Sunday 1^st September Maleny

Today didn't get off to a great start. All was fine – slept well, no rush, left the house in plenty of time – until we got to the station. Bus replacement on the Cragieburn line. (Why no mention of this on the PTC Journey Planner, which I checked last night?)

So – how long will it take to Broadmeadows, on the replacement bus? “Ask the driver.” But there's no bus there yet!

Slightly fuming, we decided that the best option was to walk to Southern Cross (just as fast as the train, as none were due for ten minutes) and catch Skybus. Not my preferred way of doing it, and significantly more expensive, but we had little choice. At least we got some exercise before sitting on a plane for two hours, and we got to the airport at about the same time as our original plan. And got on the (very full) plane with no hiccups.

When we landed, I changed into shorts; and left Alison waiting for our bags while I went over to the train station, where I worked out how the system works here and bought two “Go” cards. I walked back to find Alison coming over with both our bags.

The train took us to Brisbane Central Station, where the lady in the ticket office gave us a map of town, and another worker pointed us in the right direction to get to the centre of town; and off we went. We found a tourist info in the Queen St. mall, where we got a better map and a bit more advice; for some food, the best option was a Food Hall. Here, we had a bahn mi (a very disappointing one) accompanied by some sweet potato chips and a Vietnamese iced coffee; and it was time to return to the station to catch the train to Landsborough, 1½ hours away to the north.

At 4pm we arrived, and were met by Jane Kennedy in her Tesla. The first time I'd been in a Tesla; she drove us the nearly ½ hour drive up to Lyola, a very scenic trip through the hills with fine views of the Glasshouse Mountains to the south; and showed us to our very comfortable room.

Then, we sat at the table on the verandah and talked. I changed back into my jeans, as it was getting cooler. Cooler, not cold. We all went inside to help with dinner, then returned to the verandah to eat it, and talk more. Till nearly 9pm, when we all went in and went to bed.

Monday 2^nd September Brisbane

After breakfast – our usual sort of breakfast – we went for a walk around some of Jane's 100 acre property – on which she has put a covenant to protect its natural bushland, as much as possible. It is a lovely spot, but she is less keen than she was on renting out her two Pavilions, and the amount of work in maintaining the property is substantial – and she, like all of us, is getting older.

We walked through the bush steeply down to her creek, where there is swimming hole – though the water is very cold. Jane's having some trouble with her knees, both of which were injured in a car accident years ago; but she's obviously used to the quite steep path down to the creek. We returned back up to the house, where I removed the second of the leeches which had tried to have a go at me; then another walk out the other side through her dry vine forest. “Dry” I suppose, but the whole area is so lush; elkhorn ferns everywhere, orchids, vines......

It was time for a coffee, before Jane fed us some lunch and we returned down the hill to Landsborough Station, and the train back into Brisbane. Alison felt a bit bad about “imposing” on Jane, but we talked a lot, were easy friends to have stay for a night, and Alison would have behaved just as Jane did, if the positions were reversed.

Another 1½ hours on the train, change at Central, and we got off at South Bank station. It is sort of near the river, but it was not obvious from the station; I was a bit grumpy. Not good. Our map was not up the the task of guiding us across to the Wellington Hotel, 2km away; we had to use the phone. (The last part was theoretically through a park, but there were no paths through it – just lawn – so wheeling our bags wasn't practical; we used a road instead.)

The hotel is fine; a quite big room, with a functional kitchenette, a balcony looking towards the city, and not too posh. It was time to do nothing for a while, and that's what we've done. A coffee, a walk out to the nearby supermarket; a read; a dusk walk down to the river; watch the news, make some dinner.

Tuesday 3^rd September Brisbane

In the huge bed here, we both slept very well; and woke up to a cooler day – a perfect day for a walk. So after a relaxed breakfast, that's what we did.

