My friends and I spend a lot of time looking at maps. When we saw a remote place up in the hills behind Mt Sylvia called “Paradise” our curiosity got the better of us – we felt compelled to visit.
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Category: Scenic Rim
Border Bash
Words fail me when I try to describe the rugged beauty of the Border Track which follows the precarious ridge along the state border between Queensland and NSW.
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Highland Holiday
Liz and I recently took advantage of the Queens Birthday long-weekend to have a short holiday up in the mountains near the Border Ranges
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Cannon Creek
Every so often we’re lucky enough to do a ride which I’d call “Iconic” – something that reminds us how lucky we are to be able to explore this beautiful land on our bikes, and makes us want to bring friends back to see it with us.
I think today’s adventure through Cannon Creek in the “Scenic Rim” between Boonah and Rathdowney is one of those iconic rides.
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Mount Barney
“What lottery did I win to be able to see places like this every week?” I muttered to myself as rolled down a quiet road with the huge peaks of Mount Barney soaring above me.
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Mount Hennessy
After making it half-way up the mountain last week, we felt compelled to come back to the end of the Black Duck Creek valley and complete a loop up to the top of the range and back down via Mount Hennessy. As usual, it was steeper, rougher and more spectacular than we had anticipated.
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Black Duck Creek
If you head south from Gatton towards the Queensland border, you’ll eventually run into an imposing wall of mountains. The Great Dividing Range is difficult to cross here, except for a couple of hidden valleys. Today we visited Black Duck Creek and explored one of these secret pockets
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The Border Ranges
I’ve cycled through the Border Ranges a couple of times with friends. Both times it was raining, so we didn’t really get to see it at its best. So today I thought I’d take advantage of the recent run of specatcularly clear days and drove there for the day with my son, Jonathan.
While not being able to ride a bike for a few months has its disadvantages, there was one advantage – we had a lot more time during the day to stop and enjoy the views.
“The further south you go, the better it gets”, I said to Jonno as we drove south from Beaudesert. Just near of the border, along the Lions Road, we arrived at Running Creek. The road here crosses this pretty creek several times. It’s difficult to enjoy the view while driving, so we decided to get out and have a quick look around.
The interstate railway line crosses the range here via an unusual arrangement of loops and tunnels that were constructed about a century ago. We were able to look down on the system from the “Border Loop” Lookout.
(Pictures – Jonathan Ennis)
Our route meandered over more creeks and under several railway bridges until we eventually turned off onto the Gravel at Simes Road.
One of the joys of revisiting a special place is bringing someone who’s never been there before. Jonathan was stunned by the beauty and kept wanting to stop and take pics. I was happy to oblige.
We eventually arrived at “The Pinnacle” lookout after a long slow drive up the mountain. The last time I was here it was so cloudy and wet you could see nothing.
Today the beauty was overwhelming.
(Photo – Jonathan Ennis)
(Photo – Jonathan Ennis)
To quote John Williamson…. “You know, some people never see such things…” (The Cootamundra Wattle)
After carefully making our way down the other side of the range, we slowly made our way into Mount Burrell, in the upper reaches Tweed Valley. Believe it or not, this little stream is the Tweed River.
(Photo – Jonathan Ennis)
We found thls lady by the side of the road. She kindly posed for a photo with me but didn’t say much.
If you want to see some of the best scenery in South-East Queensland and Northern NSW in one day, I’d thoroughly recommend this drive. We drove a total of about 420km in just over 7 hours. I used most of a full tank of fuel.
Thanks Jonathan, for sharing it with me.
Oh – and thanks to my neighbor, Mike, who let me take his Holden Ute so far from home!