Mt Cordeaux - South-East Queensland, Australia

Cunningham's Gap section of Scenic Rim, taken from the Cunningham Highway. The Highway ascends to the U-shaped saddle in the middle of the picture.

What better way to spend a cool winter's day than doing an easy mountain climb! My daughter's and I headed off nearly 2 hours drive south-west of Brisbane to the scenic rim, a large ancient eroded volcanic remnant that contains the highest mountains in South-east Queensland, Australia. People from overseas might call these hills, but they're about as impressive as they get here with the tallest, Mt Superbus, reaching 1375 meters above sea level. As a matter of interest, Mt Superbus is pronounced Mt Superb-us, not Mt Super-bus as I've heard some people call it! The target of this climb was Mt Cordeaux clocking in at 1137 meters.

This is the view to Cunningham's Gap, with Mt Mitchell on the left and Mt Cordeaux on the right

To get to Mt Cordeaux requires traveling down the Cunningham highway to where it intersects the scenic rim at Cunningham's Gap. From Cunningham's Gap, there are a number of walking trails, including a 3km trail to the Mt Cordeaux summit climb. Another trail heads of to Mt Mitchell, which although higher is a longer walk and we elected to not to do this walk. The Mt Cordeux trail is well marked, although the actual summit is closed at the moment to help the vegetation regenerate (I am guessing foot traffic may have been impacting flora), however, there is an open viewing area near the summit that gives spectacular views.

Much of the trail is under rainforest Canopy and one of the highlights are the massive trees encased in the Strangler figs that use their host trees to reach above the rainforest canopy where they can photosynthesize. Another plant seen frequently along the track is the Xanthorrhoea tree, which is very common in the Australian bush (right top in the following image). Although we saw and heard some birds I suspect the cold may have rendered most of the fauna inactive!

The view near the top is superb and better than you might expect for 1100 meters since the surrounding land is near sea level. Here are various photo's at the summit, and there is more information in the caption.

Top Left: Mt Barney, at 1360 meters, is probably the most impressive mountain in SE QLD. Top Right: Mt Mitchell in the foreground, Mt Superbus at the very left in the far distance. Bottom: Daughters from near the summit Mt Cordeaux

The following photo is looking north from just below the summit. It is very exposed at this point and you definitely don't want to wander off the track, unless you don't mind gravity assisted descents!

Finally, for a bit of fun, I did a Blender render of the area in 3D to show the caldera structure of the Scenic Rim. From what I have read, the area was formed as part of the Focal Peak volcanic event around 23 million years ago.

I hope you enjoyed this brief photo summary of one of the more interesting scenic areas around South East Queensland. There is certainly more to see than just surf and beaches!

NOTE: All photo's are the authors, please credit me if you intend to use them.