Read ext3 filesystem on Mac OS X Snow Leopard
Solution 1:
i finally ended up using oracle virtualboxvm with an ubuntu natty box guest addition. setting up shared folders and making usb work is not for the light-hearted. used rsync after to copy, still got some errors, but still the best shot at it. (btw, writing to disk works smoothly too).
All in all, it is kinda sad that in 2011 you still need to be a hacker to read a simple ext3 properly on a mac.