Paronella Park
Sunday 15 November: Paronella Park
Spent the day tripping around Innisfail. The scenery is beautiful, on one side lush banana plantations, the other sugarcane farms.
The highlight was visiting Paronella Park in Mena Creek. How fascinating to find a Catalonian inspired Castle nestled in 13 acres of rainforest!
The story goes that Spaniard Jose Paronella, who arrived in Innisfail in 1913, had a dream to build a castle. And this he did, almost entirely by hand. His property included a huge ballroom, picnic areas, tennis courts, tunnels, bridges and all in the romantic setting of a beautiful rainforest. Jose added a second waterfall to mirror Mena Falls and planted 7000 tropical plants to surround the castle.
In 1933 Jose built Queenslands first hydro electric plant to power the 13 acre park, and the castle grounds were opened to entertain the public with movie nights, swims in the lake, tennis matches and live music in the ballroom.
The park is now heritage listed and privately owned and being painstakingly restored due to flood, fire, & cyclone damage over the years.
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