The end...

If dirt under your fingernails means your having a good time then I was definitely having a blast.  Although, the lady from Noosa and District Landcare did hand me a pair of gloves to join their riparian rainforest planting project. I thought they looked like riding gloves and coupled with my kerchief, imagined this could be my final Tally Ho before galloping off into the forest.  Digging back in the earth, I chose to plant a cheese tree. Considering we'd started this walk at the Butter Factory, it seemed like a fitting recognition.  

The early morning drizzle had put a slight damper on packing up and the grass cuttings had suddenly morphed into sodden clumps weighing down my already leaden feet.  Shaun announced the Yoga session was about to start and breakfast would be happening on Cooran time.  With only 10 easy kilometers today and the clocks merely a loose guideline, everyone relaxed into the Hinterland tempo and the slow pace of morning chatter.   



My heel was still complaining as my legs engaged into the steady rhythmic plod that had got me this far.  Listening to Alex, I learned this was hungry country, where the plants are on a diet and the less fertile soil had kept the farmers at bay.  Out here in the woods it seems easy to fall into deep and meaningful conversations, perhaps it's the lack of interruptions and luxury of plentiful time?  And in the silent moments, it's simply uplifting to hear the forest alive with laughter and conviviality.  However mild or wild, every person has their story.  Shaun's tale is about highlighting the Noosa Trails and the economic possibilities for the Hinterland towns. 



Initially, the Great Noosa Trail provided me with a fitness goal in my attempt to delay middle age.  In my privileged world where it's easy to be paralyzed by options, a 60km trek through the wilderness can bring everything back to clarified simplicity.  Three days in this beautiful countryside taught me that just as in life, there is always a beginning, a middle and an end.  

The start is a place full of anticipation and exuberance, the end is hopefully one of satisfied completion.  Besides enjoying the journey in a frenzy of cliches, perhaps I learned to embrace the middle (and if that includes accepting my expanding waistline then so be it.)  Yet in truth, your age, your story, your blisters, none of that really matters when you're hiking the Hinterland with your people.  When you're out on the trail, what truly matters is the camaraderie with your friends of the road, because that's what keeps you moving forward, step by step.

In a way, I did manage to achieve my Benjamin Button status,  I took three days to go from having 60 kms ahead to zero.  And now I'm a little sad I'm at the end.  But as the good Dr. Seuss says, "Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."

The middle...

However long the night, dawn will always break. And, I had to admit, it had been an interminably long night. The red wine induced stupor kept me slumbering until just before midnight. I'd woken up with a tongue as dry as Ghandi's sandal and a headache which throbbed in time to the bass drumbeat coming from the last dregs of Karaoke singers down at the pub. The freezing cold Aldi sleeping bag had turned out to be barely more than a Gortex shell. Adding insult to aching legs, the little air I had managed to blow into the mattress had already leaked out in an exhalation of bad breath.  Note to self - don't buy camping equipment from a grocery store.  Lying there, refusing to deal with the creeping hypothermia and worsening dehydration, I focused instead on the pain levels radiating from my right hip and growled under my breath about a future filled with imminent porcelain joint replacements.  I wondered if venturing out into the glacial air to put on more clothes would be worth the effort.   Two extra pairs of leggings, one puffer jacket, one woolly hat, two antihistamine tablets (hopefully the very drowsy kind) and 2 Osteo Panadols later, I managed a few more hours of fitful dozing. 

When the first dawn rays sparkled on dew-soaked grass, I squinted to check that it wasn't frost.  Creaking into a hunched ball, I poured a lukewarm coffee from yesterday's thermos into my wine stained mug and cynically toasted to Day Two - the middle of my odyssey.

Beckoned to breakfast by the mocking call of the Kookaburra, the smell of bacon and eggs convinced me to lace up my shoes and continue onwards.  The cheery calls of camaraderie from my fellow campers pulled me into a psyche of collective consciousness.  I wasn't the only one who was suffering.  We were all tired, but an unlucky few were forced to withdraw.  Devastated, they nursed their blisters and injured body parts into the shuttle bus.  It was time to dig deep, pull up the tent pegs and head off into the prairie. 