We were heading for Southbank and the West End, which we thought may be a nice low-key neighbourhood shopping area. We took the direct route, down Vulture Street; passing a community garden in the corner of the park, where you could pick their herbs. Vulture Street was direct, but it was quite noisy and had a reasonable hill in the middle; not a perfect route. When we got to Southbank, we turned off and walked down the winding Arbour St. instead.

We walked up to the north end, where there is the Cultural Centre – museum, art gallery, library, GOMA. Into the library, where we did brain drain for ½ hour, then out to the Muse Cafe. Here, I had an almond croissant with my coffee; I was expecting to be disappointed, but it was huge and very good. (Alison's choice of a cinnamon scroll was not.)

A walk around the fossil part of the museum (very interesting) and then we set out for West End, which was perhaps a 20 minute walk away. We went to a big supermarket and bought more than we expected – including a lot of food for our Overland Track walk in November – and visited some op shops. Not at all good op shops, with clothing only and quite small; until we went to the last one, which was a bit off the beaten track.

From here, we caught the free No.86 bus back to the Art Gallery, had our afternoon coffee (lunch got missed out today), had a look around the art gallery (large areas closed for changes of exhibitions) and then walked down to the Southbank Jetty, where we got on the CityHopper ferry to go home.

CityHopper is a free service, but it is not a fast one; the trip to Dockside, the closest spot to our hotel, takes 40 minutes. But it was a pleasant trip, although by now it was beginning to get dark, and was getting colder as well. So we walked briskly back home, getting there at ~6.30pm. We hadn't expected to be out for such a long time!

And Alison cooked another nice dinner, and I washed up. She can't, really, with her thumb in its splint.

It's been a good day and has changed our plans for how to get to the station on Thursday. CityHopper it will not be!

Wednesday 4^th September Brisbane

Another day in Brisbane. Today was cooler, and another walking day; even though we can take a bus, we tend not to. We set off through our nearby park, and along to the river; and walked along, towards Southbank. Our first destination was the Botanical Gardens, but they're on the other side of the river; there are lots of bridges, but none terribly convenient. So when we saw a CityHopper ferry at Maritime Museum, we got on and were taken across to Riverside. This is a reasonable distance north of the gardens, and there's a lot of riparian building works going on; so we were detoured through the edge of the city.

We found lots of large groups of walkers coming our way, all wearing shirts saying “Spirit to Cure”; Alison asked, and found they were all (more than 1,000 of them, I think!) Suncorp employees doing some sort of walk for charity?

We got to the gardens, walked through (they're not a patch on Melbourne's), and across the Goodwill Bridge back to Southbank; where we walked north, up to the museum and the Muse Cafe for another almond croissant. Just as good as yesterday's but I think I've had my fill of them.

After a brief trip up to GOMA (nothing very intesting and also in the process of changing exhibitions) we went back to the library and did brain drain. And with that over, went up to the library's exhibition of portraits, done for the Brisbane portrait prize. A lot of these were very impressive; and especially so was a section done by late secondary schoolchildren. What talent there is!

Time to go home. We tried out Stanley St., south of Vulture St., but it was no better; very busy with cars and crossings near the freeway with seemingly no regard for pedestrians. No matter. Home by 4pm, as intended, and we put a load of washing on, sat on our balcony, and had a coffee and biscuits.

And little else; cooking dinner using up our food, dealing with the washing and ironing some of it... Tomorrow, we need to repack our bags (which have exploded a bit) and catch the train from Southbank to Nerang at 11am.

Thursday 5^th September O'Reillys Lodge

We packed everything up, ate the last of our breakfast food, and walked out of the Wellington Hotel at 9am. No hurry; we need to catch the train to Nerang at 11am. We walked back to Southbank, retracing our steps in coming here – it is the best route.

As we planned to go to the library to read the paper, before going to the Muse Cafe for coffee, we walked up to Grey St. with the intention of catching the free bus; but it took too long to come, so we walked up to the library. Then coffee, then to the station where we caught our 15 minute late train.

In the train, I realised I didn't have my phone. Not happy. I rang it – no answer. So I had to use Alison's phone to ring Rita and tell her we were 15 minutes late.

