Noosa National Park - Osprey Dreaming

When we walked the Cinque Terre trail a few weeks back Jo and I were reminded of our many escapes from the world through the pathways of Noosa National Park, about an hours drive from our home in Queensland. Even Harvey commented that the Italians could learn something from the rangers that maintain the national park trails in Australia.

On Thursday, in twenty three degrees of winter sunshine, we walked from Little Cove on the edge of Noosa Heads to Hells Gate and back. Surrounded by Ti-trees and fruiting Pandanus (Jo’s favourite tree in all the world), we followed the coastline of pristine sandy beaches and pebble bays, shadowed by an Osprey as it fished the shallows for lunch. Beyond the many headlands dolphins played along with a green-backed turtle and further out in the green and blue, the Humpback whales took part in their annual migration from the Antarctic to Hervey Bay to breed.

Cinque Terre was awesome. Noosa National Park is awesome. The clarity and purity of the  ocean that is so close to the path you can touch it, the familiarity of the vegetation and birdlife and the beauty that has remained here since the dawn of time. People find their way down to the bay beaches to surf and sun bake and if you have the desire to be brown all over you can even do that anywhere along the kilometre plus of sand that is Alexandria Bay. 

Hell's gate + A- Bay

Shades of blue and green

We sat on the rocks at Hell’s Gate and watched the Osprey circle and swoop, nature’s perfect idea in action. Some students from the Netherlands exchanged stories with us about their adventures in Australia and assured us that The Netherlands is much warmer than Switzerland in winter and well worth a visit.

A-bay almost enticed us to rip our sweat-sweet hiking gear off and to take a nature plunge but memories of the hours whiled away at Little Cove over the past ten years or so called us back along the track.

Noosa National Park is an effortless, almost timeless experience of treating the senses to a day spa type experience without paying the entry fee. After almost two hours of meandering and soaking up the dreamtime that still lives here (in between the footprints and the rustling of the leaves), we were back at Little Cove to take the plunge. Some might call the water in the cove cold but for us it was on par with Lake Geneva in high summer. We found it refreshing enough to do a couple of laps with the schools of winter Whiting and the sun warm enough to lightly bake the salt lines on our bodies as we drifted off on the sand to that other place.

Star Rating: *****

Pandanus fruit

Looking towards Mt Tinbeerwah

Little Cove