In the verdant beauty of rolling hills, everything was indeed going well until I carefully relocked a gate and turned to find myself face to face with bulls!  Dirty great snorting pawing at the ground bulls (well okay -  beautifully groomed glistening Jersey daddy cows).  Regardless, they were paying me far too much attention as I tiptoed through the tulips thistles.  Luckily, I was soon rescued by two of the red kerchief brigade.   They were local Black Mountain boys who helped me shrug off my bovine attack fears for the next few kilometers and focus on the cute calves instead.  

At the "halfway point" (what's one more optimism induced white lie amongst 150 friends?) I left the boys behind and scrambled up the open slopes alone, following in the footsteps of the intrepid explorers ahead.  

After puffing and cursing up the steep climb into Woondum National Park, I fell in to step with a Bonnie lassie who kept promising me a side excursion to view stands of bamboo.  

This blister sister was really glad to finally crest the hill and make it to the lookout where there was a pop up fruit stand.

With all thoughts focused on my oozing heel, it was only much later I thought to ask who was James M McKane?  After scouring the archives of the National Library, I found there was very little mention of Mr. McKane other than he returned from the Great War to become a farmer.  In 1953, he died aged 73 after having spent his last 30 years in Cooran as a local Councillor and Mason.  Defying the clothing conventions of 1939, he cooly attended the Noosa Shire Council meeting in shorts and shirt with no tie while his colleagues sweated it out in formal attire.  A local with such refreshing aplomb deserved a lookout named after him.  I relished the view from the top of this Great Trail as the heat on the horizon shimmered below the cirrus clouds.  Perhaps Mr. McKane was sending a cooler weather front our way?

With the dramatic backdrop of the Glass House Mountains and the looming shadow of Mount Pomona, I literally had our second overnight stop of Cooran in my sights.  Originally the Gubbi Gubbi people called it Guran which means tall or high up.  I hoped this didn't mean it would be a steep incline on the home straight after being promised a few kilometers of gentle meander DOWN to the Cooran Rec Club.  

A surprise Lama encounter got me thinking about dinner and the possibility of some extra lama wool padding for my sleeping bag.  As I hauled my weary gluteus most tiredius through the scattering of tents already pitched on the sports field, I felt a keen sense of belonging with these nomadic bush walkers.  Our stiff and weary tribe were quickly replenished with hot showers and a hearty roast dinner and the crooning tunes of a female vocalist.  Embraced by the irrepressible laughter of my yellow kerchiefed kinfolk, I felt an overwhelming sense of affinity and a bittersweet triumph that my journey was winding towards its culmination.


  

The beginning...

Just the very name "Butter Factory" sounds like a calorifically delicious place to begin.  I'm sure there's an app to work out how many kilojoules you burn over 60kms in 3 days, but who cares about that?  Certainly not the smiling faces of the red kerchiefed volunteers and Shaun who signed me in, handed over my name badge and a yellow bandana, which meant I belonged.  

Intrepidly climbing aboard the shuttle bus to the Botanic Gardens, I bumped into the tag team duo of Di and Gail.  Professionally suited and booted, they confided to me their impressive weekly training routine.  I suddenly wondered if I was really up to this, my backpack was already hurting me and I hadn't even gone anywhere yet.

Shaun's real mission is to raise awareness of the Hinterland trails. I'd say he's doing pretty well already considering it was only 7:30am and he'd already got a bus full of hopefuls peering at the map.  Normally, I like the reassurance of a map, but I felt a little daunted at the distances it proclaimed I would be walking. So I folded it up, put it away and resolved to follow the crowd and the well placed markers.  The only problem was that I was first off the bus and with only a couple of ladies ahead of me, I was almost the leader of the pack.  

Just as I was beginning to enjoy my own company and the warm sunshine, a vicious blue heeler hurtled from a driveway snarling ferociously. Feigning dominance over him with a trembly shout of "Go Home!", I upped the pace to nowhere fast.

