Thread: Fraser Island track conditions

Hi all,

I am off for my annual pre-Christmas Fraser Island pilgrimage (December 14th to 22nd inc.) and was wondering if anyone has any first hand info. on the condition of the inland tracks and Indian Head bypass etc?

I understand it might rain..... before I go.. but what are they like now? The epa says soft and rough but they say this all year round!

I generally camp at Lake Boomajin and tour around from there so I tend to do the inland tracks just as much as the beach. Last year I got stuck at Dilli and had to be snatched out by a Toyota.

Are any other members going to be there at this time?
What is the "generally safe and usable" air pressure for the really soft sand? I tend to stick to 20 pound so I can still drive at 60 on the beach.

Cheers

Sean

We were at the start of november, the tracks were pretty bad and we basically drove EVERY track on the island with the exception of a few unmarked side tracks we didnt get time for, we also pulled out a heap of people out and had a few run ins with the local tour bus drivers.

The beach run on the southern end of the island up to indian head was all good with plenty of beach but north of orchid beach was undrivable at high due to the waves coming right up to the sand cliff face, the indian head track was fairly cut up but no more then usual, but i did have to snatch out a new wrangler, new hilux and a d1 towing a camper from it. the climb up from the beach to the champagne pools was VERY cut up, watching troopies drive up it was interesting with large holes dug at the bottom of the wooder tracks. The track to orchid beach wasnt to bad though, just soft, and the run over to wathumba was nice and easy there was also a side track open here that wasnt open last time, it takes you over to the western beach north of wathumba, you cant drive on to the beach but we pulled up at the gate near thebeach and walked the last 50m's to a very nice spot on the beach.

The eastern beaches were fairly bad too compared to last time we were there, there was alot less beach to drive on, we drove all the beach from wathumba down to moon point and most of it was only drivable mid to low tide, but that was certainly the best area to camp we found with alot less people around.

The inland tracks down near eurong were all trashed basically, all cut up and chewed out by poor driving, nothing i would consider hard 4wding but definetly time consuming to drive, the worst runs we found were the tourist drive that goes past lake garrawongera, we drove from north to south on this one, it actually would have been a fun drive in the oposite direction and may have even required low range! Also the track leading from central station over to lake birrabeen was trashed as well, one hill climb was completely chopped up with large holes dug(probobly by a troopy full of back packers) all the way up, we had no trouble driving it but it took my sisters jeep a few goes. The tracks around lake mckenzie were all pretty soft and cut up but not as bad as i had expected considering the state of the less traveled tracks, the drive over to King fisher was as bad as usual and troopies everywhere to make it more interesting. North of king fisher up to urang creek and moon point the tracks were actually fairly good although we had to do a bit of track clearing of fallen trees and the actual run out to moon point was as bad as usual.

The run over to Worralie creek from Kgari camp ground was excellent except for the first section up to lake allom, we actually crossed the island here from side to side(west to east) in under 30 mins on the way home.

Down the bottom of the island around dilli village and lake boomajin it wasnt to bad although there were a few bad patches, the drive across to ungowa was easy with the gravel road then the track down to garys anchorage were all in good shape as well although the area had been totally burnt out with some patches down near garys anchorage still smouldering!(we later found out these tracks were supposed to have been closed due to wild fires - someone obviously forgot to put signs up!)

Honestly though nothing there was hard and could be easily done in any stock rover if you know how to handle the sand, for us we drive on the beach all the time at stockton and compared to that fraser is a peice of cake.

If i was going back for xmas i wouldnt bother spending much time down near dilli village/eurong except for a few stops at birrabeen and the eurong bakery - go over to the areas around woralie, bowardy and awinya creeks, its so much nicer to have a camp spot were you are lucky to see another car drive past rather then having several cars worth of people camped around you....