Travel: Tewantin National Park

Tewantin National Park is a paradise for mountain bikers. If you’ve got two wheels, a helmet, and a water bottle, then be sure you ring your bike bell since we’ll be hiking! That’s right, we hiked over 18km of trails in Tewantin National Park. Oh, and be sure you use your map, since not all the trails are clearly marked.

We hiked this beautiful shaded place on an extremely hot day – it was 38 degrees outside. That’s slightly over 100. Hot! Luckily about 80% of the hike is shaded and in the trees, which was perfect. Okay, photo time.

Tewantin National Park

The trail head we picked was just off a main road and we followed the power line in to meet the shaded trail. Keep an eye out for mountain bikers, since this is their playground.

You can see in the map below that there are so many trails, running crosswise and full of some switchbacks, making it fun for all. The nice part about the map is it highlights how long and difficult the trails are for bikers, but not hikers. As such, we ended up being out on the trails a little longer than anticipated. All good, though, we made up for our extra work with snacks!

Following the power lines was fun, and strange. It reminded us of when we went UTVing back in Calgary a few (okay, like more than a handful) years ago. A clear path is perfect for UTVs.

We also came across a lot of diverse vegetation and some bridges, which were neat. By the end of the hike we crossed paths with about 6 mountain bikers (I think we saw the same person twice, yet I’m not sure) – they ride so fast, so sharp, and with so much intensity, it was important to keep our ears open. These little bridges helped, since you could hear the tires rumble on them from far away.

Here’s an odd hollowed out log – I just love the contrast in light. It looked better in person.

In the end we hiked for about 3 hours. There aren’t a lot of maps on the trail – in fact we came across this one when we thought we were close to finishing. We were so wrong – we had a long hike back, yet it was still fun.

I’m not sure if you’re like me, but I like to know how far we’re going, our pace, and then I can do the math as to how much time we’ll be hiking. Perhaps it’s a safety thing, I’m not sure. Either way, be sure you have a phone or an offline map.