The wind cooled my brow and the vast blue skies were filled with bird song and the gentle rustle of eucalyptus.  I let out a contented sigh to mark the magical moment and had a little chuckle over whether I should take the road less traveled.

With the reassuring murmur of walkers behind me and the freedom of the hinterland ahead of me, my mind began to question the real reason for this pilgrimage.  Perhaps it was to find my way? Although, with the early morning coffee and the scary dog encounter, the only thing I was hoping to find was a toilet.

Somewhere between nowhere and elsewhere, just as I was pondering the dilemma of cripping a crapple in the bush, I was joined by my first friend of the road, Annie.  We fell into companionable conversation and so I decided to follow the African proverb that says, "If you want to go far go together."  However, she was setting such a blistering pace I wasn't sure if I would  live to regret it.

The Gods were smiling upon me when we disturbed a python who was basking on the track. Annie was an official snake relocater, "But only in Western Australia," she informed me. What did I care? She shifted it with her walking stick and casually continued on. Annie had also trained as a paramedic which was another good reason to kick up my aching heels and keep up with my new best friend.

Guided into to the pop up tea tent by Wendy's wheels, the walking was more than half done.

With the restorative power of carrot cake and tea under my belt, the last few kilometers were a breeze.

Perhaps I should have taken better heed of the instructions on the last sign of the day?

 

Instead of waiting for the bus, I decided to follow the man in the felt hat who I imagined was Peter the goat herder all grown up. Or maybe the haunting melodies of Edelweiss lured me to join the Von Trapp family and escape to Kin Kin on foot over the mountain.

What's a couple of extra kms between mountain mates? Finally, I made it into Nirvana .... the Kin Kin pop up foot massage.

The last rays of sun were falling on my fellow nomads, when I made my way from tent city towards the bright lights of the art gallery.  

I had been promised of a glass of champagne. 

Making sure Shaun had at least one champers in hand, I noted a curious door at the back of the hall and wondered if this was my last chance to "exit stage left"? 

The warm buzz of alcohol in my veins persuaded me that my pilgrimage must continue until at least after dinner.  Mouthwatering food by The Black Ant Catering Company and a glass of red wine with my friends from the road convinced me that trail walking was indeed a most excellent idea.  I gaily toasted to the 22kms to come tomorrow.

Zipping into my tent, I drifted asleep to the sounds of the bug zapper on the house next door, the snoring camper in the adjacent tent, the cranking tunes of the local pub band and the occasional police siren pulling over suspicious drivers. These Kin Kin folk sure know how to put the life into the Country Life.

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The Great Noosa Trail

It doesn't matter if you're on some far flung exotic location traveling Cape Town to Cairo, or simply taking a trek in your own backyard, every great journey has a beginning, a middle and an end.

The Great Noosa Trail begins in the Hinterland of the Sunshine Coast in Cooroy and meanders through some 60kms of the most scenic valleys, rainforest and farmlands that Queensland has to offer.  Spending the first night in Kin Kin and the second in Cooran, the journey ends in Pomona after an optional climb up the mountain.  

What makes this walk great isn't just the 150 participants, the vast distance or the stunning views back over Noosa, this journey is great because of the people. It's made great by the camaraderie of the friends of the road you meet along the way and the excellent organization of the man behind it all, Shaun. He humbly admitted that behind his smiling laughter he cracks the whip on his red kerchiefed posse of volunteers. They make everything run smoothly from the bacon and egg breakfast to the luggage co-ordination.

Everyone has a great reason to begin the Noosa Trail, I thought my reason was to avert Middle Age in a frenzy of fitness.  However, somewhere in the middle of my journey, curled up snug in my tent with the sounds of cicadas gently blowing on the breeze, I realized this was about starting something, persevering through the blisters and aching legs to claim my prize of completion.  So it's into the wilderness, just me, my organic coconut water and 150 soon to be new best friends.