Natural Bridge, Naminbah Valley, Queensland

I first visited Natural Bridge about 20 years ago, together with my kids and my cousin’s kids. We all had a wonderful time getting to see the various rock formations, stroll along the rain forest paths, picnic in the surrounding grounds and swim in the chilling waters of the cavern's recesses. These days the whole area has changed and the river waters are no longer accessible to visitors, having been fenced in completely, leaving three viewing platforms and well-constructed walking paths through out.

"The Natural Bridge was formed at the junction of one basalt layer and a softer volcanic layer beneath called agglomerate.  The lower, softer layer was undercut at the base of a waterfall, forming a deep cavern.  At the same time, the circular motion of boulders in the stream above had formed a deep pool.  The drilling action deepened the pool until it broke through the cavern roof, allowing the stream to plunge through the hole and out through the cave below.

Behind the Bridge the mountain-fed waters of Cave Creek form a waterfall which plunges through the roof of a cave into a sparkling pool below, which then flows into the Nerang River and down the Numinbah Valley.  Surrounding the creek is dense sub-tropical rainforest.

Once home to the Kalibah Aboriginal people, the Natural Bridge area remained untouched by European settlement until it was discovered by timber-getters, probably in 1893. Magnificent trees felled in the area included a giant red cedar taken in 1893 from near Natural Bridge.  A huge section of this was displayed at the Paris World Fair."

I was recently driven out to Natural Bridge by that same cousin, this time minus the kids, who are now all grown. The images above were captured during that visit. They are the result of bracketing three RAW files, blended together using the NIK Software HD Efex Pro 2, and final development in Adobe Lightroom 4.