But that didn't matter; they were a bit late too, and all worked well. We piled into Rob “The Happy Traveller”'s van, and by soon after 2pm we were dropped off at O'Reilly's lodge.

We checked in. We are (happily) not too close to Rob & Rita. It's 7º cooler here than the coast, but the sun had come out and it was very pleasant. After unpacking a bit, I rang my phone again – and was answered. It had been handed in at the library; so I left my details and Rita will pick it up when they are there after the Auswalk trip.

While I was persuading myself not to worry too much about it, it's good to know where it is!

We went to afternoon tea at 3.30pm, then a talk by the manager about O'Reilly's history and its various sections (it can accommodate a total of ~500 people, and has a staff of 136!).

Now, it was getting late in the day. Nonetheless, we set off on a walk of ~5km to Python Rock. We got there, as the sun was setting, seeing that the controlled burns set across the valley were still burning; and seeing some lyrebirds as well. We got back without needing torches, which this time we had carried with us.

As we passed Rob & Rita's room, we knocked. Rita continues to worry about all sorts of things! And we came home to a pre-dinner chips and wine. Very nice.

Then a fine dinner with Rob and Rita before we returned to our cold room and worked out how to turn the split on.

Friday 6^th September O'Reilly's Lodge

We had a cold room in the evening but I was toasty in bed, and had to uncover myself a couple of times. I'd put the alarm on for 6.15am, but we were awake before that; we threw on some clothes and went out to the early-morning bird walk. A large group of people, many with very big cameras, and an interesting and informative guide. We saw and heard about log runners, bowerbirds Regent and Satin, whipbirds, catbirds.... until it all finished at 8am, and despite being quite warmly dressed I was feeling the cold a bit.

So we came home, had a nice hot shower, and went down to a very good breakfast, on our own. It was 9.45am before we set out on the day's walking – a shortish walk to (and up) Mick's Tower, through the wishing tree, along to the Morans Falls lookout, and then back to O'Reilly's – where we stopped at the cafe and had our morning coffee.

The next walk was longer – out along the Border Track to start, then down, down, down on the Box Forest Circuit, to Canungra Creek. Through lovely rainforest with lots of massive brush box trees, amongst all the others. We lunched on a rock on Canungra Creek, at Nuguran Falls. From there, the track followed the creek – but followed it quite steeply uphill. When we were nearly at Elabama Falls we found Rob and Rita, who were a bit lost. They'd accidentally taken a wrong turn and were walking the other way; so we put them right, and walked most of the way back with them. Till we were nearly back, when Rob tripped and fell flat on the track.

He recovered – with a few grazes – but then went straight back home, while we went to the overgrown Mountain Botanical Garden and then the Tree Top Walk – the first of its kind in Australia. Then home. 4pm or so.

We returned to the Tree Top walk, and this time climbed the 2-stage enclosed ladder up the tree at one corner – to a height of 30 metres above the ground. Good views, and close to the tree canopy; but – high!

We had dinner with Rob and Rita again, this time with the “tasting paddle” of five O'Reilly's wines she won in the quiz yesterday. Another excellent meal and we're not a stuffed as last night. And our room is warm.

Saturday 7^th September Binna Burra

We packed up, mostly, before breakfast; the cask of wine and the chips had to go in a separate bag to avoid being squashed. By 8.20, we'd dropped off our bags at reception, written postcards to Jack and Frankie, and set off on the 24.6km track to Binna Burra.

(Alison started counting the number of people we came across on the track, to compare with the 34 allowed per day on the Overland Track. The count came to more than 50 – a number of whom were running the track.)

It was longish, but very straightforward – basically, you followed the Border Track all the way. The track was all reasonable – some better, some worse – and I was impressed with some of the track work which had been done, many years ago.

The vegetation and birdsong varied as we went along; there were good views, but also a fair amount of smoke haze obscuring the view.

