Eua Island is a high island 40 km off the south coast of Tongatapu, Tonga. This is where the Eua National Park is located, which boast 450 hectares of pristine tropical rainforest with exotic bird life including lorikeets, musk parrots, pacific pigeons, kingfishers and tropic sea birds. Deua National Park is located approximately 312km south of Sydney and west of Moruya. The largest park on the Eurobodalla Coast, the Deua National Park, covers a massive area of over 117,826 ha, most of which is relatively undisturbed, pristine wilderness. The best access is by the Moruya to Araluen Road following the course of the Deua River. Access to the western edge of the park is via the Krawaree Road south of Braidwood. Access to the south east of the park is difficult. Within the park, vehicular access is generally confined to 4WD tracks and forest roads. There are camping facilities at Deua River Camping Area, Bakers Flat and Dry Creek. Bendethera Camping Area (4WD access only) and Berlang Camping Area (2WD gravel roads) have fireplaces, pit toilets and a car park. Rivers provide a water supply. Accommodation is available at Moruya, Araluen, Majors Creek and Braidwood. Visitors are provided with fireplaces, rubbish containers, toilets and a car park, and rivers provide a water supply. The Park provides for wilderness recreation activities including bushwalking, bushcamping, abseiling, canoeing and adventure caving. With the exception of Bendethera Main Cave and the first 200m of Wyanbene Cave, permits are required for caving from the NPWS Narooma Office, phone 02 4476 2888. See the magnificent 96m deep Big Hole and the Marble Arch. Bushwalkers are advised to be well equipped and experienced as there are no constructed paths in areas of the Park. Vegetation and climate within the park change markedly with altitude. Over 90 species of birds have been recorded in the park with bellbirds and lyrebirds commonly seen. Both wet and dry open forests, mainly of yellow and white stringbark and forest red gum cover the lower slopes while at the heads of the coastal valleys wet niches support small pockets of temperate rainforest dominated by pinkwood, sassafras and lillipilli. The Deua is home for many mammals including swamp wallabies, red-necked wallabies, grey kangaroos, echidnas, possums and wombats.
Eua Island is located only 7 minutes by plane from Tongatapu, (air services currently suspended) or 2 hours by ferry. Even thou you can see Eua from Tongatapu's south-west shore, the weather is cooler on Eua. During mid-summer when it is very hot and humid in Tongatapu, Eua's weather is very pleasant. It is a rugged and diverse island with bush lands, rainforests, dramatic cliffs and white sandy beaches. Eua's National Park has 800m wide band of tropical rainforest. It is bordered on the western side by the sheer cliffs that descend from the highest ridge on the island. There is a campsite in the park (a patch of level grass) although no facilities available at this time. There are caves and gorges to explore.
Eua is home to the beautiful but rare red shining parrot and is known to have some of the best underwater cave diving in the Pacific. The most spectacular scenic viewpoint in all of Tonga is at Anokula where the King built himself a palace in 1983. The soaring cliffs drop 120 m straight into the coast, creating an unsurpassed panorama of awe and beauty. Eua is an island for walking and exploring. Bush walking is a popular activity. The island is crisscrossed with a complex tangle of bush roads and tracks accessible only by foot or horseback. You can opt for a day walk or a complete loop of the island which could take up to 10 days. Rock climbing and Cave Exploring are also popular activities. The Lokupo Beach area is backed by steep cliffs and an excellent spot for rock climbing. There are also many caves to explore with most being approximately a 2 hour walk from the main road. The more popular caves are Showerfalls Cave which is a small cave behind a steady stream of fresh water that flows through a narrow, fern-covered limestone gorge.You can climb through this cave to the other side although this is recommended for only the hearty adventurer. Ana Kuma or"Rats Cave" is riddled with stalagmites and stalactites. A narrow passageway leads through the rock to a small ledge and a stunning view over the rainforest to the Ocean. You can view many varieties of birds in Eua for it is a bird lovers paradise.It is famous for the Red breasted Musk Parrot, however other varieties are: Reef Heron, Jungle Fowl, Pacific Pigeon, Blue Crowned Lory, Barn Owl Pacific Black Duck, White Rumped Swiftel, Crimson Crowned Fruit Dove, Purple Swamphen, White Collared Kingfisher and the White Tern. Much of the island is covered in plantation and grassland with small patches of coastal forest where at dusk you may see the cave-dwelling sheath-tailed bat (pekapeak) hunting for insects. The large flying fox, or fruit bat (peka) roosts in large forest or plantation trees.
This is the most popular trek taking you through the only National Park in Tonga. The trek starts at the edge of the plantation forest, passes through the National Park, Hafu Pool and to the "Big 'Ovava" tree before ending where the tour began. The tour takes in the sights from two spectacular lookouts; Lauua and Lokupo Lookouts, where there are stunning views of the National Park coastline and of sheer cliff faces and surf. There is also the opportunity for bird watching, where the rare parrot Koki (red shining parrot) may be spotted. The tour then moves to Rats' Cave, a small cave amongst the cliff face with views of the coast. This trek takes five hours covering the middle-east coast of 'Eua Island. This walk is included in the fourwheeldrive tour or can also be done unguided with a provided map. Eua island's has the best trekking / hiking in the South Pacific. 'Eua island has the largest National Park in the Kingdom of Tonga. This is the perfect and only island to hike in the Kingdom. 'Eua National Park is positioned on the East coast of 'Eua.'Eua National Park has a unique un-touched flora and fauna and plants and trees that are only found on Eua Is and not the rest of Tonga but some of the same vegetation, plants and trees are found on other South Pacific islands. This proves that 'Eua Is is not geologically not related to the rest of Tonga. There is a unique parrot called the Red Shining Parrot (KOKI). This Parrot is only found on the island of 'Eua and no where else in the world.For a rare unique bird, population is good, 100% guarantee you will hear this bird on any of the walks, which means there is a very good chance you will see it.Then you have your common Pacific sea birds, which are very beautiful to the Pacific only like the White tail tropic bird (Tavake), White turns(Tala), Brown booby, Frigate birds(Hele Kosi) and plenty more. he 'Eua Banyan trees (Strangling fig tree) are quite spectacular, another unique characteristic about these trees is that they are all growing out of the giant gaping sink holes, shafts in the ground, with a cave, which you climb down the tree and into the cave. This tree is called Big Ovava !!! On Some of the walks, it is not un-usual to see whales and turtles from high cliff tops looking over the lush virgin rain forests down to the Deep Tonga Trench ocean. This is a real bonus to the trek of the day. Trekking to more accessible beaches are fun as well or take a horse ride to a beach, this makes for a nice day.
