Hervey Bay

Another 2 and a half hours down the road is Hervey Bay, the main connection between the mainland and Fraser Island, also well known for its whale watching tours. It was once eight small fishing villages but grew into one larger city. We spent a couple of quiet days here riding along the esplanade, sightseeing, going to the Cinemas to watch Rio 2, shopping and playing at the parks. During our time at Hervey Bay our funny little guy Camo turned 5. We celebrated by doing all the things he loves starting with pancakes for breakfast, opening presents that were Spiderman and Batman orientated, ten-pin bowling, playing at the park and making his favourite dinner Pasta and Green (pesto) followed by chocolate cake!

Ten Pin Bowling

The birthday boy with his girlfriends Lily and Amy and Taylah and Oliver on the ends

Happy Birthday to you Camo

All day he kept telling everyone that he was now five and that he was a big boy, although when talking about seagulls and cheeseballs he is still calling them ‘Sea girls and Cheese boys’ and we think it’s so damn cute that we don’t want to correct him! We also met another lovely family who like us had travelled overseas BK (before kids) and were on a three month pilgrimage to see some of the best things that OZ has to offer. They too, kindly spoilt Camo with birthday gifts but not before Camo had fallen in love with their two older girls. At every opportunity he had he would put his arms around them and call them ‘my beautiful and my lovely one’. Looks like we will have a ‘player’ on our hands when he is older or possibly next year when he starts school!

Our friendly humpback whale

While Camo’s biggest highlight was falling in love again, Glen, Mel and Taylah’s highlight was of course going on a whale watching cruise. It had been cold and windy when we first arrived so we put the whale watching tour off for three days and we were glad we did. Mel took her sea sick tablet ready to brace the swell but she needn’t have as it was calm and sunny all day. We cruised alongside Fraser Island which is magnificent with its silica sand. Just a bit of useless information Fraser Island is 127kms long!

Within forty minutes we had seen two humpback whales cruising quite fast so we followed them for a while taking photos and oohing and aahhing. Although we were within metres of them, they were not really in the mood to play so we cruised on looking for others. We soon found another two who were willing to play around our boat or as we were told, they were mugging our boat, and did so for nearly two hours. Mugging is where whales swim closely around your boat. You are unable to start your boat up or manoeuvre it until they are ready to let You go! They are unbelievably massive and elegant.

Sorry, we had to add a video as well

A very happy Taylah up close and personal

We watched as they twisted and turned their enormous bodies in the water within an arm’s length of the boat so that we could see their bulk. We were in awe when they waved to us or slapped their tails on the water and laughed when we were spurted with water or heard them communicating with one another. At times they would bob their huge heads out of the water and you could see their eyes looking right at you. We turned Japanese and literally took 500 photos so our apologies for putting our best three in the blog (or seven). Our tour guide said ‘it doesn’t get any better than this’.We all felt so fortunate to have experienced such a majestic moment and the kids learnt a considerable amount from the experience as they were taught about conservation as well such as why they are harpooned and why we should save them. For a family who were not planning on going on a Whale Watching cruise we are so glad we changed our minds and would recommend this for anyone travelling up this way.

TIP: Apparently it’s best to go on the Whale Watching Tour when the conditions are calm as the whales are more playful. We cruised with Tasman Ventures, a three tiered vessel that costs a family $300. At that price you get morning and afternoon tea and all the tea/coffee/hot choc you can drink and a free DVD on whales. As you can imagine, Mel basically drank their supply tea dry!