Road Trip From Brisbane to Airlie Beach

There was a joke when I was a kid that alternated between statements of good and bad news. I am going to attempt a parody of that joke here:

Good news: I found a ride north from Brisbane.
Bad news: The ride is not going all the way north to Cairns, as I wanted.
Good news: The ride is going about 90% of the way to Cairns, to Airlie Beach, from which I should be able to get a ride to Cairns pretty easily.
Bad news: Should be able to.
Good news: The ride is from a girl.
Bad news: The girl is French.
Good news: There is another girl in the car.
Bad news: She is also French. And does not speak much English.
Good news: They are both easy going enough and the driver is a decent driver.
Bad news: More French music than you can shake a stick at.
Good news: They have friend in Noosa Heads, our first stop.
Bad news: For some reason, I am not allowed into the residence of the friends.
Good news: I am allowed to sleep in the car.
Bad news: I am not invited to dinner or to hang out with them.
Good news: Not a big deal. They can enjoy their French conversation without the pressure to translate for me and I can entertain myself.
Bad news: There is nothing to do in Noosa Heads. It is not a place to see stuff but rather a place to be seen.
Good news: I had an opportunity to fulfill a goal of seeing a movie, in theaters, on each continent I visit.
Bad news: I failed at this goal a long time ago.
Good news: Whatever, I still got to see a reasonably priced movie.
Bad news: The best option of movies was Grown Ups.
Good news: Surprisingly Grown Ups was not terrible.
Bad news: The following morning we were waking up at 5AM so that they can go surfing. I was invited but was not allowed to use a board.
Good news: I took a awesome picture of them silhouetted against the rising sun, with surf boards headed out to the water.
Bad news: I was not going surfing.
Good news: I got to do some excellent hiking in Noosa National Park instead of surfing. And, their surfing sucked because of the tide.
Bad news: We did not have a chance to visit North Shore, which is supposed to be nice and empty.
Good news: We headed off early enough to cover some good distance and spend some time in the a quick stop over, Hervey Bay, upon my request.
Bad news: Once we turned off the main highway to go to Hervey Bay I was asked, "This is 70 kilometers away, are you sure you want to go?"
Good news: I asked them to let me out of the car and we split ways.

They let me out at a McDonald's upon my request because there is free wifi there. We said our goodbyes without hard feelings. I figured out some semblance of a plan, sent a couch surfing request to the only CS hosts in Hervey Bay that had logged in more recently than a week ago, and started walking down the road with my thumb up. After about 20 minutes some guy picked me up and drove me to Hervey Bay Centro, the main bus stop in Hervey Bay. As soon as I got out of the car and gathered my bags, I rushed to a group of people getting in a maxi (a taxi that holds 10 people) and asked if there was room for one more. Other than the maxi driver and the guide everybody in the maxi was American. The group was on some volunteering trip in New Zealand and Australia. The main guide was Australian and ran the show and there was a secondary guide, who was American and 25, that seemed to be an intermediary. The rest of the group was 16 to 18 year old and the ride there was kind of strange. I guess I had forgotten what people are like at that age. Either way, I got a ride into town and, since I had not heard from the CS host that I sent the request to, found a place to sleep for the night.