Montville, Queensland

When we were on our mini-break on the Sunshine Coast, the sun didn’t shine. Nevertheless we behaved like proper tourists and went sightseeing.

Village Hall

Now Alfie doesn’t like sightseeing and he was in luck because Carl’s brother lives in Montville, a small town in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast, with his wife and three children. They said, ‘We’ll have him’ – for the day, that is. They took him on a bush walk where there were waterfalls and things to climb and that was just perfect for our little guy.

The wood shop

After drop-off, Carl and I decided it was time for an uninterrupted coffee. Carl’s brother had told us to caffeinate at a place called The Edge. Well we went there and yes, it is on the edge but it shares the space with another cafe and we ended up there by mistake. We ordered a soy latte and a soy hot chocolate and it somehow cost $13.50. There was a 20-minute wait for it to arrive and it didn’t even come with a little marshmallow or an amaretti biscuit on the side. Overly-inflated prices and a delay are not a nice welcome for tourists.

The view from The Edge

Moving right along…Montville is a very quaint and gorgeous country town that still has all the character and charm of yesteryear. It’s 400mtrs above sea level and was settled by Europeans in 1887. Today the town has a population of just under a thousand but on the day we were there, (a public holiday) the population far surpassed that figure. Tourists love the town and aside from a lack of accommodation, it caters well for tourists.

Quaint street signs

After our over-priced-tourist-inflated caffeine-fixes, we strolled along the main street. Everything seems to be centred along this one street, Main Street, and it’s easy to walk along although it’s not flat.

Tourist pose

We first visited St Mary’s, the Anglican Church that was consecrated in 1914. It’s a lovely old building that’s so very typical of what was built in that era in towns with a small population. On the site there is also the Village Hall and the St Mary’s Church Hall. All buildings have their original charm and have many uses today.

St Marys Anglican Church

Inside St Mary’s Anglican Church

My sister-in-law used to work in Wild Rocket; a restaurant that serves British cuisine with live music on weekends. The building was built in 1918 from timber milled from the land. It was a fancy goods store and lolly shop and much loved by the residents as a meeting place. It became a restaurant in 1975 and today is Wild Rocket. I believe Maureen and Lorraine have dined here and loved it so this is the restaurant I wanted to visit but alas, it wasn’t open for dinner on the day we were there. If we had stayed just one extra night we would have been able to experience the ‘Roast Night’ where for $18.95 you can have roast beef with all the trimmings including Yorkshire puddings. What a perfect winter’s meal.

Love roast beef with Yorkshire puddings!

Then I found a shop, Christmas on the Hill; a shop dedicated to Christmas 365 days per year. With ‘Christmas in July’ becoming an ever-increasingly popular event in the Southern Hemisphere, the shop was buzzing. But can you believe, they don’t allow photographs (which I only discovered after taking a few!)

The Christmas Shop

Carl was missing. I found him in Almari Leather, a shop we’ve been to before and never left without making a purchase. This time we bought a belt for Alfie because he’s so thin he can’t keep his pants up and some ‘cracks’ for the stock-whips Archie and Alfie have. Because you need multiple stock whips when you live in the city.

The leather shop

Next we visited an antique store, Rare. I found a Breville coffee machine that’s the same model as the one my parents had when I was growing up. Shocking to think some of the things I grew up with are so out-moded they’re considered collectibles!

We were very ‘up-to-the-minute’ when we had one of these

They also had a lot of luggage that I photographed only because when I was organising Archie’s Titanic 21st I was searching for old suitcases as I thought they’d make excellent props. They’re not as easy to find as you would think!

Old suitcases

We then looked at a craft shop but it was so busy I didn’t go inside.

Craft Shop

We’ll stop the tour of Montville to show you something we had to stop and admire for quite some time. Here, parked on Main Street, Carl found a 1978 Corvette. Did you know the body’s made entirely of fibreglass panels? Who cares. Moving right along…

A Corvette

We visited many more shops but loved The Nut Market not only because of its beautiful setting but because inside, it had some interesting and unusual items. I bought some of the ‘kick-ass hot sauce’ and although tempted, hesitated with the bars of tabasco flavoured chocolate. Something for my friend, Hannah to review for sure.

Nut Shop

The nut shop

Entering the nut shop

Tabasco flavoured chocolate

So that’s just a little of what this town with a population of less than a thousand has to offer. It’s well worth a day-trip and all-day parking is free.