Rayners Walking Track (4km)

Mount Jerusalem National Park sits on the outer slopes of the ancient Tweed volcano, where ridges, escarpments and deeply cut creeks mark the edge of one of northern New South Wales' most dramatic hinterland landscapes. West of Byron Bay and near Mullumbimby and Uki, the park forms part of the broader Tweed Caldera country, linked in character and ecology to nearby reserves such as Nightcap, Border Ranges and Wollumbin. It is a relatively compact park at about 5,152 hectares, but it protects a striking cross-section of the caldera's forested terrain.

The country here shifts between tall eucalypt forest on the drier slopes and wetter rainforest along sheltered gullies and creek lines. That mix reflects the park's position between coast and range, where high rainfall, fertile volcanic soils and changes in elevation create sharp transitions in vegetation over short distances. Bangalow palms are a familiar feature in the moister parts of the park, and the sheltered forested valleys give the area a distinctly subtropical feel even when the ridgelines are more open.

Mount Jerusalem National Park also belongs to a much larger story of rainforest conservation in the NSW-Queensland border ranges. The Tweed Caldera reserves are recognised for their outstanding landscapes and biological diversity, with parts of this broader volcanic region included in the Gondwana Rainforests of Australia World Heritage property. Across the caldera, these forests support an unusually high concentration of marsupial, bird, snake and frog species, which helps explain why even smaller parks in the network matter so much as habitat links between larger blocks of protected country.

This is also Aboriginal cultural landscape, part of the living Country of Bundjalung people, with the wider Tweed Caldera holding deep spiritual and cultural connections across interconnected places rather than isolated sites. European settlement cleared much of the surrounding lowlands, so parks like this now protect remnants of the inland forest that once stretched more broadly across the hinterland. What remains is a landscape where geology, rainforest history and cultural continuity are all close to the surface.