Saturday 7 March 2026
Today we had a chance to get a little ways into the Australian bush, not the hot arid landscape but rather into the Tamborine Mountain Rainforest on a ship organized excursion out of the Port of Brisbane on a small group tour led by Bill, of Southern Cross Tours. On the 1:15 hour drive to our first stop, Bill filled us in on some of the history of Brisbane beginning with the founding of a remote penal colony for repeat offenders here in 1824 to its status as the capital of Queensland and Australia’s third largest city that’s looking forward to hosting the 2032 Summer Olympics. It’s a port city with a diverse economy and a sub-tropical climate supporting a laid back attitude and a outdoors oriented lifestyle. Brisbane and the nearby Gold Coast have a climate much like Florida but drier. Curiously many of the place names here have been borrowed from Florida and in fact Bill makes his home in Miami. It was fascinating to hear him tell of the fire dependent environment here. Of the the nine hundred species of gum trees (eucalyptus) that predominate the forests in Australia many are dependent on fire for reproduction and the high oil content of the leaves and bark can lead to incredibly intense forest fires that are impossible for firefighters to contain. Many landowners now follow the First Nations fire management practices using small carefully controlled fires to prevent catastrophic forest fires. Before long we arrived at The Manor in the community of Mount Tamborine for a Devonshire Morning Tea complete with scones, clotted cream, and jam then headed on in to Tamborine National Park and the Curtis Falls track where we walked the round trip of just 1 km to the viewing platform to admire the falls. Along the way we learned about the native citrus finger limes, the giant stinging tree, the bark shedding habits of eucalyptus trees, and the scrub turkey nesting behavior. Fascinating was the strangler figs that germinate in the crown of a host tree, send roots to the ground, and eventually surround the host tree which dies and rots away. We also spotted a pademelon for a couple of seconds before he hopped off into the brush. Next we had a bit of free time at Gallery Walk for shopping or refreshment. We checked out the gelato, incredibly creamy and pleasantly less sweet. From there we drove to an amazing overlook down into a huge caldera. It’s a spot favored by hang gliders although we did not get to see any. We did admire the sculpture rock. Then for yet another refreshment break we were treated to an Aussie BBQ lunch and wine tasting at O’Reilly’s Vineyards. It also offered an opportunity to visit some quite well behaved alpacas before taking a tour of some wide open grassy fields in the hope of spotting kangaroo. Instead we got to see an example of Australia’s largest bird of prey, a Wedge Tailed Eagle and his handler as well as Smithfield dog and his owner. On the way back to the highway we saw a mess of fruit bats in a tree in a neighborhood, a place where these noisy mammals are probably not appreciated despite their importance to the environment. It’s been a full day of exploration giving us more insight into a number of aspects of life on the Australian continent. Our world keeps getting larger and larger!
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