Keeping the best till last??? Spring Bluff; Part 4 Carnival of Flowers...

Spring Bluff railway station  is a well loved destination for a visit here in SE Queensland. The little station is known for its beautiful gardens and the whole precinct is now heritage listed. This is part of the historic Ipswich to Toowoomba railway line, the building of which started in 1864 and the first train came through on April 12, 1867. The station was decommissioned in 1992 but was put on the National trust register in 1994. It is on a line which, with the mining boom, has become very important for the transportation of coal. The only passenger trains these days are tours and special excursion trains.

Now for some more recent history affecting Spring Bluff station...last year in January, a huge wall of water washed away the side of the hill/bluff that the station is 'perched' on. The damage was huge as the photos from the Queensland Rail website show. The railway lines had the soil, stones and some sleepers washed out from underneath them...the beautiful gardens and the bitumen carpark were washed away...

The line was reopened in 2 months and the complex of gardens etc was reopened in August; quite an effort! It's hard to imagine the volume of water that came down this dry looking culvert in January 2011...

When DH and I arrived at Spring Bluff, we saw that there was an excursion train from Toowoomba at the station. These tourists had come up the range from Toowoomba and had had a picnic lunch at Spring Bluff. The train started loading for the return journey about 20 minutes after we arrived... and then we waved to those on the train as it pulled out of the station...I can't help myself...always wave at excursion trains :-)

Look how high that step up to the train door is!!

That's ok...QR has a set of steps...

And then when all the passengers are aboard, the steps are wheeled away :-)

The 'station master'...a volunteer

The old 'points' room

So now some photos of the station and its gardens...

The old station master's house

the terraces in front of the old caretaker's cottage

The cute caretaker's cottage

that old tree planted in 1870

terraced gardens beside the road into the car park...

DH ordered a Devonshire tea; this is half of his scone!




Just as we finished our cuppas (and DH ate his scone) we heard a train in the distance climbing up the range . It was a 'double-header' coal train, but it was empty we guessed as it was going pretty fast up the range. There were over 40 wagons behind the 2 engines. 

What a great finale to our Toowoomba visit.

Part 3; Queen's Park during Carnival of Flowers

Next DH and I went to Queen's Park to have a look at the garden displays there. We would not be disappointed...

the last time DH and I toured this park, the monument was surrounded by scaffolding and restoration work was being undertaken...

Like a meadow filled with poppies...

A garden bed of herbs...

Ornamental kale plants

The tree below has 2 'collars' of perspex and I asked one of the gardeners whether this was because of possums. And it was...apparently the possum population in this city park has 'exploded'. The possums have been causing considerable damage to trees such as this cypress and in some cases endangering the life of the old trees. The possums also dig up and eat the seedlings of  the annuals that are planted for the displays. The park staff were given a permit to trap and relocate 20 of the estimated 60 possums which live in this one park.

The 4th part of our Carnival of Flowers day out will be about the station at Spring Bluff...a very special place :-)

Photographic Scavenger Hunt...a solitary tree...

Once again I'm joining in with Deb's feature which this week is about trees...solitary trees to be exact. But some of my photos maybe have a few more trees :-). So here we go...my tree pictures...

The first photo was taken in Reid, Australian Capital Territory, when DH and I visited a very historic church which pre-dated the setting up of Canberra. I was quite taken with this huge old tree in the graveyard.

 The next photo was taken in Toowoomba and this tree was just behind the car park of the Tourist Information Centre

This is also in Toowoomba...this old tree was growing on the footpath along one side of the Laurel Bank Park....

This tree was growing at Picnic Point on the edge of the range at Toowoomba 

yet again...Picnic Point. This tree is near the lookout area

This is an old cypress in Queens Park, Toowoomba ; note the perspex 'collars' on the tree trunk to discourage possums

A lovely old palm tree in Queens Park

 Above is a plaque giving the details of the tree below, which was planted at Spring Bluff Station in 1870

Technically not a solitary tree. These trees on Norfolk Island are growing horizontally because of the strong winds that buffet the area around the golf course and graveyard.

One of the many Norfolk Island pines that cling on to  the cliffs

I had planned to drive over to my old  primary school to take some photos of trees there that were mature specimums when I was a student there over 55 years ago! But will save that for another time.