middle of the camp, but as it turns out there is no need to be worried as they are big, but pretty placid creatures. In the evening we cooked our food, had some drinks and enjoyed a night under the stars. So far so good.
The next day started well and the sun was still shining as we canoed further up the river to find a giant sand patch in the middle of the forest. After an hour and half canoeing and a further hours walk, we found what looked like a desert film set and chilled out for about an hour before taking the previous journey in reverse.
Our last evening started pleasantly enough but by about 8 o'clock the rain started. We had all bought these plastic rain macs, but they turned out to be little more than plastic bags that ripped easily and were soon unusable, so we all had to take refuge in our tents. As darkness fell the rain got stronger but the toilets were a short walk away. The lanterns we were given also turned out to be useless after about an hour or two, so me and Gem were reliant on the light from Gem's phone which had a range of about 1 meter, navigating our way through trees, gravel and increasingly big puddles and back, while Gem jumped at the slightest noise that came from the darkness.
And so the rain kept on falling, and falling, and falling. We thought we had come completely prepared, I had even bought a bottle of dry shampoo, but as it turned out we were totally unprepared for what was probably our worst night in Oz. Our tent was hounded by the rain which leaked all over the place and everything, including ourselves, was getting damp, and in various places around the tent, actually submerged. This was when our clothes were forced to take on a new purpose, as we put them around the edge of the tent to soak up the incoming water inches away from our head and toes. Wonderful. The rain carried on all night and we were lucky if we even got 2-3 hours sleep.
The morning came and we couldn't get out quick enough. The rain actually stopped for an hour or so in the morning as we packed up before we had to canoe back down the river. Well that journey took another 2 hours, and we were already still cold and wet from the night before when it started to bucket down again, except this time we didn't even have leaky tents to protect us. But with true English grit, we ploughed on down the river and eventually made it back to our pick up point. Admittedly we had a bit of help from two girls in another canoe who suggested we tie our canoes parallel to theirs to give us twice the manpower, though would you believe this only had limited success as one canoe always edged ahead or away from the other. In fact the only extra thing we did achieve from this was seeing our friend drop her cigarettes in the water, only for her to stick her paddle in a few metres away and realise we were canoeing over water that was only knee high, but in these circumstances, there was no going back.
Just to top off our little safari, the pick up boat was an hour late, so we waited in our sodden clothes freezing our butts off for a little longer than we wanted, but when it did arrive we could only feel...well a little bit sorry for the people getting off the boat who were just about to start their safari. On our way home, our driver told us that the tents weren't really designed for that much rainfall and that today was the first time in 2 years he had to turn on the heater in his car. As you can imagine, that made us feel a lot better. Of course, if it wasn't for the weather we would have enjoyed the trip even more, but we were thankful for the first day, and when we were out on the water just floating down the river surrounded by the forest in pretty much complete silence, it was about as relaxing as anything you can possibly do.