Home to beech and podocarp forests and sweeping, crystal-clear waters of pristine azure and turquoise blues, this stunning walk weaves across swing bridges, boardwalks and raw stone. It gives you the innate sense of being immersed in the forest itself.
We decided to travel through our home state...Just in this one road trip, we had been to the red outback centre of the state to the crystal clear oceans that frame its edges.
When we swam into the part of the cave where the salty rock drops down closer to the surface of the water, that rocky kind of roof soars back up into darkness...and sleeping bats. The contrast between the bats and the dark heights of the insides of the cave and the weightlessness of the light aqua clarity of the water that has built up in the cave is quite wild and ridiculously cool to experience...just drifting inside the cave, enjoying it all.
The sky started to explode with beautiful deep and bright blues, oranges, and yellows. Seeing the ocean in the distance start to sparkle as the sun rose in the sky, colours vibrantly brightening up with the fresh day ahead..it was so, so worth it.
The national park is an entire island and is the natural home and only place on Earth today where the Komodo dragon lives and breathes in its natural habitat. The Komodo dragon is practically a living dinosaur and it plays an important role in how scientists continue to form their understanding of evolution.
The sunsets from the villa those first few days were unlike anything I have ever seen - and it only got better from there. With an incredible time ahead of us, we settled in for a night overlooking the boats lighting up the reef-peppered waters that surround Labuan Bajo.
I left Australia for those three months with a fresh degree, no job and no address. I am going back to go to my official graduation, with a job in my dream career field and am excited for whatever it is that comes next. Life is truly too short to stay rooted down if that is not what makes your heart happy.
Four to six hours long - depending entirely on how often you stop throughout the day - Samoeng Loop takes you past waterfalls, vast valley views, towering mountains, cafes - some of which are amazingly set down in the streams so that your feet dip in the cool pebbled waters while you eat and drink - and fruit and vegetable farms.
We had this insanely beautiful view all to ourselves. Moonlight Crag sits in my top five hikes in Queensland for a very good reason: while some hiking trails are lovely the entire way with one hidden gem that draws in the crowds, Moonlight Crag has incredible views the entire way and has no less than four magical spots that are crowd pleasers.
The waterfall breaks over a fallen tree, and the result is something that seems out of a fairytale – you’re in a cave, watching a waterfall break and churn into a creek that flows between a rainforest. At night, the entire underside of the cave lights up with hundreds of glow worms.
With stunning waterfalls surrounded by dense Australian bush, this place is special. Interestingly, Cedar Creek Falls was also the shooting location for television series Terra Nova. Even so, this magical little spot remains (mostly) a secret.
