Beyond the seductive necklace of balmy beaches studding the Sunshine Coast, elevate your playground to the host of treats and treasures tucked away in the hinterland. I launched my latest hinterland dip in Eumundi, home to one of the largest artisan markets in the Southern Hemisphere. “Make it, bake it, sew it, grow it” is the market mantra. Bursting with over 600 stalls and held every Wednesday and Saturday, it's the personal interactions with the producers which underpins its magnetic pull. You’ll meet the talented hands behind handcrafted furniture, homewares, artworks, ceramics, cutting-edge fashion and jewellery.  

Have a chat to the farmers and bakers who sell fresh produce and gourmet delights by the truckload. Chill out under the beautiful heritage-listed fig trees as you indulge in a massage, have your palm or tarot cards read, listen to live local music and watch the street performers. Eumundi Markets reach deep into the ‘try before you buy’ philosophy, so I happily nibbled my way through a veritable platter of delectable delights. A sure-fire hit is the Langos caravan, offering a variety of flavours. Langos is a traditional Hungarian street food, made from a simple yeast dough, deep fried in oil. If highly recommend a Langos slathered in garlic, sour cream and cheese. Scrumptious snacks! 

Eumundi Markets. Photo / Visit Sunshine Coast

My hinterland base was the leafy township of Yandina, staying at the namesake hotel which has been serving up yarns and coldies since 1889. Built by Australian pioneers as a staging depot on the route between Brisbane and the Gympie goldfields, this venerable wooden pile, with wrapround balcony, is one of the Sunshine Coast's oldest watering holes. Renovated last year, it’s a cracking spot for some hearty hinterland hospitality, while comfortable accommodation awaits upstairs. Just down the street, join the locals at Meadow Bake Shop for great coffee and breakfast bites. This gorgeous artisan bakery opened 12 months ago in a gracefully restored historical corner store. 

Yandina Hotel. Photo / Visit Sunshine Coast

Suitably fuelled up, I tracked south from Yandina to strike out on a signature Sunshine Coast experience: self-driving the Blackall Range tourist route. The brown Highway 23 signs waymark the official route – much of which skirts the razorback ridgeline of the escarpment, with several stupendous lookouts affording jaw-dropping views down to the ocean. The route also stitches together a swag of highland villages, national parks and scenic reserves and lofty lookouts. Tailor the touring circuit to your preferences. I started by first venturing to Mapleton Falls National Park. The short and sweet Wompoo circuit walk is a fragrant jaunt through verdant rainforest, heavily scented with eucalypts, to Peregrine Lookout where the gushing curtain of Mapleton Falls and expansive views across the Obi Obi Valley unfurl for your viewing pleasure.   

Close by, stake out take a rainforest hike to the even more impressive Kondalilla Falls, complete with swimming hole for a revitalising dip. Needless to say, these falls gush like fire hydrants during the rainy season. Many hinterland communities along the Blackall Range first developed as farming bases, evolved into hippie strongholds in the 1960s, before morphing into solid creative hubs in the 1970s. Montville is a star specimen, richly textured by an incredibly creative class of people, bursting with colour, character and vitality. Beginning life under the bold name of Razorback, that becomes very self-explanatory when you reach the 500-metre-high ridge-top location of the town. It’s a storybook town that fast infatuates, complete with watermill, chintzy cafes, cosy craft cottages and leafy serenity.  

Kondalilla National Park. Photo / Supplied

Tenaciously clinging to the eastern escarpment, this picture-postcard village offers dress circle views across the softly folded valleys and lush green pastures, tumbling towards the coast. The main street stores brim with curios, treasures and confections, like the Clock Shop Montville, housed in a German chalet that looks like its shuffled out of a Brothers Grimm fairytale, ticking and tocking with several thousand timepieces. 

