Mackay - Places to See

Information Centre
Visitors arriving in Mackay from the south should stop at the unusual Tourism Mackay Information Centre (320 Nebo Road) which features a replica of the chimney from the old Richmond Sugar Mill. They provide excellent maps and can book trips to the Great Barrier Reef as well as advise on accommodation and sightseeing. There are one-day trips to the Great Barrier Reef, Hamilton Island and Lindeman Island. In fairness, access to the Whitsunday islands is a lot easier from Shute Harbour which is part of the new township of Whitsunday.

Victoria St Buildings
Along Victoria Street, Mackay's main street, there are a number of outstanding old buildings. One of the most impressive is the Commonwealth Bank (1880) at number 63. It features huge Doric columns on the ground floor with cast-iron columns and balustrades on the first floor and the imposing Queensland National Bank building (1922) on the corner of Victoria Street and Wood Street. It is an interesting mixture of Corinthian columns with ornate corners and plaster arches.

Gordon St
Gordon Street, which runs parallel to Victoria Street, also has a number of impressive buildings. There is the huge Mackay Civic Centre which features a fountain identical to the one in Sydney's Kings Cross. The Anglican Church is the third on the site. The first was built in 1867 and actually fell down and the second was destroyed by a cyclone in 1918. The Masonic Temple (1927), like so many Masonic Temples, is a huge ornate building. In this instance the style is basically Classical Revival which was all the rage in the 1920s. It cost �6 500 to build. At the easterly end of the street is Queens Park with its band rotunda, children's playground and excellent displays of tropical orchids.

Customs House
On the way out to the Mackay Bulk Sugar Terminal the visitor has to cross the Pioneer River. On the town side of the Forgan Bridge is the superb old Customs House which was built in 1901 to collect interstate excise on the local rum production.

The Mackay Bulk Sugar Terminal
Located at Mackay Harbour the bulk sugar terminal is well worth a visit. Reputedly the largest in Australia it is capable of holding over 700 000 tonnes of sugar. There are no tours of the facility.

Harbour Beach
Nearby is the Mackay Surf Lifesaving Club which operates on Harbour Beach, a delightful and quiet location removed from the more popular Town and Illawong beaches which lie to the south. Beside the beach is an excellent children's park with a huge variety of activities as well as distinctive novelty fish garbage bins.

Far Beach
At Far Beach there is a monument to the 29 people, most of them school children, who were killed in 1960 when a Fokker Friendship crashed in the sea while approaching Mackay Airport.

Cape Hillsborough National Park
45 km north of Mackay is the Cape Hillsborough National Park. An area of 850 hectares beside the ocean it is a combination of rugged hills, rhyolite boulders from the old volcanic plug known as Pinnacle Rock, and sandy beaches where, in the late afternoon, kangaroos can be seen. The area is predominantly rainforest and the chief activities are bushwalking or beachside swimming and sunbathing. There are camping areas at Smalleys Beach and a resort at Cape Hillsborough. For more information check out: http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/parks/cape-hillsborough/index.html

Greenmount Historic Homestead
Perhaps the most interesting journey to be taken from Mackay is the one out on the Peak Downs Highway which leads to Walkerston and Mirani.

Walkerston, located 15 km from Mackay and 20 m above sea-level, lies in the heart of a rich sugar-growing area. The first settler in the area was John Mackay but in the late 1860s John Walker (after whom the town is named) took over Mackay's properties which, following his death in 1879, were sold to the Colonial Sugar Refining Company.