16 August 2012 - Yandina Caravan Park, Sunshine Coast, Queensland

This morning we left lovely Brisbane after having this time done our best to visit its many attractions. Unlike Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide which we gave about a month each, Brisbane does not offer quite as much as those more southern cities. Of course for the holiday maker who is intent on spending their annual holiday savings, there are restaurants aplenty and shows that could be added to the list of activities we ourselves have enjoyed.

We travelled north away from Brisbane, noting even more road construction to add to that we have already seen whilst in the city. The population of this city in 2011 was estimated at just over two million and is the third largest city in Australia, a far cry from the “country town” it was when Chris briefly lived here nearly forty years ago. The city is growing quickly but not as fast as the coastal areas nearby. The Gold and Sunshine Coasts are growing even faster and it was to the latter we were headed.

Of course, it was on the Sunshine Coast that we really commenced our journey, once the caravan was set up with all the bits and pieces required for such a big open ended trip. It is here that our friends, Neil and Pauline, live, they who were so helpful as mentors when we first arrived in Australia in January 2011. Alas they are currently chasing the sun and escaping the winter, even such as it is on the Sunshine Coast, and last heard of, way north west of Cairns.

Today we took a slightly different route to that travelled previously, passing through Coobulture where we picked up fresh bread for lunch and then continued on north parallel to the Bruce Highway, joining the Steve Irwin Highway at Beerburrum. Because of this we passed much closer to the Glass House Mountains which we have seen from several angles as we have previously travelled in the vicinity.

The Glass House Mountains are a collection of twelve peaks, ranging  from those not much more than 120 metres ASL to Mount Beerwah at 555 metres ASL. They are all cores of extinct volcanoes and situated on an otherwise flat plain. When Captain Cook sailed up the coast in 1770 he named them Glass House Mountains because they reminded him of the huge glass furnaces back in his native Yorkshire. He obviously had a marvellous imagination.

Most of the land about or at least 2,117 hectares, have been incorporated into a National Park, the original acreage in 1994 and the last addition more recently in 2010. Perhaps if we had not already booked into this caravan park, we may have felt inclined to head into the national park to stay. This is the down side of being sensibly organised; it removes such spontaneous decisions.

We were settled in to our site by mid-afternoon, and did a short recci trip about the park. There are twenty two acres of land here beside the South Maroochy River, full of lovely cane palms, permanent park dwellers, some of whom live in the brightly painted onsite caravans reminiscent of Brighton’s beach boxes in Port Phillip Bay and the inevitable birds, including some insanely hilarious kookaburras. We have booked and paid for a week, all very sensible and all very frustrating as we have just tonight seen that Maryborough to the north is hosting the Camping and Caravan Show this weekend. We might have otherwise gone.