Cooloola Great Walk - QLD's longest hike!
Updated: Sep 24, 2020
Having completed numerous hikes and Great Walks in New Zealand (most recently the Dusky sound) it was time to try our hand at a multiday hike in Australia. Fortunately for us living in Rainbow Beach, Queensland’s longest hike was right in our backyard!
Preparations for this hike were rather hasty (we have had some practice now and it certainly wasn't the longest hike we have done) and our packs included the following:
shoes + 2-3x thick socks each.
sleeping bag
tent
1x yoga mat each
water filtration bottle + spare bottles to hold the water *** normally we would carry our water bladders, but these were left in NZ.
sunglasses
2-3 shirts and shorts each + underwear (as you deem necessary)
wide-brim hat
small gas cooker and gas
matches + lighter
6 pack cider (it was Rachel's birthday on the trail!)
hammock
sunscreen
baby wipes (shower on the track)
first-aid kit
bug spray
pawpaw cream
portable power bank
phones (only for music some nights)
camera
oats
carrots
bananas
bread
peanut butter
nutella
milk powder+coffee +hot cho. powder +tea bags
scroggin
noodles
tuna
The Cooloola Great Walk
This track is 102km one way. It is not a circuit, so you need to be dropped off or picked up at the end. We timed our hike to line up with when Rachel's family were heading back to Brisbane from their stay at Rainbow Beach and were dropped off at the Noosa North Shore Retreat & Tourist Park - 500m from the start of the track entry. This way we could hike all the way back to our front door - literally!
Pre Hike:
To give ourselves an early morning fresh start we stayed overnight at the Noosa North Shore Retreat & Tourist Park campground. We indulged in some luxuries before having to live off light-weight, simple meals, and had subway for dinner and a pie/coffee combo for breakfast to get us going.
Day 1
Before the taste of mince pies had disappeared from our mouths we were established on track heading northeast towards the Noosa coast. The first section could be described as being open, hot, marshland with the occasional tree. Once you were nice and warm it didn’t seem to take too long before you stumble onto the beach. Shoes off and tied onto our backpacks we walked up the coast, wading in the water as we went and searching or shells. Our shell search certainly slowed us down. This was a really nice beach; from behind you could see the ”upmarket” town of Noosa dug into the coast and ahead, the vast ocean and bushy hills. This strip of beach is often called a Beach Highway. It actually is an official highway, on the beach! We strolled along next to plenty of 4wd enthusiasts cruising by. This didn’t ruin the experience, rather, it was quite a novel experience.
At one point some, quite far along the way, the beach police asked us if we wanted a lift -we later found out they knew little about the Cooloola Great Walk and probably wondered where on earth we were walking to. This was kind of them to offer, but being seasoned hikers we politely refused, despite our backpacks full of the likes of food, cider, fresh fruit, and a few really cool looking shells.
Being the experienced hikers we are and spending a lot of time looking down at shells, we managed to walk straight past the marker indicating the track moves back inland. We backtracked slightly and were soon on the right path inland. This was after another quick encounter with the same police who said others had also missed the marker.
We didn't want to go bush bashing like we would have in New Zealand due to the chance of stepping on a snake. After the beach section, the track moves up, down, and around some small hills (allegedly mountains) which gave an elevated view of the surrounding areas.
The campsite seemed to pop up on us and was nestled atop these hills. This camp spot was beautiful (our favourite) and afforded us an expansive view of Lake Cootharaba below. We followed the winding narrow path through native bush towards the 6 separate off-shoot camp spots and found a little spot to set up our tent. The communal area was the most scenic and we spent the rest of our day getting to know fellow hikers as the sun went down.
Day 2
By the morning we knew there were two other groups of hikers following the same path as us, heading in the same direction. As a rule of thumb, we are typically the last hikers 'out of the gate'. Sleep is important to us, as is a nice cup of tea to start the day. As per tradition, we were last to leave camp this day too.
The majority of day 2 was spent walking up and down along a well-formed sandy track over large dunes. This section of the hike offers the best coastal views from above and
we could spot Double Island Point off in the distance.
