Bordering Queensland, the North Coast region has everything you wish for a holiday. Beaches, beautiful scenic landscapes and pleasant towns. This region stretches from Coffs Harbour all the way north up to Tweed Valley, rigtht south of the Gold Coast and Lamington National Park.
The New South Wales/Queensland border town of Tweed Heads and its coastal and rural villages form a montage of pristine beaches for surfing and fishing, World Heritage national parks, river cruises, resort shopping and highlights such as the Minjungbal Aboriginal Culture Centre.
Further north is Yamba. an anglers dream, the famous "barrels" of Angourie which draw surfing aficionados like a magnet, and the most eastern point of Australia, Byron Bay.The coast is a stunning stretch of white beaches backed by the lush rainforests of Mount Warning and Nightcap National Parks.
The beautiful area inland from the far north coast, between artist-filled Lismore in the fertile Richmond River valley to the south, and staid Murwillumbah in the even lusher valley of the Tweed River near the Queensland border, is known as the Far North Coast Hinterland. But pioneers dubbed this region – once covered in rainforest that included species of flora extant from the era of the ancient supercontinent of Gondwanaland – the Big Scrub. The hinterland’s three national parks, plus several reserves, are World Heritage-listed, protecting pockets of rainforest which the settlers never managed to log, and which protesters helped to save in the first successful anti-logging demonstration in Australia, in 1979.
Mount Warning – Wollumbin or “cloud catcher” to the Bandjalung Aborigines – is what remains of the central magma chamber of a four-thousand square-kilometre, shield-shaped volcano; from this 1157-metre peak, where the sun’s rays first strike Australia, dazzling views reveal the area’s geographic features. Mount Warning National Park rises in the middle of a massive caldera eroded on the eastern side into a huge bowl, where the Tweed River flows to the sea through the mostly agricultural patchwork of the valley floor.
The northwest rim section consists of the McPherson and Tweed ranges, in the Border Ranges National Park; the southern section is within the Nightcap National Park, near countercultural Nimbim, and The Channon – one of many villages in “the hills” and famous for hosting the largest, most colourful market in the area.
Justice Bus Service (tel 02/6621 2307) runs daily between Lismore and Murwillumbah via Nimbin. From Byron Bay, there are several tours of the hinterland, and those that stop at Nimbin can be a convenient way to get there.
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