K'Gari - Two Days in Paradise

The first day of the new tour starts with an early morning - at 6 AM, we board the bus heading towards Noosa, from where we go directly to Rainbow Beach and then to K'Gari, the largest sand island in the world. Rainbow Beach gets its name from the multi-colored sand, while K'Gari means 'Paradise'. Indeed, the island is like paradise, although the way to move around it is not. After a total of 2 hours of travel, we switch to a 4x4 bus in Noosa, which we can also use to navigate the island because the roads, like the entire island, are made of sand. The beach serves as a highway where you can drive up to 80 km/h and even small planes land. The roads are so bumpy that traveling feels almost like a roller coaster. It's amusing at first, but after several hours, it becomes exhausting, and I definitely wouldn't want to swap places with anyone who drank themselves half into a coma the night before and is having the worst hangover ever. Well, I wouldn’t want that even if I weren’t bouncing around in a hot bus with 20 other people on sandy roads...
Upon arriving on the island, we are greeted by a native with a ritual where we are painted with colors. This way, it is said, we symbolize to the ancestors that we are welcome here. Then we head to our accommodation, which is located in a fenced area as there are free-roaming dingoes (wild dogs) on the island, and we see one of them pretty quickly. We receive a long safety briefing about dingoes (don’t run, don’t go down on your knees, leave the fenced area only in groups and with a prepared dingo stick, make noise if necessary) as there have reportedly been some 'negative interactions' lately (i.e., dingoes attacking humans).
Next, we get back on the bus and head to Eli Creek, a stream that flows fresh water into the Pacific. You can 'enter' at one spot and let the current take you along through trees and shrubs; it's beautiful and relaxing. Here, I talk a bit more with a fellow traveler from Switzerland, which is nice as it allows us to switch back to German conversation and we understand each other well. This helps me gradually settle into the group. The night before, I felt somewhat out of place amidst the discussions of the 20-year-old British girls about the right outfits for the island.
After a detour to a shipwreck, we return to our accommodation, where I relax a bit in the hammock until the sandflies start to bother me. For dinner, we have steak, kangaroo sausage, and thankfully potatoes and salad. In the end, we hear an old island story around the campfire.
On the morning of the second paradise day, it is raining heavily, so we have breakfast to summon the sun and then head to Lake McKenzie. This lake has the clearest water and the finest sand I have ever seen, felt, or experienced. We swim, and when I finally want to read a few pages again, I get hit by another rain shower. No big deal. One advantage here is that you can just keep your wet clothes, wet bikinis, and wet hair on; it’s so warm anyway that the cooling feels good. After another bumpy ride, we are taken deep into the rainforest. I step off the bus and have to immediately close my eyes to take in the incredible soundscape.
The cicadas don’t sing, they don’t buzz, they don’t put on a concert; you would need to invent a new verb for what they do, alternating loudly and softly and in perfect harmony, as if a gas pedal is being pressed at regular intervals. I step slightly away from the group and take a few steps with my eyes closed into the forest (maybe not smart as there are snakes, spiders, dingoes, but whatever!), listening to the birds and how the drops of morning rain drum down from the leaves onto the trunks of the trees and the ground. When I open my eyes, our driver stands before me and says, 'I'll always recall that look on your face walking in this forest,' and I reply, 'I'll always recall the sound of this place you brought me to.' Then the sound level of the group approaches, and we walk a bit deeper into the forest, still listening and feeling, I let the others go back for one last solo moment in the woods.
After this auditory whirlwind, we are driven to another spot in the rainforest where we enjoy our lunch. Before that, the female part of the group sets out for a small walk as there are certain locations on the island that are 'mens only' or 'womens only' - this is a 'womens only' spot. On this path, we see holes in the sand marking the tunnel exit of a very poisonous spider (although I suddenly find spiders more interesting than ever before, I really don’t want to encounter this specimen) and a wonderful tree to hug. After lunch, we can paint on the ground with colorful sand and leave our handprints behind. After a stop at the beach, where we have a farewell with a smoking ceremony and the visit of two dingoes, we return and are taken along Rainbow Beach back to Noosa after the ferry crossing. Our hostel has a pool and a happy hour, so we can end the evening with gin and tonic in the water.