Steps and falls

Tuesday
The sun was shining again today and we decided to visit a couple of nearby waterfalls. Our first stop however was the look out over the Glasshouse Mountains, which we visited the first day in the rain and mist. This time we had a good view of the Mountains themselves though as usual the view became hazier with distance.

There are 2 waterfalls in the vicinity and we headed for the Mapleton falls first. This was further by car but a shorter walk from the car park once you got there. This involved retracing the journey home from the day before, passing yet again through Montville and Mapleton, where we turned off from the road from yesterday. The lookout for the falls is indeed only a 100m or so from the car park but you are virtually on top of the falls so you can actually see them. There was a photo in the info stand so we knew what they looked like.

From there we travelled back towards Montville to the Kondilla falls. These were some 1.3 km from the car park so it was a good hike. You first come across some small falls into a rock poll at Picnic Creek.

From there it’s another kilometre walking through the rain forest to the Rock pool above the main falls. There is, again, a slightly bigger fall feeding this pool. You can see the top of the falls from here as well but to see them in there entirety you need to climb back from the rockpool and then down again and walk to the look out. The falls are some 90m high and worth the walk. From there it is back up the steps and then the hike to the car park. I counted nearly 250 actual steps back plus the inclines along the path and through the park and picnic area near the car park. Needless to say I was perspiring freely in the heat by the time I got there.

That was enough for the day and we headed back to Maleny. There were numerous roadside stalls selling bags of avocados for $2 and sometimes macadamia nuts as well. Unfortunately the nuts were still in their shells and past experience indicates they are quite hard to crack. The avocados were almost as hard so in the end we didn’t buy any.

We picked up some stuff at the supermarket and had nachos for dinner.