📍1770 Larc! Paradise Tour: An Honest Review Of The Signature Full-Day Adventure.
LOOKING FOR AN IN-DEPTH REVIEW OF THE ICONIC 1770! LARC PARADISE TOUR?
The town of 1770 is one of the most beloved coastal towns in QLD. Revered for its spectacular natural beauty, idyllic seaside atmosphere and being the first place famous British explorer Captain James Cook landed his famous Endeavour II vessel in the state, it is the perfect road trip destination or scenic detour off the Bruce Highway for anyone visiting the Gladstone region.
One of the best things to do while you’re visiting this breathtaking paradise is explore the nearby Eurimbula National Park by way of the iconic 1770 LARC! Adventure, which might just be as well-known as the town itself, since the two of them essentially go hand in hand, they are synonymous with each other! Any time there is a travel program showcasing 1770, you can damn well bet they are going to talk about the hot pink amphibious vehicle. After all, that’s how I knew them so well!
The company offers 3 tours: a one-hour picnic tour, a two-hour afternoon tour and their signature 7-hour Full-Day Paradise Tour! However, it is only the latter that ventures all the way up the Eurimbula’s coastline to the boat-only accessible Middle Island, where the company has been given exclusive access to Queensland’s only still operating lighthouse you can tour inside and there’s no way I was missing out on that, so that’s the one I went with. Here are my detailed thoughts and observations about this national park’s pristine coastal wilderness and exploring the historic lighthouse while riding a super-fun, vibrantly-coloured and unmistakably iconic water-and-land receptacle there and back!
1770 LARC! Paradise Tour.
- Fun, hot pink amphibious vehicles.
- Breathtaking creeks & coastal landscapes.
- Historic lighthouse tour.
1770 LARC! Tour: Review Overview.
In this detailed review of my full-day LARC! Paradise Tour, I highlight all my favourite aspects of travelling with them through Eurimbula National Park whilst also mentioning the areas where I felt could use improvement. I will cover everything from the booking process, the amphibious vehicle ride, touring the Bustard Head Lighthouse, the Historical Museum & Cemetery Tour, plus the swimming and & sandboarding activities and morning tea and lunch.
Is Eurimbula National Park Worth Visiting?
Eurimbula National Park is definitely worth visiting. With its long, pristine beaches and stunning creeks, it is easily one of the best places to visit in 1770 if you’re craving seaside solitude. However, the southern half of it and its campgrounds at Eurimbula Creek and Middle Creek are only 4WD accessible, except Ganoonga Noonga Lookout, with careful driving. Middle Island, which has the Bustard Head Lighthouse, museum and cemetery and the magnificent Pancake Creek is only reachable by boat, so if you don’t have a 4WD or a boat you can’t see much of the national park.
And that’s what makes the LARC! Paradise Tour such a great adventure because it’s the best way to discover these gorgeous landscapes, see plenty of birds, and learn the history. Plus, it’s in a super fun amphibious vehicle that bounces its way over the terrain like a puppy running up the stairs!
Online Booking & Checking In.
✔️ Pros.
- They are easy to find, being advertised all over the 1770 & Agnes Water Brochures, and are available on their websites and through many third-party websites.
- The 1770 LARC! Tour office is super easy to find. Just look for the giant hot pink vehicles on the drive into town. They’re impossible to miss.
- Checking in was pretty quick.
- The office and gift shop had a good selection of souvenirs, gifts and small toys.
❌ Cons.
- I don’t like that the third-party booking websites don’t have the mandatory (QPSW and Bustard Head Lighthouse Association) price included with the ticket. You have to pay on arrival. This makes it seem like you’re getting the tour for a better price than the official website and is easy to gloss over. Why don’t they just include it in the main cost so that people can just have the payment already finalised and not be met with an outstanding fee when they arrive? It’s off-putting and seems a bit deceptive not to mention inconvenient. I like rocking up knowing my admission is already paid for.
- I certainly didn’t appreciate the dismissive comment “That’s how they (the third-party sites) get you”. Ummm, it’s your company that puts it further down? There wouldn’t be any confusion or overlooking it if it was in the big, obvious booking box with the large bolded price.
- You don’t get to pick where your group sits, the guide arranges that just before you get onboard.