Check out Illume Creations, home to Tina Cooper’s vibrant hand-blown glass art, particularly sculptures and vases. For a riveting display of local works all for sale, a visual feast is the Montville Art Gallery, housed in a characterful 1890’s Queenslander on the main street. There are over 40 artists on permanent display. The gallery owner, Wayne Malkin, is an acclaimed seascape, landscape and portrait artist who specialises in oils. His ocean and hinterland landscape works are drool-worthy, strongly representing his passion for the playful effect of light.  

My favourite spot for coffee and cake is the legendary Poet’s Café, strikingly constructed like a Victorian conservatory-style tearoom, festooned with stained glass windows and renaissance-style portraits. They’re very proud that their coffee is made from fresh spring water bubbling up from the natural spring below the premises.  

Poets Cafe, Montville. Photo / Poets Cafe

After soaking up Montville’s allure, I moseyed on to Maleny, which enjoys an even loftier perch than Montville, bracketed by lush and rolling green hills. Maleny is like a microcosm of the hinterland’s finest features, a blend of creative types, aging hippies, a pumping artisan food production scene and magnificently bucolic beauty spots. Maleny is renowned as bountiful food bowl, which I will showcase in an upcoming article on Sunshine Coast’s sublime produce.  

But a great starting point is to take a stroll along Maple Street, popping with colour and personality, and dotted with organic cafes, brilliant bookstores, eclectic boutiques and quirky independent stores. It’s remarkable what a tractor-beam Maleny is for alternative healing and therapy practitioners. I perused a head-spinning variety of kooky main street offerings from cosmic dieting, aerial hammock healing and soul breathing to harmonica healing and plant-based cancer treatments.  

Sprawling out from Maleny, a stunningly green, undulating countryside, dotted with cows, interspersed with pockets of remnant rainforest, and offset by compelling bird’s-eye views of the Glass House Mountains. A must-do is Mary Cairncross Scenic Reserve, a spectacular rainforest with boardwalks threading through this fabulous reserve, abuzz with raucous tropical birdlife. The magnificent elevated viewing deck offers a dreamy panoramic outlook across the eleven thrusting vertical rocky columns of the Glasshouse Mountains.  

Glasshouse Mountains. Photo / Supplied

Another radiant encounter with nature is to tootle your way to Maleny Botanic Gardens and Bird World, one of Australia’s biggest private gardens. This botanical tour de force is like a green-fingered Disneyland, is constantly expanding, including an Oriental Garden, Rose Garden, Fairy Garden, a Rainforest Walk and a fascinating grotto of ancient basalt rocks that were thrust up at the same time as the Glasshouse Mountains were volcanically formed. But as much as the gardens are divine, it’s the feathered friends who really steal the show. This is the mother of all menageries. 

There’s four walk-through, free-flight aviaries to admire, aflutter with over 700 birds. It’s the parrots that are the runaway favourites, many who were abandoned by previous owners. You’ll encounter macaws, black cockatoos, Amazons, Green-cheeked conures and Alexandrines, who happily landed on my head, arms and shoulders. A crowd-favourite is Coco, the 85-year-old Amazon Parrot, who still sings opera and can belt out the first verse of “Old Macdonald had a Farm”, without dropping a note. Maleny Botanic Gardens & Bird World has just been voted Queensland’s No.1 attraction by Tripadvisor. Get amongst it!  

Bird World fun. Photo / Visit Sunshine Coast

Fly direct to the Sunshine Coast with the low-fares leader, Jetstar, who operate year-round services from Auckland to Maroochydore, three times a week. It’s the fastest way to paradise. You can be enjoying Mooloolaba prawns on the beach by lunchtime! jetstar.com 

From glorious beaches and warm seas to nature, outdoors adventure, wellness, hyper-local food and artisan distilleries, pick your vibe and grab your fill of golden sunshine moments in the Sunshine Coast. For the latest destination inspiration and visitor tips, head to visitsunshinecoast.com 

Mike Yardley is Newstalk ZB’s resident traveller and can be heard every week at 11.20am on Saturday Mornings with Jack Tame.