Saturday, Jun 02, 2012 at 09:04
makintraks, Personally I would probably leave the van on the mainland and either hire a camper trailer, rent a house or stay at either
Eurong or Kingfisher Bay. There are a couple of
places to hire a camper from in
Hervey Bay if needed, and there is an assortment of houses to rent over there.
But if insistant on taking the van I would talk to the barge operators first to see whether they will take a van of that size over there and how much it would cost if they would. The barge at
Inskip point would be your best bet as it is a drive on drive off setup whereas the one at River heads is a reverse on and drive off when you get to the island but if you come back from Fraser Is that way you will drive it on over there but you will have to reverse it off when you get to the mianland which would not be a pleasant thing if the tide was low as the ramp angle is pretty wicked.
If you do get to the island I would park up south of
Indian Head and would then explore the northern section with your vehicle only. The tracks from
Indian Head are not what you would call tight but with the setup you have it will require some very careful driving. We have been up to
Orchid Beach a number of times with a hard floor camper trailer in tow and never had an issue but then again it is a lot lower (about 1.4m high as to around 3m) than your van, not as wide (1.85m as to 2.4) and certainly not as long (4.75m as to around 9+m) and weight (1.6T fully loaded, as to your van I would
hazard a guess and say around the 3.5T)
So if these figures are roughly correct then it will be a very hairy trip through some of the tracks and might even have the missus jumping out and making sure you don't take out anything mounted on the roof of the van. Plus the "swing around" on the back of the van when going around corners will have to be watched as
well.
On another note if you do get bogged in the sand there are not very many vehicles out there that will be able to pull your 200 series and van out. So make sure you get rated recovery hooks put on the front of the cruiser (do not use the tie down points most vehicles come with) and take a full recovery kit including an 11T snatch strap as
well as a long handled shovel and a minimum of 4 maxtrax (2 sets) (I would take 3 sets of maxtrax but that is me as I like to be fully self reliable and carry all the gear I feel I need to self recover).
I would also
check the tides when you want to go over as this will be probably your biggest concern as you don't want to hit the beach at high tide, 2 hours either side of low is a good start, but if there is a storm about this can change very quickly.
Not trying to scare you but just some things to have a good think about.
If you do go over to the "Island" have yourself a good trip, there is plenty to see and do.
Cheers
crd
AnswerID:
487432