Traditionally known as women's country and called Peregian (Aboriginal for Emu), it's hardly a mountain, more a rocky outcrop. Several sleek and shiny crows sit sentinel at the entry, sounding their welcome.
I'm thinking to take the track around to the western side where I know there will be masses of tea tree and dog rose.
The track is damp still from recent rains and the dew hanging heavy, droplets sparkling with colour. A trapeze spider has hung a cleverly crafted web in the tangle of grass and sedge stalks.
So our flower hunting begins. White flowers, always a bit dodgy to identify... tiny bells top a small green tuft.
The growth habit helps…these are on long straight stalks ...might be epacris heath. And then there are the milkmaids, clear and bright, "You look happy to greet me", lovely as Edelweiss, though much simpler.
Contrasting colours of red and green vibrate in the early morning light glowing through the grasses, filtering through the callistemons and picking out the baby seed pods of the prickly moses plants.
It's a gorgeous morning, a fabulous experience to just be, to give over to the beauty. A family of little birds is bathing in a puddle on the track just a couple of metres ahead of us.
We can see throughout the wallum growth sprays of gold pea flowers with their deep brown 'eyes' and the balls of creamy fluff of the prickly moses still blooming.
Ah these tricky spiders…even laying traps on the ground! And here is a strange little plant, a club rush in flower, don't see many of them. Grasstrees sprouting new spears.
As the track lifts out of the swampy ground, my flowerhead mind goes completely off …I love the white Queensland wax flowers and just adore the pink boronia, great gorgeous clumps of it. Mmmmm.
It's a little drier here. There's a low growing banksia and a small eucalypt that would gladden the heart of any gardener.
There's Mt Ninderry rising above the distant treelike.
We walk beyond the fork in the track. The tea tree bushes and the dog rose are gone. Last year there were masses of white and pink bloom all the way up the hillside. It was spectacular. Now there is a broad spread of blackened earth, sprouting grass trees and black skeleton hakea. Looks like a control burn has happened here. It will be interesting to see if the tea tree and dog rose return. The hakea no doubt will love the burn.
Everything changes. Ah well. We return to the fork in the track and wander uphill.
The left of the track has not been burned and there are a scattering of white tea tree plants, quite small, but no dog rose. A little sarsaparilla in bloom.
A murder of crows is wheeling around the rocky top. They're flopping and feinting, vying for position to spy out the territory, see where the next fish and chips will need unwrapping.
We turn near the summit to walk the ridge track down. A brilliant shining ocean lies to the east and a sea of softly waving grasses to the west now. The breeze has a chilly edge to it.
In the distance lies Mt Cooroy.
We're walking a really rocky area. The flowers are different. The yellows sport two kinds of goodenia and a hibbertia, and a lime green orchid, not so easy to spot in the grasses.
And then we find it! A treasure. Just one for the whole walk…a fringe lily, on the very edge of the track, six flowers and heaps of buds. So exciting to see it here, as they're disappearing. Many photos!
But then….we're carefully picking our way down the rocky track when we stop to let a family move past us. As they gather traction down the hill, we see what the mum is twirling in her hand…the fringe lily. Pretty flower, pick it. We're so stunned we can't speak. The family is long gone by the time we gather our wits to think that we could've, should've said something.
We emerge from the park and wander to the parking lot by the high school. The median strip is planted with native bushes, full with flower. Tiny red birds, scarlet honeyeaters are flitting through the callistemon and nearby a mistletoe is calling to its own little red bird.
We live in a beautiful land.
Some info for Sunshine Coast dwellers and visitors... the wildflowers on Mt Emu will probably be good for another week till mid September if you want to see them for real, and I hope you do. There are two track entries off Havana Rd East. Best to take the track furthest down this road where it terminates at the high school. Happy wildflower hunting.
