We had planned on visiting Paronella Park today. But driving there we were debating it after reading some bad reviews and it was quite expensive. We decided I would just go as I was more interested but as Matt came up for lunch the owner was at the front and greeted us. After Matt showed his hesitation, the owner gave us both a $10 discount and we both went in. You do really need to do a tour to get the most from the experience otherwise I'm sure you would be disappointed. To get even more value for money we stayed the night as the caravan park was included in the ticket price, so we got hot showers and free WiFi. Plus the real benefit was then going on the night tour. I must say the staff and service given really made this place great. They were all really friendly, knowledgeable and ran the tours well.

The man, Josѐ Paronella, who built this place in the 1930’s had a pretty great story. His childhood dream was to have his own castle and instead of building one he could live in, he built 2 castles he could see first thing in the morning from his bedroom window. The castle was built perfectly so that it framed the waterfall through the centre of the building. Unfortunately, this was not known until 2006 when Cyclone Larry tore down many trees that the previous owners had let go unkempt. Josѐ’s daughter did tell the owners in 1993 about the view but she was misunderstood and the owners thought she meant from the top of the castle not through it.

Nearly all of the lighting shown on the night tour was in the original place Josѐ placed it. He was the first to have electricity due to making his own hydroelectricity plant, 24yrs before electricity was brought to the area. The original turbine has been restored and is still used today to generate electricity for the park.

The current owners are planning on doing plenty of work to the park including restoring buildings as some were unsafe to walk through. I think this place would be great to visit in about 5 years if all their plans are realised.

A highlight of the night tour was seeing fireflies up close. They are actually beetles which I didn’t know. As a gift, everyone on the night tour was given a piece of a wall that fell down in Cyclone Larry as a reminder to follow our dreams.

These Kauri trees are beautiful and we learned that although they will not grow any taller, they will now grow outwards to approximately 5m making 5 of the trees connect in one area.