Tamborine Mountain
Lush Tamborine Mountain is a favourite destination for tourists who come seeking avocados, Devonshire tea, crafts, bed-and-breakfast style accommodation and spectacular scenery for which the Scenic Rim is renowned.
Tourists can stroll Gallery Walk on Long Road at Eagle Heights, a row of shops offering homemade crafts, soaps, Australian bushcraft, and natural produce and enjoy cappuccinos, Devonshire teas, rich cakes and a range of casual to elegant dining experiences.
Across the mountain, visitors can find garden nurseries with teahouses, craft shops, art galleries and excellent restaurants, watch hang gliders launch from the escarpment, take bushwalks through rainforests to waterfalls, and visit wineries and a distillery.
Markets are held regularly at different locations. Visitors from Brisbane can travel to Tamborine Mountain by two routes: the 80-kilometre route south through Beenleigh and Tamborine, or the more direct route along the Pacific Highway and up the Oxenford-Tamborine Road.
Visitors on the Gold Coast can travel along the Pacific Highway to the Oxenford-Tamborine Road, or travel through Nerang via the Nerang-Tamborine Road.
Tamborine Mountain is home to a permanent population of more than 7500 people who live at North Tamborine, Eagle Heights and Mount Tamborine.
The mountain offers medical centres, supermarkets, a hardware shop, banks, post offices, travel agency, computer shop, real estate agents, takeaway food outlets, cafes, restaurants, veterinary clinic, fruit and vegetable market, video shop, hairdressers, bakery, butcher, accountant, solicitors, dentists, doctors, hotels, chemists, and historic hotels, motels, and guesthouses.
Education is provided by pre-schools, primary schools and two high schools. Locals enjoy gardening, craft, rugby league, lawn bowls, tennis, horse riding, golf, gymnastics, dancing, martial arts, athletics, soccer, a range of hobby clubs, and hang gliding.
Community facilities include an information centre, playgrounds, community hall, theatre, swimming pool and library. Council's Customer Service Centre and Library can be found in Main Street where locals and visitors alike enjoy the relaxed atmosphere of the Village Greens.
On a historical note, Tamborine Mountain was thrown open for selection in 1878. Applications for blocks of land were granted to nine families. But only two settled on the mountain blocks - John O'Callaghan (deputising for William Walsh) and his nephew, E.H. O'Callaghan.
The first National Park created was on Tamborine Mountain. There are now about 17 sections of national park on the mountain, providing refreshing sub-tropical rainforest walks with numerous accessible waterfalls.
Tamborine Mountain has a cooler climate with rich, red volcanic topsoil. This is moistened by more than 1550mm of rain each year, feeding subsurface streams and basins to make it a horticulturalist's dream. Avocados, kiwifruit and rhubarb head a long list of commercial crops.