“Do you fancy climbing a mountain today?” I asked Nathan.

“Sure, where?” He replied.

“Glass House Mountains National Park. Just up the road…It’ll be fun!” I said

And this part of the story will be finished off a short while down this post.

I woke at 5am on Sunday morning as the sun was beaming through the tent. I got dressed and sat in one of our chairs and read a book by Cathy Glass from start to finish all before Nathan surface about three hours later. It was hot too even at that time in the morning so it was nice to catch a bit of early morning sun!

We actually cooked beans on toast for breakfast that morning too! We weren’t in a rush and our plan had just been to find ourselves a nice beach to laze around on all day! That beach would be Sunshine Beach in Noosa.Noosa was a very posh part of the country. Might not seem it to everyone else, but to us it did. The houses, the people, the shops, everything about it screamed ‘money’ but it was incredibly beautiful with Main Beach being named one of the top 10 beaches in Australia for 2017.The sun didn’t feel massively hot as we chilled out soaking it up. The clouds even began to roll in relatively quickly as the day went on and the wind added an extremely welcome refreshing breeze! To top it off, the waves were HUGE! It reminded me of the day in Manly after the storms when the beach was closed! Beach Closed??? Really???

It was nice to chill out and do nothing as well as trying to work on our tans that have faded insanely fast these last few weeks! The downside was, as always, we caught a bit more sun than we thought. After using the shower atop the steps to de-sand myself as I managed to get it in every possible place, I then stood by the car like a bit of a lemon, trying to dry off before getting in the car.Eventually I gave up and sat on a plastic bag to prevent my butt soaking the seat. We left the beach and headed to the cute town of Beerwah where we would stop by Woolies to grab some sausages, a $1 French stick and something to drink before ending up in Anzac Memorial Park in Kilcoy. Here, hot showers were advertised which was a welcome relief. The weird part is that we were all camped outside a school???There were lots of caravans and campers in this relatively small field. You could camp for free for 48 hours but it was very clear some of these people lived here. Some even cracking open a beer at 7am! I like my drink, but that’s even too early for me!The sausages, despite taking a while to cook, were delicious! By far my favourite camping food we have eaten, not that there’s been much choice! Noodles? Beans on toast? Noodles? Spaghetti on toast? I have absolutely loved living out of the tent and car! Might pitch a tent in my back garden when home so I don’t feel like I’m back to reality yet!

The sun was still hot until gone seven so we sat out until night set in.Waking up Monday morning was horrible. My face was so tight and my eyelids slightly swollen to the point I couldn’t see fully, it looked like I had way too many Botox injections. I looked horrific! I got up, showered, for a looooong time and sat waiting for Nathan to get up whilst applying copious amounts of after sun to my face! That was the result of a few hours in the clearly-it-was-insanely-hot-you-idiot sun. The best part was I had a blister on my chin.

So, Monday had the task of keeping my face well and truly out of the sun! In the car we got and set off to the Glass House Mountains Visitor Centre. There, I picked up a few leaflets and a map. And here is where it began…

“Do you fancy climbing a mountain today?” I asked Nathan.

“Sure, where?” He replied.

“Glass House Mountains National Park. Just up the road…It’ll be fun!” I said.

We hadn’t done a proper hike for a while so I thought it’d be nice to get out into the fresh air and get my legs working properly again! We pulled into the car park at Ngungun, one of the mountains, swapped flip flops for Skechers and sprayed a bit of mozzie repellent. Then we were on our way.It started off as a nice trek across a flat wide path. All for about five minutes. Then it changed. Boy did it change. No sooner had we got round the second uphill bend, did Nathan say, “we should have brought water.” Next thing I knew he had legged it back to the car to get it. I kept on going at a snail pace wanting to conserve my energy. Then, there became options. You could climb stairs to bypass the bends, or continue walking round the bends climbing up. We didn’t realise this until half way as I’m sure the bends would have taken less energy than the bloody steps!The steps weren’t made for a short arse like me that’s for sure. Every step was an effort. The hand-on-thigh sort of effort that you think helps get you up! I had my trusty sweat mop with me and didn’t stop. We found a random cave carved into the side of whatever was next to us too. All this whilst trying desperately not to scratch my chin! Christ it was itching. My sweaty face probably wasn’t helping matters. I highly recommend wearing proper trainers or walking boots on this sort of terrain too. I mean Skechers are soooo comfortable for city walking buuuut as we probably should have remembered from our time back in America, they aren’t the most supportive or grippy sort of shoes. Nevertheless they got us to the top. And my god it was worth it. We had amazing views of everything around us, including Mt Beerwah. It was incredible. Whilst at the top taking in the sights around us some girls were like “eeeew look at that.”

I thought they meant the view in a weird way. No no turns out they were talking about my back! Turns out I ended up with 52 mozzie bites. Whoops! There I was thinking it would be a good idea to send most of our repellent home with Mum a few weeks ago as we hadn’t had any issues being bitten really! Since I did that I’ve been eaten alive! Still, at least my back now matches the 300+ sand fly bites I have on my legs from Peru!!It was only after I was told I had so many that they actually became itchy. All the way back down I was itching and hitting my back with my towel. Nothing worked. Clearly I am just mosquito food!I am so shit at walking downhill. I started my descent before Nathan and when he caught up with me he gave me a very weird look when I said I had anticipated being back at the car before him. It’s important to have goals right??

Hot, sweaty and incredibly itchy and somehow muddy too, we reached the car, downed about a gallon of water and tried to figure it where we were going next. We had conquered Mt Ngungun 💪🏼!!Next stop was the Glass House Mountains Lookout. From here you could see all of the large main mountains. Despite the clouds, it was beautiful.One of the things I love about these places is that there is always some sort of folklore that goes with it. These mountains are no different. Legend has it that the mountains are part of a family, with Mt Tibrogargan, the father and Mt Beerwah, the mother. The other mountains are their sons and daughter with Mt Coonowrin as the eldest. The father, asked his eldest son to help his mother to safety upon learning that the sea levels were rising. Instead, Coonowrin decided to flee which infuriated his father who proceeded to strike him with his ‘nulla nulla.’ This trike caught Coonowrin so that he dislocated his neck. Eventually, racked with guilt he attempted to seek forgiveness from his siblings, which is why there are so many small lakes and streams that pass through the mountain area. His father still ashamed, turns his back on him and instead gazed out at sea whilst Coonowrin sits with his head hung in shame. Fascinating. You can see the story unfolding as you gaze upon these magnificent mountains! Next stop in this beautiful national park was Wild Horse Mountain Lookout. We pulled into the car park and began this trek. Well, as if my legs weren’t dead enough (they were, they were cramping) this was such a steep climb up. I’m not kidding the last part especially felt vertical! These photos don’t show just how steep it really was!Again, they put these paces right at the top of bloody steep hills but it is so worth it! This was the lookout and it gave us full 360 degree views of the area around us. Miles and miles of views including the Glass House Mountains.The lookout provided the most amazing views all around. We sat up there for a while before debating whether to roll or walk back down the hill…Deciding to be sensible, we walked down, seeing how many mozzies we could kill as we did. That’ll teach them…

Back to Anzac Memorial Park to camp for the night in the thirty degree heat.

Until next time…