LARC! Amphibious Vehicle.
✔️ Pros.
- The LARC! is such a cool vehicle! I love that it is bright pink and easy to spot whenever it’s out, especially when travelling along the beaches.
- The pull-down stairs on the side of it have a wide berth and railings so you have something to hold onto as you descend and ascend.
- It has about 24 bucket seats, and each comes with a bottom cushion for comfort.
- There’s no glass and it has a high roof and few vertical bars so it’s easy to enjoy the scenery even if you are on one of the inner seats.
- Crossing the creeks was so much fun as it was bouncing going over the sandy underwater terrain and was a highlight of the tour, breaking up the long stretches of driving across the smooth beach.
- It was also fun reversing into the ocean to cool down whatever was overheating, which did make us later but added another layer of fun.
❌ Cons.
- Pretty early on the LARC was overheating, but we managed to trudge along. The creek crossings were great at bringing the temperatures down so that it could still keep operating. (These are old workhorses that served in Vietnam.)
- The tour ran an hour over because of the mechanical issues. (But I was enjoying the day out so much it didn’t matter.) However, you might want to not have anything organised after.
Eurimbula National Park.
✔️ Pros.
- Going through the creeks was one of the best bits! It was fun and bouncy. They were also the most scenic parts of the mainland, making it even better.
- Plenty of bird species were also spotted both on the beach and in the sky, which was a great way to break up the long stretches between the creek crossings. The guide was having a great time calling out the seagulls, pied cormorants, pied oystercatchers, and even some white-bellied sea eagles, which he would hilariously say “That’s [some made-up name]” as if he personally knew who they were.
- The skipper pointed out a turtle on the beach and a shark in the shallows on two separate occasions! Unfortunately, the turtle was dead and I think the shark was a shovelnose ray, which looks like a flat shark, especially with its tail features, but is actually a part of the ray family and hangs out with them.
- One of the best parts was traversing through Pancake Creek on Middle Island, then going up the incredibly rugged road the guide aptly called “The Rollercoaster”.
- Then the spot further up the road after lunch called Aircraft Lookout, which was the absolute highlight thanks to the most magnificent panoramic coastal views of the aforementioned river winding through the landscape between here and the mountains plus including the breathtaking coastline we’d just come along back to Bustard Head Lighthouse. And as we came back the same way, we got to experience it twice, which was great allowing passengers on both sides to enjoy the epicness
❌ Cons.
- The drives between the creek take a long time, so it would briefly get the slightest bit boring.
- The guide says there are often emus on the beach, but none showed up that day, unfortunately.
Bustard Head Lighthouse, Museum & Cemetery.
At the Lightstation, the caretakers arrived and the skipper took over as the guide. Our group was split up in two. The skipper took half inside Queensland’s only still operating tourable lighthouse, while the rest of us went into the cottage-turned-museum with one of the caretakers. Afterwards, we all were directed to have a look inside a smaller museum that had stories about the people who lived on the island and took care of the lighthouse. Then it was down to the cemetery to learn even more about them.
✔️ Pros.
- It was great to see inside a working lighthouse and learning about its heritage was interesting.
- It was in immaculate condition with lots of intriguing memorabilia.
- Without giving away the context, the skipper’s joke about its construction was one of the highlights.
- It was great being inside the lantern room and seeing the lamp up close.
- Getting to go around the gallery (the balcony at the top.) was fantastic and featured some lovely panoramic views, although the bushland was obscuring it a bit. The Skipper was kind enough to take some photos of me.
- The museum in the Caretaker’s Cottage was excellent, being one of the most perfectly maintained and neatly displayed places I’ve ever been.
- I appreciated that it was a mix of showrooms and showcases so that you still get a sense of what life was like in there, while also getting to see the different lighthouse, nautical and marine artefacts and souvenirs in there.
- The other mini-museum in the substation building was also interesting and the skipper told stories about what life was like for the early caretaker families that lived in this isolated paradise and some of its dark history.
- It was also fascinating and sad to see the cemetery where they were buried.
❌ Cons.
- I would have loved to have had more a little time to look more closely at the different items in all three places we visited and read the writing on the walls in the substation.
Swimming & Sandboarding.
