The Beauty Beyond Byron Bay

Pilot Guides

The far northern coastal region of New South Wales is best known for the surfing town and now major tourist hotspot of Bryon Bay.

Byron continues to captivate surfers and international tourists alike with its spectacular beaches and its historic lighthouse, situated atop Cape Byron, Australia’s most easterly point.

But beyond an increasingly crowded and urban Byron is a hinterland characterised by bucolic forests , more spectacular beaches and a lost world charm .

Here are some of the highlights

1.Lennox Head – a few miiles south of Byron. Bay lies the sleepy seaside town of Lennox Head .Its Main Street is fronted by a seven mile long beach popular with surfers but far less crowded than Byron .

2. Mullumbimby – This small modest country town a few kilometres inland from Byron became popular with hippies who were among the first to be captivated by the bucolic charm
of the area known as The Northern Rivers .

3. Murwillimbah ::

Sugar cane has been important industry for this old agricultural town and a working sugar cane mill still dominates the approach to the town . Disused rail tracks which used to cart the cane to the mill have now been been re purposed into cross country biking trails where bikers can traverse the route of old rail lines across the cane fields and rivers and through forests .

In town ,classic old art deco shopfronts house hundred year old shops like the Austral Cafe .

On the outskirts of town is the new Margaret Olley Art Gallery named after the local but famous national still life artist whose works are in display here .

The gallery overlooks the Tweed River, one of several huge rivers which dominate the landscapes of The Northern Rivers .
Beyond the Tweed lies the valleys and slopes of the mysterious Mt Warning sacred to the local Aboriginal tribes, and beyond that the hidden valkeys of outlying old colonial settlements located up against the border with the adjoining state of Queensland .