The Bunya Mountains

We have now officially been to paradise! It is in the Bunya Mountains. It really isn't that far from Toowoomba -- less that two hours. You would not have thought that there would be signs, now would you?




As further proof that this is really paradise, here is a short video mostly to share the sounds of the rain forest on the mountain.

The roads to paradise are not always paved with gold. In fact, in some places there are reduced to a single lane of tar down the middle, with room on each side to move over for meeting or overtaking. I have always been amazed in the Tolkien books how the mountains just suddenly leap up from a flat plain quite unlike those in the eastern US. Here, however, that is exactly what happens. This flat, empty terrain is no more than 30 minutes from the edge of the mountains.

When you start up the mountain, it gets steep very quickly. On the way up, there were sections of 7% grade, coming down the other side there was a short section posted with a 20% grade!

We took 4 km walk through the forest and at one point we emerged to a bald place where we could
see.

This bald spot is the result of human engineering. The Aborigines set controlled burns on such places for millennia to clear the trees and promote the growth of grass.

Back in the forest, there were ferns galore.

When we stopped for lunch, we were visited by an Australian Brush Turkey and a Crimson Rosella.

And there were Redneck Wallabies out to feed.

The streams were covered with rainforest spinach.

And there was a strangler fig large enough to walk through.

You should come to paradise sometime and experience it for your self! Until then, you can see these photos and more on flickr.