✔️ Pros.
- The creek is absolutely gorgeous and it was nice to do some activities rather than sitting down or walking around.
- Sandboarding was super fun sliding down the 10m-ish dune.
- Swimming was beautifully refreshing on the warm November day.
- The guide took some photos of me with the LARC and a fun forced-perspective shot of with the skipper.
❌ Cons.
- I wish we had more time to do these activities. It was pretty short. I wondered if that was because we were making up for lost time because of the overheating issues.
- I didn’t like that they asked us to wash the boards with the leaked radiator fluid on them (the source of the overheating.) in the pristine creek.
Morning Tea & Lunch.
On Middle Island, there is a large hut, where we had morning tea after going up “The Rollercoaster”, and lunch after the Bustard Head Lighthouse, Museum & Cemetery Tour.
Morning tea was fruit and individual packets of chips. Lunch was wraps and salads. For drinks, it was water, a specially concocted LARC juice, tea and coffee. This is the only place on the tour where there are toilets, which are caravan-style.
✔️ Pros.
- The hut is spacious and shady, with benches all around the perimeter. There is also additional seating hiding at the side nestled under the trees.
- The mandarin I had for morning tea was large as was the vegan salad bowl they specially made for me, which was tasty. I felt bad I couldn’t eat it all, but it definitely kept me going for the rest of the day.
- I liked that you wrote your name on your paper cup to reuse later. The cups also had a humanised rabbit and dog who appeared in love with each other which was hilarious.
- The toilets are caravan-style, so they are better than stinky drop loos. The guide checks the cubicles for spiders. (However, I did still see one later.)
❌ Cons.
- The benches don’t have backs.
- The toilets are primarily for the ladies, but guys can use them for No. #2. However, for number one, there are plants to water.
Overall Experience & Recommendation.
I had such a fun day out doing the full-day 1770 LARC! Paradise Tour. I loved going in an amphibious vehicle that I’ve never been in, which was so fun to ride, especially the super bouncy creek crossings and the steep “rollercoaster” road on Middle Island, which also had that magnificent view I will never forget! And, I had always wanted to see inside a lighthouse, so that was memorable too.
I also loved that on the way there was plenty of birdlife to see and a couple of marine animals too. Granted, the turtle was unfortunately dead. Probably killed by a tiger shark, their biggest predator.
Another great thing is that the tours all start along the same route, so you’re essentially getting the Afternoon and the Picnic Tour included in the Paradise Tour, which is a bonus. To be honest, I don’t think I would have enjoyed those nearly as much because, while going across Round Hill and Eurimbula Creek was fun, it wasn’t nearly as incredible as the many things that lay ahead that I mentioned above.
Plus, the guide and skipper were fun and engaging and made the whole experience so much more memorable. So aside from them not including the mandatory fee in the payable price or right next to it on the third-party website making it look like you’re getting a better deal than the website and the unprofessional response from the desk clerk about it, the actual tour itself was incredible.
Who Is The 1770 LARC Paradise Tour For?
- Those who don’t have a boat or 4WD to visit Eurimbula by themselves.
- People who like unique vehicles and new vehicular experiences.
- Folks who enjoy bouncy rides.
- Those who love pristine beaches and epic coastal scenery.
- Have always wanted to see inside a working lighthouse and learn lighthouse history.
- Birdwatchers.
- Those who like chatty guides.
Who Would The Tour Not Appeal To?
- People who have a boat and or 4WD and prefer to explore themselves.
- Those who want to go to Eurimbula to camp.
- People who don’t like arriving at a place thinking they’ve paid only to be told there is an outstanding sneaky mandatory charge and that it’s their and the third party’s fault when they aren’t the ones being transparent by putting the full cost of it as the main price and hiding it for on-arrival payment under a clickable pop-up.
Conclusion: Honest Full Day Larc! Paradise Tour Review.
The Full-Day LARC! Paradise Tour was such a fun adventure from start to finish that I didn’t even mind that the vehicle was on the verge of breaking down several times and caused us to be back an hour late because it meant being on this cool vehicle longer and listening to the guide and the skipper observations, jokes, commentary and banter for longer.
If you plan to visit 1770/Agnes Water, consider looking at these other posts.