Our first stop was after two hours, at Bithongabel – one of the few spots here with enough clear space to put up a tent, and a lovely spot. It used to have a view, but trees grew. Then we passed Wanungara Lookout, but the view was obscured by smoke haze; we continued to Mt. Merino, a 10-minute side trip, to a lovely spot with a very good lookout atop high cliffs. It was midday, and ate our lunch and finished our thermoses of coffee.

We walked on. It was another 2½ hours walking, mostly easy downhill but not entirely; the bush changing as we went. We had a brief stop at Joalah Lookout, and went on; the last kilometre, as so often, seemed to go on for far too long. But at 3.30pm, we walked into Binna Burra.

Here began a different part of the day. We walked the 700 metres to our SkyLodge Studio, where our bags had been delivered to. A magnificent view to the north – even from the bath – private balcony, huge bed, coffee pod machine and a plunger, hot chocolate, gas log fire, microwave, hotplates..... even a clock!

So we had a coffee and some food on the balcony, and both had a bath; clean clothes – different people! I had a background worry about how Rob and Rita were faring (we passed them quite early this morning and had not seen tham since), but they got in about an hour later.

We walked the 700 metre each way to the tea house for dinner. A very nice dinner, again.

Sunday 8^th September Binna Burra

A sort of sleep in today – there was no hurry. As good as yesterday's bath was, the shower here also is good and spacious – the first one we could share since leaving home.  And we went off to breakfast – not a buffet, here, so we shared a big breakfast and fruit bread; and I had a very nice dirty chai too.

It was 10am by the time we set off. Back uphill along the border track, then downhill to the Daves Creek circuit. It was a nice walk; through yet more huge trees, into more sandstone country with lot of really tall sheoaks, then ti tree, then low scrub as we got near the edge of an escarpment with good views down to the Numinbah valley and across to Springbrook National Park.

Then we had to go up again. That's what happens. We climbed up Surprise Rock, and had to climb down to the same way; and then got to the optional extra walk to Upper Ballanjui Falls. We took it. It went down, down, down; past Ngarigoon Falls, some cascades, Ballanjui Cascades, Booboora Falls, and then the end at the top of Upper Ballanjui Falls, with views down to the valley.

Then we had to turn around and go up, up, up. We got back home at 3.30pm, read on our balcony in the sunshine, had another bath....

We walked over to dinner with Rob and Rita. Slowly. Rob has been difficult, Rita has worried; Alison is very good with them, but... it's quite hard work sometimes.

Monday 9^th September Springbrook

We were all packed and walked over to breakfast – which didn't open till 8am, by which time there was quite a crowd waiting to get in; including some from a bushwalking club in Ballarat. Serious people and they didn't tempt us to join a bushwalking club!

We were first in, and first to get our breakfast; we wanted to, because Rob the happy traveller was coming to collect us at 8.30am. We were ready, but our lunches weren't; we had to wait ten minutes for them. Then away we went.

We were being dropped at Numinbah Valley; Rob and Rita wondered about starting further on, at Apple Tree Park; but Rob the happy traveller persuaded them to go the whole way. “It's only 13km.” So off we all went. This went, after a little section with some creek crossings, up a very steep 4WD track, to a flat clearing at Woonoongoora Walkers' Camp. No water here, 12 smallish campsites which were all empty, and which all needed to be booked with National Parks!

On. We knew it was up again; somewhere around 950 concrete steps up. It was quite a slog, and produced a lot of sweat. We came out to the Springbrook Road at Apple Tree Park; a picnic ground with toilets, but nothing else. A good spot for lunch.

Despite being there for an hour, part of it talking to two young Hungarians, Rob and Rita didn't appear. It was 4km along the road to the village of Springbrook, but that's not the route we took. We went down 245 vertical metres to Little Nerang Creek, crossed it, continued up the other side to Warringa Pool, and further along got to the Purling Brook Falls circuit, where we made a slightly wrong turn – we walked it anticlockwise instead of clockwise. Although in the end it made little difference, it meant our track notes were useless; and the signage was almost non-existent. So we kept walking up, along more major paths, but with no real idea of where we were going or how far it was to get there. We just kept walking.

