Kelli28

anyone made the trip by road from brisbane to cairns were travelling up in september and need advice on where to stop what its like ect ect ...

biggy

stop at Yeppoon....I will make ye a cup of tea lol

Kelli28

do we get choccie biccies too??

biggy

oh I think I could manage that lol

Kelli28

so whats to see and do in yeppoon? how far is it from brissy? sorry i havent a clue where it is

CazBeckham

HI Kelli

ME and OH did the road trip from Brissie to Cairns in Jan 2006.
Just got a map and decided that we would drive for around 4-5 hours a day - stopping as and when we felt like it. As we are photographers we stopped quite a lot en route. Check out www.beckhamdigital.co.uk

Over two trips to Australia our trip was:-

1st trip:
Flew to Melbourne (got rellies there) - flew to Sydney - drove to Brissie -(got rellies there) flew to Cairns

2nd Trip
Flew to Melbourne (got rellies there)- drove to Sydney - flew to Brissie - (got rellies there and now Daughter and Son in Law)drove to Cairns

WE are applying for our CPV so hopefully this time next year we should be almost on our way.


Caz

annqldau

Memories of Spanish City...LOL... looking at your location.

OK we did Cairns to Brisbane nearly two years ago and stayed in crest hotels and a variety of motels.

You can get holiday accomodation info on http://www.queenslandholidays.com.au...tion/index.cfm

last minute deals on http://www.wotif.com/hotels/australia-qld-hotels.html

info on what to do on http://www.greatsoutheast.com.au/

But when we did it we just picked up some of those free hotel guides in the tourist places and just did pot luck on the night as they are all dirt cheap compared to UK even the 5 star hotels. That way you don't have to follow a set route but can meander where ever you want.

youngy73

depends on how long your trip is but for me its fraser, 1770 and airlie beach. you can pretty much drive past everything else.

biggy

Yeppoon is 8 hours North of Brissy

www.capricorncoast.com.au

Agnes Water and 1770 are also nice

annqldau

Quite agree re: Fraser Island, we side tracked for 3 days to there and did it in one of the hire landrover defenders, although next time I'd go for the patrol for the greater comfort. The island trip included your overnight stays at Eurong I think it was.

Not sure if we did 1770, if we did it mustn't have been memorable.

snappy

How long are you planning on taking? You drive there in 2 days if you spend a long time driving each day.

For me the places to stop or detour, go the Australian Zoo if you haven't done so already going past the glass house mountains. Head off to Noosa (only do this in a 4x4) go over on the ferry and drive up the beach to Rainbow Beach driving through Freshwater track NOT over the rocks at Rainbow Beach. Then head into the town and get a ferry onto Fraser Island.

Back on the mainland either drive around the Tin Can Bay and pet the friendly dolphin that comes in for a feed there (dolphin is the only attraction) or go from Fraser to Hervey Bay and cut out a bit of the highway.

Go to Bundy and visit the rum factory (don't bother buying the rum as you get it cheaper elsewhere for some weird reason), go to the botanical park in Bundy and admire the Ibis birds nesting also that wee house imported from the UK (can't remember the story but quite surreal all the same)

Camp over night at the free stop at Calliope before Gladstone, great free camping spot.

Drive round Rocky and spot all the bulls, also go and see the line of Capricorn at the tourist info centre. Pop into Yepoon for a cuppa with Biggy

Either fall asleep from Rocky to Mackay or go the country route and head inland to Emerald and Saphire to do a bit of gem fossicking. Head up to Clermont and camp at the very cheap ($5 per night for everyone in your car) at the Theresa Creek dam, have a campfire and admire the milky way by moonlight.

Head into Mackay past all the massive coal sites - they go on for miles and this road also makes you feel very small with it's never ending horizon in places.

Have a quick nose in Mackay but for me personally I wouldn't bother staying too long (sorry Mackay people) although Dolphin Heads was quite a nice spot. Then onwards to the Whitsundays now this is a must do not go past here without going on a tour of the islands preferably by air - the MOST amazing once in a lifetime experience that I will always cherish was flying over and landing on the Whitehaven beach in a helicopter sipping champagne, worth every dollar we paid

Go and see Bowen the place that is now a popular Hollywood film set and with the likes of Hugh Jackman wanting to make it home. Buy a fresh Bowen Mango from a local farmer is a must at this point.

Onto Townsville, go to the water park with the massive bucket of water that drops every now and then on all the screaming kids below. Also a great place to visit the Reef HQ

Through Ingham, Cardwell, Tully - now you can either go off on a detour in Tully for a bit of the best white water rafting in Australia or head to Mission Beach and have a cuppa with me

Then onto Silkwood making a detour to South Johnstone heading towards Paronella Park another MUST. You can also camp here the night which is worth it as you can come and go into the park and the night tour is just another experience that must be lived.

Onto Innisfail buy some fresh bananas from the farmers and enjoy Either head straight up to Cairns via Babinda and the boulders or head off towards the Tablelands past the tea plantations of Nucifora, for a few days of being wowed by breath taking scenery, stunning waterfalls (Milaa Milaa is my favourite and also close to the yummy dairy farm where you can buy fab grub). Head up to Kuranda through Atherton, Mareeba down to Kuranda and finally into Cairns.

So jealous as I loved every second of our road trip up to here

jules29

Thats a really good plan - thanks for that. We are also driving from Brisbane to Cairns in Sep. We (2 adults and 3 kids) are driving up in a campervan for 10 days. The kids can't wait and to be honest neither can I. It will be a nice chance to see something before we get bogged down with the day to day stuff.

Jules

jaca

Hi there
I'm sooooo jealous we did this in Nov '93 & it was amazing & the kids were really good ..they were 1yr old & 4yrs old & loved the adventure although I'd make sure that the air con in the car is topped up as we were melting until we realised it had a leak & needed topped up!! we chose much the same route as everyone else stopping off in the usual areas Hervey Bay which has a lovely wee town centre & a gorgeous beach, Airlie beach where you will see the most amazing blue sea (which ironically we couldn't go in because of the time of year !!!) It's very touristy with loads of back packers & a lovely lagoon for the kids..then the tropical north...you must go to holloways beach where we lived for a wee while it's so pretty & I miss it so much while I'm writing this !! We hadn't booked any accommodation in advance as we wanted to go at our own pace (or the kids pace) & this wasn't a problem we found plenty of reasonable places to stay.

Have the best time.....I'd advise you to take garlic tablets or whatever works for you to repel mossies as we got eaten alive for the first few days in cairns
Best wishes Jacq xx

datamile

You could also do the gem fields if you want a detour. Places like emerald etc, you can visit the underground mines, or even pan for you own stones. It is about 400kms in from the coast.

annqldau

Between July and Sept the Whales at Hervey Bay, Redcliffe or Goldcoast are well worth going to see. You will tend to see one most trips as they use spotters then the boat radar/gps thingy.