We left the mainland on the Kingfisher Bay ferry from River Heads. Leaving from this location please ensure you have booked. We didn’t and we had to sit there and wait while the ferry came and went as we did not have a spot book despite being the first ones there. While we were waiting for our time to board, we booked our campsites, yes we left the booking until the last moment. The lady on the phone was helpful with booking our locations based on where we were roughly wanting to head, or so we though… The staff on the boat tell you when to board and where to park. {If you leave from Inskip, you board as you arrive. There are two boats at Inskip and they just go back and forth all day long with each trip taking approximately 10-15 minutes. The first ferry leaving at 6am and the last at 5pm daily.} On the ferry ride over is where everyone drops their tyre pressure, leaving from Kingfisher Bay there is plenty of time on the ferry to do this, the trip takes between 30-50 minutes. On the voyage over the Captain told as a few historical points about the island including an old XYZ mine that we were going past, noting the old xx equipment on the beach and xx area. The ferry pulls up to the dock, and you’re off, last on is the first off. 

The first night we stayed at Ungowa approximately 20kms south of where the ferry drop off point is. There are only a limited number of spots at this site and when we arrived a family and a couple were already set up. There is a Dingo-Aware storage locker at this location, but we just left all of our food locked up in the car. Unpacking our camper trailer I was at the front of the car as I was getting our bags out, and I saw my first Dingo. I stood still to allow it to walk past when all of a sudden very close to me, there was a second. I hadn’t even seen it and that is what scared me. Please be vigilant when around these animals, they are hunters, and that is their instinct. After freaking out about that I made Michael deal with the fact that the toilet was going to be set up inside the camper that night, and any further nights that we were not in a dingo fenced area. I am not going to die because I need to pee at 3am! 

The next morning we headed to our second campsite at Lake Boomanjin, but upon arriving found that you cannot set up camper trailers here. Also, there is no phone reception here to ring the parks line and discuss options! Note to self for future journeys to K’gari, don’t be those people! Book ahead and book online.  After finally getting phone reception long enough to speak to someone in parks, we found out a couple of booked locations were not suitable for campers, and needed to update our itinerary. 

We drove to Govi where we were now staying for two nights. This was a nice little spot and even had a home-made dingo stick! We had a little track that took us over a dune straight onto the beach where we took our camp chairs and did some 4WD watching. There were all sorts of 4WDs ranging from small to large, but mostly large, also, buses and motorbikes. During the day we explored the surrounding area: there was a loop road driving through Eurong; Lake McKenzie (Boorangoora) and Central. Lake McKenzie was absolutely beautiful; we had our pool noodles so we floated in the water there for a while. Approximately 8 kilometres from Eurong there was a crossroads and even though it was probably not the safest, I had to get out and have a look as it was such a beautiful intersection. Just near there is Pile Valley with some really beautiful big Satinay trees, these trees can grow up to 40 metres in height and have a 4 metre girth, totally substantiating yet another stop to hug a tree. 

Before we left the mainland we had pre-prepared meals in vacuum bags so we didn’t risk attracting wildlife, so dinners were quick and easy allowing us more time to be out and about during daylight. 

Our next stop was Cornwells for 2 nights, this camp was inside a dingo fence. There was one other family there when we arrived, they left on day two giving us the whole area to ourselves. The first morning I woke and went outside to go into our toilet enclosure when I heard something move. After calling for Michael the moving got a bit more vigorous and I imagined a snake being in there. There were no toilets there and I just wanted to pee, omg, please don’t be a snake. We managed to get the zip open and discovered a lizard that was pretty scared, upon trying to move the toilet and foam mats we had in there, we discovered it was actually two lizards, a pair of naughty brothers hiding from mum maybe. Michael pulled the tent pegs out of the enclosure and tipped the back up and away from us and they scrambled off into the bush. Gotta love camping! We spent a few hours on the beach watching cars drive past and get bogged, well, I watched and Michael helped everyone that got bogged. Our exploration around this area consisted of exploring; Lake Waddy and the lookout, watching aeroplanes land/take off on the beach, helping Danish tourists who were really stuck, and checking out a few of the sandblows and reading the signs to learn what a sandblow is and how it forms.  

Waddi Point Beachfront Campground was our next designation. You need to drive past Eli Creek on the way up, so we went for a walk up to see what the fuss was about and wow, totally worth the fuss. This was definitely a return to location. We stopped at the S.S. Maheno; The Pinnacles; Red Canyon; Indian Head; Champagne Pools and Orchard Beach and the Driftwood Bar – FYI fuel up here was $3.18/L (compared to approx. $2/L on the mainland). By the time we set up the camper and watched the sunset, that was our day done. The next day we drove along the beach up to Sandy Cape Lighthouse via Ngkala Rocks and Turtle Rookery. Due to the backlog of vehicles trying to get over the rocks the tide had turned by the time we reached the northern end of the island, and we only got to check out the RAAF No 25 Radar Station, the grave site and WW2 Bunkers. We did not have enough time to walk up to the lighthouse without getting stuck up there for hours, it would be impossible to drive around the point as the only option is the beach, there is no road and the tide was coming in fast. We did however stop along the way back to pick up a lot of large beach debris and drop it off at the Waddy Point transfer area. We had two large garbage bags, a large plastic bucket and a large plastic container full of mostly plastic rubbish as well as a few large pieces of thick heavy rope that we wound around the spare trye to get back. After our stay at Waddy Point on our way back south, we detoured inland and checked out Lake Allom. We parked our camper just north of the S.S. Maheno, then went and spent a couple of hours floating down Eli Creek in our inflatable rings. Make sure if you ever visit K’gari, you take an inflatable ring and allow plenty of time to float down this creek. We were meant to be catching up with some friends in a couple of days and spending a few nights on their boat doing some whale watching in the area, but a really bad storm front was heading in our direction. We decided to grab the camper and make a run for the last ferry off the island. Of course this would be the only time we get bogged. A lovely young couple stopped and helped us to continuously dig the tyres out, but not one person with a tow rope stopped and offered to help us. They just kept driving past and occasionally beeped stating frustration at where we were bogged. Our goal was to get from the S.S. Maheno to the Ferry Venture Ferry Landing (south of Kingfisher Bay) within 1.5 hours, so we started to get a bit worried when we were bogged and no one was helping us get out.  We managed to make it with only minutes to spare. The next day we were reading news stories about the wind and rain that was hitting the sites we were booked to stay at. Trees had even fallen at Central which was our next destination so we were more than happy with our decision to have departed. Another FYI, if you need to cancel any booking, unless you give 48 hours’ notice from the start of your booking, you will not be refunded, but at $6 a night, it is not a big deal if there is only a few nights booked.