First of all, Hervey Bay is just that – a bay, or rather a coastal bay. It’s name is well enough known but should be thought of more as a region than a destination. The coastal region comprises three beachside neighbourhoods; Urangan to the east and nearest to Fraser Island, Torquay in the middle and Scarness to the west. There’s little to separate each with beachfront houses and motels linking them together.

We are staying at the Pier Caravan Site in Urangan. It’s a new site with very modern facilities and a number of 45-degree slabs and driveways making reverse parking much easier. The only downside, there is no shade – at least until the newly planted trees have grown tall enough. It’ll be more of an issue in the summer but fine for the rest of the year. You also feel as though you are in suburbia with the site surrounded by houses.

Urangan, incidentally the Aboriginal name for a dugong*, is home to an enormous pier, which provided deep water access to what is otherwise a very shallow bay for freight and produce being sent by rail to and from nearby Maryborough. Sadly no longer used for freight and at one stage being demolished, local residents campaigned to save the pier – well most of it. Originally reaching 1.1KM out to sea but only 868-metres remains. That’s still huge and a good return walk at the start of the day to watch the sunrise over Fraser Island and again at the end of the day to watch the sunset in the west.

Another popular walk is the 17KM beachfront Esplanade. Ideal on a sunny day with many trees providing shelter and pleasantly warm in the winter.

Hervey Bay is probably best known for its whale sightings, regarded as the best place in the world to watch Humpback whales. The humpbacks rest and play in the bay for a few days at a time as they head from the Antarctic to their breeding and birthing grounds of the Great Barrier Reef. The whales appear along most of the east coast of Australia and Hervey Bay in particular between July and October. The timing of our trip means we’ll most likely miss the whales but at least the temperature will be more comfortable and much lower humidity… and we can always return!

One of the main reasons for visiting Hervey Bay, though, is to explore Fraser Island, the world’s largest sand island and the only one with a rainforest. And that’s where we are heading next.

• Dugong – for our international friends a Dugong, also known as a sea cow, is a large ocean living mammal with front fins or paddles used like legs and a large fluke tail, similar to that of a whale. Partial to sea grass the Dugong is found mostly in shallow tropical and subtropical waters where it has easy access to food, which it eats with its huge, cow-like mouth.