After these dunes, the track then transitioned to an even bigger dune, the Cooloola Sand Patch. The sand patch is aptly named; it is a massive patch of sand that the track travels across. We would hate to imagine how hot it would be in Summer! This was Marcus' favrouite part of the hike. You can get some really cool photos on this section of the track; the expanse of sand seems to collide with blue expanse of the sky. We enjoyed lunch at the top with a great view out west. We walked on for a while longer, down for a while, and then along the Noosa river for a while until we reached our second camp spot.
The campsite was located right next to the Noosa river where the eccentric group of fellow travelers was found to be skinny dipping on our arrival. Marcus chose to go up to his knees to give himself a quick bath as there were warning signs for bull sharks. Rachel preferred to have a baby wipe shower. After our quick 'shower' we set up our hammock. This was a big luxury - we have never carried a hammock before on a hike - but it was the perfect thing to enjoy a cider and read in at the end of the day.
Day 3 - Rachel's Birthday!
"On the road again"...This day we traveled through quite a bit of dry low land areas. Today it felt like we were just clocking up the kilometers (today felt rather monotonous). We remember this day involving lots of red dirt and some burnt forest. The burnt patches were a stark contrast to the vibrant new, green growth. This section also had many ferns and Yakka bushes that thrive after bush fires.
On a whole, we wouldn’t say this hike has difficult terrain but you do cover reasonably large distances each day - roughly 20km a day. Thankfully each day you progress your bag gets lighter.
The campsite this night was quite nice and because we had overtaken one of the other groups we got the second pick. This campsite had a flat, elevated communal area with raised wooden benches almost large enough to pitch a tent on. The individual sleeping areas were further along a gradually sloping downhill. If we were the only ones there it would have been nice to set up in the communal area as the ground was a lot flatter. It was at this campsite that Rachel enjoyed a simple birthday celebration of a card, some jewelry, and the remaining ciders. She also pitched up her hammock to sit back and relax in beneath the tall trees.
Day 4
Rainforest was the theme of this day. It was interesting to find such dense, lush rainforest so close to the sandy coast. The views and bird sounds were lovely on this day.
Today it was raining sporadically which brought with it a few unwanted hitchhikers. It was at this point of the hike Rachel had developed some sizeable blisters and found it a lot more comfortable to walk in socks. The downside to this was she became an easy target for leeches. It’s wasn’t until we reached the campsite that the leech was found fat, slimy, and stuck to the side of her foot. The leech had been on there for a while enjoying a feed and was thankfully flicked off easily. I am not sure how common leeches are on the Cooloola great walk as Rachel was the only one to find one.
Marcus also found some interesting wildlife in this section as he managed to find a brown snake. The poor snake was sunning itself in a small patch of sunlight on the track when Marcus almost stepped on him. The snake was very docile and we managed to get a picture. Whether it was a Brown snake or just a brown coloured snake am not certain but I’ll let the snake experts at home decide.
Day 5
We are on the home stretch now, never before on a hike had Marcus experienced such sore knees, several holes in the Swiss cheese model must have lined up to achieve this end product; carrying too many luxuries, wearing sneakers, not boots, big kilometers each day, and walking through lots of sand. Ahh well, not long left.
Just because it was the last day didn’t mean it would be uneventful. We were chatting away approaching one of the landmarks of this leg, Poona lake. Prior to reaching the lake we had caught up with some members of the eccentric group, we think they may have been naturalists as one of the lads was quite comfortably taking a leak facing towards us. He said hello and completed his best 'willy wagtail' routine as if that was just the norm. Lake Poona was reasonably nice looking and was a refreshing stop for Marcus to swim and cool down his aching knees. Rachel did not feel like swimming and was once again preoccupied with removing leech number two.
Our favourite part of day 5 was reaching Carlo Sand Blow, we had been here many times prior to the hike, however, reaching this point provided an outstanding view of expansive sand and a panoramic theatre-style view of the bold, blue, contrasting ocean.
The other perk of being at this point was that we knew we were only five minutes from civilization and a hot shower! 🚿. We transitioned from sand to track and then track to pavement, right up to our front door, which was a novel experience for both of us. The hot shower was divine and we changed into fresh clothes. After our showers, we completed an extra side trail of about 2km return to Arco's for some pizza (would highly recommend)!
......................................................................................................................................................................................................................
At the time of completing the hike we rated this hike a 2.5* out of 5, so we will stick to that. The main reason we thought this is because although the track follows the coast, you can only see the coast for about 2 of the 5 days.
Comments