So much to do and so much to see. I love showing the Goldcoast to visitors. It also gets us out and about.
Are you like me, when you have lived in an area for a number of years you stop seeing it? Day to day routine takes over and old habits just wrap around me like a comfy blanket. Then some one comes to visit and all of a sudden I am seeing my home town with fresh eyes.
It is about 5 years since we went for a drive up the mountain to Lamington National Park. It is a lovely drive the road twists and turns passing through a couple of small villages and up into the heritage listed rainforest. Our first stop was at Mt Tamborine village, a very popular tourist destination, to visit the gallery walk. A street lined with craft shops, fashion and jewellery boutiques, cafes and restaurants.
A shower came over as we left Mt Tambourine and I wondered if we would make it right to the top of the mountain. The road is quite narrow and in places only one way sections to negotiate through. But we carried on. A short stop at Canungra to buy sausages for a BBQ then it was into the rainforest.
The rain has stopped but it is windy and over-cast, time to put warm jackets on for a walk through the rainforest to the tree-top walk-way.
(I have found this terrific link about Lamington National Park and O’Reillys it has the virtual tour that I have included below. It is the next best thing to being there.)
Four years after the arrival of the O’Reilly Family, Lamington National Park was declared, thus effectively isolating the O’Reilly’s from the outside world. While Lamington wasn’t Queensland’s first national park, it is the most significant, and was regularly referred to as ‘Queensland’s National Park.’
World Heritage status was bestowed on Lamington in 1994 in recognition of its high biodiversity, and the fact it has a living museum of the evolutionary steps taken in the development of Australia’s modern day flora. It now includes 20,200 hectares of varying forest types, from temperate Antarctic Beech forest high on the border ranges through the sub-tropical rainforests, to the dry eucalypt forest of the northern escarpment.
Lamington National Park provides food and shelter for a huge array of sub-tropical bird life (over 160 species), reptiles, frogs, mammals and invertebrates.
This is the O’Reilly’s section of the mountain and the O’Reilly family have lived here for over a hundred years. It is now a retreat with various styles of accommodation. There are many walks through the forest and it is renowned for the bird life.
The most popular walk is the tree-top walk. Just a short 500 metres stroll from the car park a sturdy board walk takes you up into the canopy of the rainforest. Then for the brave a ladder is attached to one of the tallest, and hopefully, sturdiest strangler fig trees which takes you 30 metres above the forest floor and a magnificent look-out over the canopy.
The plan was to have a BBQ at the area provided with tables and electric BBQ’s but by now the rain had started again and the wind had a considerable chill factor and dusk was setting in, it would not be a good drive down the twisty road, so we made the decision to go back down to Canungra.
What a difference when we arrived at Canungra the wind had dropped the rain had stopped and we settled in the park for our dinner on the free BBQ.
So ended a great day out…
it is great
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Thank you for the comment
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You have great life
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Thank you, this is a beautiful country to live in
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Same! I love going for drives an exploring our beautiful city. Nothing puts a smile on my face more! Xoxo
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G’day Sechy Thank you for leaving a comment, I love to hear from other bloggers. We certainly do live in a beautiful area, always plenty to see and do
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What you have written us so true. We are always so busy touring newer places that we miss out on the city where we stay. You have inspired me to explore my own city as a tourist now 🙂
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Yes when we first came here we rushed around exploring every where but now it takes visitors to get us out again
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Yes it all looks sooo green and lovely, we never go up there at the weekends though as it spoils it all, we went to Canungra only a couple of weeks ago as they had a garden expo in the old hall, very cheap plants, love the green behind the gold.
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I agree about the weekend, even mid week it was hard to find a park at Tambourine.
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I just love Mt Tambourine! These are fantastic pics 😀
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Thanks Dianne, Tambourine is a great place to saunter around
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Seems like a great day – and beautiful pictures! I love the birds!
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There are usually many more than that but we arrived a bit later in the day and all the tourist buses had gone and the birds had gone off to roost
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How glorious!! Makes me want to go back to Australia soon!! Love the rosellas and the gorgeous beaded peacock!
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That little boutique had beautiful fused glass jewellery and ornaments, quite a unique design
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What a lovely place, you are so lucky.
The tucker looks worth waiting for.
Sft x
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Ah yes it was delicious, my son is an expert on the old barbie. 🙂
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Those Rosellas are so lovely. What a beautiful place to spend the day, Pommepal. Pity about the weather, but at least the rain held off for the barbeque. 🙂
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Yes we were lucky as it was only light showers and it only came when we were driving from place to place and stopped when we got out of the car
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A great place and a terrific day out. I understand what you mean about failing to see what is around you, we have American friends who have toured the UK and the area where we lived and he keeps saying, did you see this or that, and I’m ashamed to say that I haven’t seen most of what was just around the corner from us!
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It is certainly a good thing to have people come along with fresh eyes to see what has become common place. I also think the wordpress photo challenges help to keep me looking around
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lovely pictures !!!
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Thank you for the comment Gwennie
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looks like a good day out, every one enjoying themselves. The roads sound like the ones around here, not for the faint hearted. My those saugages look good I can almost smell them.
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Hi Sandra I would not want to drive those roads in the dark. Those sausages were good done the old Kiwi way, marinated with beer…
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great to see what you been up to, looks like Laurie and Kerry having good visit!
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Yes we had a good time, fortunately the weather was good
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You reminded me of our trip to Lamington National Park, a few years ago – nice memories.
I just love the free BBQs around for people to use – they are always so clean!
Looks like you had a great day.
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The BBQ at O’Reilly’s were coin operated ones but the ones at Cunungra were free. A bit grubby but nothing a drop of water couldn’t fix. All adds to the flavour… 🙂
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