Rainforest Circuit and Cypress Grove Circuit

Maiala, Mt Glorious, D’Aguilar National Park, Queensland, Australia

2.5 km

This is one of my favourite short walks to do when I have a few hours up my sleeve and a hankering to get out of the city and into the wilderness.

The Rainforest Circuit is a sweet walk that winds through a light-dappled gully, lush with rainforest ferns and fig trees and a fair number of super-tall, spotted gum trees towering over the canopy.

The path is an easy grade, with the odd run of stairs, and occasional patches of mud after a wet period. Even on the hottest summer day, it’s cool under the shade of the tall trees, so it’s a great, relieving get-away.

The biggest decision to be made is which direction to walk in – clockwise (the high path), or anti-clockwise (the low path) – from where the path splits in two about a hundred meters in. You will see the same things going both ways, but if the afternoon light is dropping down over the western ridge then it’s best to take the low path first.

As it was going on 3 pm, I went anti-clockwise, taking the flight of wooden stairs down into the gully to briefly cross to the eastern side of a stream. Very quickly, the path enters a new, lush world, and modern life slips away. I savour the fresh air, the smells of loamy forest, and the sounds, and the living-energy of the place.

If you’re quiet, the birdsong is amazing – like what I imagine pre-historic times might have sounded like. Screeches, and warbles, and laughs, and the bird that sounds disturbingly like a baby crying. I have no idea what any of them are called – except the kookaburras.

At the beginning of the walk, there are bush turkeys roaming around, scratching at whatever they can find. Deeper in, and if you stay quiet, the pademelons will eventually pay you a visit. They’re very shy, but often come out onto the track for the dropped seeds. It’s not rare to hear them dashing about in the undergrowth. This one had a joey in its pouch.

Follow the path for a good half hour, winding in generally a northerly direction from one steep creek gully to the next. There’s so much detail to see, you’ll want to take your time to look both up into the canopy and down into the moist leaf-litter where fungi hide and tiny birds scratch around in search of insects and seeds. I especially love tracing the intricate weave of the enormous fig trees that grow up around other trees, strangulating them as they grow and tighten, till they’re big and sturdy enough to stand on their own. The tree they’ve strangulated dies and rots away to land as mulch on the rainforest floor, leaving an empty space for the light to come shining through.

The National Park people have helpfully erected educational signs about the what you might see in the immediate environment, and some history of the human uses of the landscape.

Eventually, the windy path leads back up to a drier section where the canopy is thinner and more spotted gum trees stretch high and wide.

At about the two thirds mark, the circuit connects to a gravel road. Across the road is the continuation of two other walks – Greenes Falls, which is a there-and-back-again walk to the top of a waterfall that’s best to visit during the wet season, and the Cypress Grove Circuit.

It’s dry this time of year, so I chose to cross the road and walk the quick Cypress Grove Circuit, where different trees naturally grow in the higher, more exposed terrain.

This enormous gum (which I think is an iron bark) looks just like what I imagine a mammoth foot might have looked like back in the day. No mammoths to be wary of, but I’ve seen snakes on this path, so do watch out.

At the end of the Cypress Grove Circuit, cross the gravel road again and continue along the final, easy third of the Rainforest Circuit. The vegetation here is sparser than deeper in the gullies, but it’s still cool and lush, and there’s heaps to enjoy.

If you’re with kids, they’ll love looking through the burnt-out eye of this tree trunk, a bunch of weird and wonderful habitats, like this gnarled hole in a tree, and, nearer where the paths converge, the enormous hug tree. You’ll need at least half a dozen sets of arms to ring around the whole thing (apologies, forgot to take a pic).