Noosa means ‘shady place’ in the original owners language.

The town is spread along many bays and many splendid houses can be spotted along the water.

As our last adventure on our Australia tour we had booked a canoe trip on the Noosa Everglades. We boarded a boat of the ‘Noosa Everglades Discovery’ tour company taking us into the Everglade waterways.

Some of the houses we spotted even swam anchored on the water like this ‘house boat’ that took the meaning of the word to another level :

The Noosa Everglades are part of the Cooloola National Park. They are a series of fresh waterways with smooth mirror like passages.

Our boat anchored at a recreation site for morning tea and biscuits. Then we took our canoes out to the water. F and B took one and K and I the other.

Equipped with a paddel each and some stuff in a dry storage sack we headed up to ‘Noosa Upper River’, a distance of about 5 km.

Being first timers in a canoe it took us a bit to get the hang of it but once we had figured out how to steer we had a lot of fun navigating the river arms.

In between we stopped paddling and let the canoes drift a bit listening to the birds sing.

We were all really glad we had taken this trip and agreed we would like to go canoeing again soon.

The reward for putting all our strength in paddling up the river- and getting a few blisters along the way – was a BBQ lunch at the historic logger’s camp Harry’s hut, a relic of the early timber harvesting days. We regenerated with Aussie steak and salad while we were being closely watched by a guana.

The ride back we took the boat again while others of our group took our canoes back to the first stop.

On our way back to Noosa we were able to watch  a fire fighting helicopter practice taking up water in the lake and then dispersing it over the woods. It was quite interesting to watch.

Almost back to Noosa we passed along an island that belongs to Richard Branson, the owner of Virgin Australia. You can rent the island, which can host up to 20 people, for a bargain price: just 22.000 Australian Dollars- per night! Apparently Brangelina, Robbie Williams and One Direction are among the guests that can be spotted on the island.

We, however, settled for a swim in the pool when we got back to our hotel.