We eventually got to the end, at the village of Springbrook, at 4.30pm. It had been quite a long and hard walk, with lots of uphill. We rang Wayne from the Mouse's House, and he came and picked us up, and drove us the 5km there.

We had hoped that this would be a very nice place, but were disappointed. There are 14 cabins, and we are in “Happy”. It has a large double spa bath, but... it's full of glitzy stuff; an iPad instead of an information folder, but when you try to look something up it just says “loading..”;weird lighting (inluding some blue lighting) but all in all not very good lighting despite there being so much of it; coffee pod machine, but no coffee pods; trendy rustic wooden table and chairs, which are really heavy and difficult to use; a bed sticking out into the room so youu tend to bump it when going past; a shower with two options for shower heads, but no idea about how to change them...

Food in the fridge to cook for dinner on the barbecue outside; but nowhere near the standard of the food packs we've had in similar situations before.

Enough! We had a shower, put on clean clothes, and managed to get some heating working. We visited Rob and Rita, who finally got here near nightfall; left them to shower and relax and came back and cooked dinner.

Tomorrow? Who knows?

Tuesday 10^th September Springbrook

There were two options given for walking today; a two hour, 100 vertical metres; or a five hour, 450 vertical metres. I was strongly leaning towards the shorter of the two, and this was reinforced by thunder and heavy rain in the middle of the night; which also pointed out the very good luck we've had with the weather, so far.

The windowless bedroom here meant we didn't really wake till nearly 8am. And there was no rush. We visited Rob and Rita (more worries!) and walked over to reception, with our iPad. Wayne rebooted it and showed us how it was sort of working, and we bought two coffee pods for the machine.

Back home, we did some labelling of photos before using our coffee pods (which made a very good coffee.) Then, out for the walk – carrying two “Bunnings” umbrellas, borrowed from reception. And just as well! The Twin Falls circuit took us down to the base of a high cliff, past Twin Falls (where there was a large school group), along to Blackfellow Falls (where the track went behind the waterfall), back up to the cliff top, and back. It was here that the rain began, and it did not let up. We got back to the beginning of the circuit, then walked home, turned on the lights (inside was very dark) and lit the fire – properly, this time.

We read in front of the fire, ate our lunch, and listened to the rain outside. We didn't really go outside again; it was wet and gloomy. Alison made a salad, and bacon sandwiches, to have for our lunch tomorrow; we kept the fire going well, cooked our dinner and ate it with the last of our cask of wine (I am amazed that it has lasted as long as this!), and a drop of whisky later on as well.

Wednesday 11^th September

Last day. Rob the happy traveller was coming to pick us up at 9am; we were awake before 7am, so it was a relaxed morning, getting everything packed up, and having breakfast, and leaving everything clean and neat. We waited out the front with Rob and Rita.

Then off we went – for perhaps 20 minutes or so, when we stopped with a flat tyre. Just change it? No – the spare tyre, underneath the car, had fallen off! There was no spare. So Rob THT called Tony, who set off to pick us up. But he wasn't just around the corner – it was at least an hour before he finally drove up. We had a lot of waiting time, some of which was spent adjusting Rita's day pack to fit her better; then doing the same for Rob's, only to find that he didn't like it better adjusted to his height and wanted it back the way it was.

We were due to be at the airport at 11.55am. Tony drove a Tesla, whose screen suggested an arrival time at the airport of 11.53am. And despite heavy traffic on the freeway – at one stage stationary – that's about when we got there. Just in time! Goodbye to the others and drop off our bags, go through security – and relax.

Alison bought me a coffee and we sat and ate our very good lunch, made last night out of leftovers.

And we got on to the plane. A very full plane, as usual.

A good trip but we'll be happy to be back home. Alison will be very happy to get the wire out of her broken thumb!