The Glass House Mountains.
A short trip just north of Brisbane (40 mins past Australia Zoo) took us to the Glass House Mountains. Wonderfully enchanting and exceptionally beautiful as the winter sun beamed down upon them. There are two stories as to how the mountains, isolated as they are came to exist, the sciency one and the Aboriginal one...both are pretty cool. The Aboriginal story is better I think...According to Aboriginal legend, Tibrogargan (364m high), the father and Beerwah (555m - highest peak) the mother, had a number of children. Coonowrin (377m high - narrowest and most dramatic of all the volcanic plugs) was the eldest, Tunbubudla were the twins (293m and 312m), Coochin (235m), Ngungun (253m), Tibberoowuccum (220m), Miketeebumulgrai (199m) and Elimbah (129m).

The legend tells of Tibrogargan noticing that the sea was rising and calling out to Coonowrin to help his pregnant mother gather the young children together so that the family could flee from the rising sea. Coonowrin ran away in fear and Tibrogargan, incensed by his son's cowardice, followed and hit him so hard with a club that his neck was dislocated. When the seas retreated the family returned to the plains. Conowrin, teased about his crooked neck and ashamed of his behaviour, went to Tibrogargan and asked for forgiveness but the father just wept with shame. Conowrin then approached his brothers and sisters to ask forgiveness but they too could only weep with shame, thus explaining the area's many small streams. Tibrogargan then called Conowrin and asked why he had failed to help Beerwah. He explained that he felt she was big enough to look after herself, though he did not know she was pregnant. Tibrogargan then turned his back on his son and still gazes out to sea today, refusing to look at his son who forever hangs his crooked neck and cries. Beerwah, the mother, is still pregnant, as it takes time to give birth to a mountain.

Pretty good story eh? We attempted climbing 3 of the peaks but only made it up 1. First up was Mt Tibrogargan and we got pretty far up only for the face to become near vertical and as neither of us had the right gear or probably the right insurance we decided it probably was best to head back down. I did give it a shot first mind...We then headed for Mt Beerwah, the largest and probably the most impressive. Unfortunately the track was closed due to land slides and even though we took little heed of the notices there was a ranger positioned at the start of the trek to warn us of the dangers (and fines) should we climb. It is impossible to climb Mt Coonowrin so we headed to Mt Ngungun instead. It is meant to be one of the easier climbs but its still a challenge, a fun one nonetheless. The caves half way up it are cool and the views from the top are spectacular. 360 degrees views of the surrounding landscape and you are able to see as far north as Mooloolaba and Alexander Heads, as Far East as North Stradbroke Island and all the way back south to Brisbane. The township at the foot of the mountains shares the name and the pub (of same name funnily) is excellent. We had dinner in there, a gorgeous steak for myself whilst Mike attempted the MAN BURGER...400g of meat on probably the same weight of bread!! He managed it and now has his name, written in pencil on the wall to prove it.
Considering that we just choose to head to the hills on a whim, it turned out to be a really great day. I would totally recommend it to anyone with a car who is going to be in Brisbane for a while, if the weathers good its fantastic and you can say you've seen a pregnant mountain, how many people can say that.