This Dreaming  Legend that has been handed down through time immeasurable  has a few variations. Each version has a maiden called Murrawar who falls in love with the Rainbow entity whom she loves. Murrawar sings her sweet songs to the Rainbow spirit every morning.One day a very bad man, Burwilla (or old husband in some versions) steals her and beats her cruelly to make her work. She runs away along the beach and Burwilla chases her and throws his killer-boomerang.  She calls to the Rainbow entity that comes running to help her; but the Rainbow spirit is hit by the killer-boomerang, thus forming the Coloured Sands hills along the beach. Some stories have a Rainbow man who is the maiden’s lover, others have a couple of warriors in the story who call on the Rainbow entity to help the maiden; but whatever the version the Rainbow is shattered to form the remarkable hills of Coloured Sands stretching for miles along the pristine beach. 

This is the poem from the first novel of the trilogy that gave credence to the title:

Mary’s Dream

She drifted intoa dreamy world where

frothywater washed onto a beach of coloured sands –

the colour ofpeople - black, white, yellow and brown;

then suddenly ahuge wave, whipped by a fierce wind,

churned and  swallowed the coloured sands 

that kept swirling and curling, around and over, 

this wayand that way until one colour emerged - 

the colour of tan. 

People walked proudly out of those waves – 

beautiful golden tanpeople, the colour of all people combined

 and the eyes thatshone from those beautiful, 

golden, tan faces were full oflove and peace.

Rainbow Beach on the Sunshine Coast is perfectly situated in Queensland's south east between Frazer Island and the resort town of Noosa. 

Coloured Sands Trilogy by Barbara Hartmann King ...