Day 6 – The Land Of The Large

After yesterdays fiasco, we had a fairly quiet day today. I think our body clocks are in line with the sun currently, so we’ve got a habit of being up and ready early. So by 8 o’clock we were packing the car and getting ready for our 3 hour trip to Mooloolaba, with a stop or two along the way. I personally spent the majority of the trip working on yesterdays blog, but whenever I popped my head up and looked out the window, there was always something interesting to look at.

With a comfort stop already under our belts, we were heading to our planned stop when we decided we were hungry. We spotted a park while we were driving through Gympie, which has a little cafe sign and a food truck out the front. When we pulled up, we realised that the cafe, which was attached to a museum focussed on the gold trade in Gympie was closed. Talking with the lady on the truck, she told us about how this area was devastatingly impacted by the recent floods in Queensland, and that they are working out of the truck in order to bring in some money while they work on repairs for the museum building, which houses the cafe. Unfortunately, they are still a few months away from being able to reopen to the public. While waiting on some food, we noticed a line that was drawn on the cafe window, with “flood level” written above it. Considering that where we were standing was actually quite a way up a hill looking down into the valley below was quite confronting, and very sad. everything below us was under water. The fact that these guys are up and getting it done with a smile on their face is incredible.

Once we had finished eating, and I had stopped feeding the Bin Chickens (ibis), we got back on the road. Next stop is The Big Pineapple! Now, no one should go to the “Big” attractions with high hopes of great quality, but the Pineapple was pretty good. There are also some development plans in the works to update the surrounding area and hopefully become the tourist attraction it was meant to be.

We kept driving until we reached the accommodation, which is right on the beach in Mooloolaba – what an incredible view! This room is a fully serviced apartment, so we came in a put a load of washing on before we kept going for the day. We had one more place on our list today, which was a lovely waterfall in a park just outside of town, which was lovely and green and peaceful. When you get down to the bottom, theres a small lagoon you can swim in which is at the base of the waterfall. We were running out of light quickly, so we only had a quick stop here before heading home. Right now we’re heading out for food at a local Japanese restaurant and get ourselves ready for another day tour. Tomorrow we’re heading to the Noosa Everglades Experience, where we get to boat the river and explore on a canoe for a bit. It should be fun!