Lamington National Park

---

---

On a Saturday we started out early to get to Lamington National Park. Once we reached Canungra, we headed up into the Mountains by way of a 36km, windy road that took about three quarters of an hour to drive through. The scenery was beautiful but the road was scary with the whole trip being blind hairpin turns all the way up.

Finally we reached the Green Mountain campground, situated next to O’Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat. Our campsite was situated right at the back of the campground in a hidden camping area for the Great Walk Hikers. We set up in a little alcove hidden behind some trees, very cute!

Lamington National Park has a number of walks. The first walking track we did was the Python Rock lookout, a short 3km walk passing through rainforest and eucalyptus with a platform at the end looking over the valley and Moran falls. We then went the other direction and walked to Moran falls where the water has eroded the volcanic rock away and overtime became a waterfall. Both of these are beautiful and quite easy walks to do.

We then headed back to camp for some lunch, wine and R&R. Lunch and wine were lovely; however, for the next 2 hours the sky was filled with helicopters. They were bright yellow so we figured they were probably private transport to O’Reilly’s or tourists rides. Whatever they were they went on for hours and seriously killed my zen, to the point where I would probably not recommend camping here on the weekend if you’re there to relax.

We then had dinner, more wine and as you do when camping, headed to bed early. It got very cold quickly. It was quite windy during the night and the bush turkeys kept jumping on our table, which was irritating.

In the morning we had breaky and then packed up. We were going to do another short walk but due to my female navigational skills we drove out in the direction opposite to where we needed to go to do the walk so we decided to head home slowly.

We stopped off at a lama farm/shop/cafe. There were some cute Lama’s in the paddock. The gift show was nice but really expensive, but if you walk out the back of the shop to the cafe sit down area there is an amazing view of the mountains, definitely worth the stop just for that!

Further down we came across a winery, Sarabah Estate. The signs seemed to indicate you needed to book to see the vineyard, so we kept going. I later found information at the visitor’s centre, which indicated otherwise. We drove a little further and came to O’Reilly’s Vineyard; we stopped here while I did a tasting, $3 for 5 tastings and tried a lovely sparkling chambourcin. One thing I have found in QLD is that a lot of cellar doors charge for tastings. Usually it is refunded if you buy something but still quite irritating.

We then drove into Canungra for lunch. We checked out the historic Canungra Hotel and then had pie at the Outpost Cafe before heading home.

---