Rach, March will be a great time, as the school holidays aren't until April. We did a trip to the gold coast a couple of years ago and did Seaworld and Movieworld. We stayed at a place called Treasure Island Holiday Park, which turned out fantastic as it was basically in the centre of the two places. Only took about a 20 minute drive to either place (if that) We stayed in a cabin, something like a garden villa i think it was called, for about $150 per night in the low season. I remember the next villa up the chain was about an extra $20 a night, looked a bit bigger, but it was beside the pool, and DH said as it was a family orientated place, staying close to the pool might not be a good idea.

They had facilities for washing,drying and ironing as well. Next door was a subway and across the road was a place called Harbour Town, which had outlet shopping, but more importantly a woolies so we could grab some food to cook our own meals.

Taking food to the parks is a good idea, we spent a small fortune on food at them both.

The place we stayed at had a bus pick up point directly out the front, and it had a drop off at Seaworld from memory. We were originally going to do the bus thing, but then decided against it as we are always running late LOL! I can't remember how I found out about the bus pick up? It might have been from the accomm. website? and then I googled for the bus website?

Have you checked out the websites for the parks you want to visit? I think they may have timetables on them for any shows, so you can plan your day (sort of) before you get there as well.

Here in Qld, we can pre purchase our tickets from the RACQ and members get a discount. Maybe you could look into your own state to see if they have something like that as well? There are also passes like the 3 park super pass i think is what it is called, and one I just found, called a Theme Park Fun Pass. Just watch the prices as I think they are per person, and check out the kiddie ages for them as well as to wether or not you have to pay for little persons.

If you can pre purchase your tickets, I think you may not have to wait in line with everyone else. I'm pretty sure at Seaworld, we basically walked right through as they had a booth open for people who had pre purchased their tickets.

Maybe weigh up the option of buses/taxi's with hiring a small car for a couple of days too. I'm not entirely sure if it would work out cheaper or not, but worth looking at. Another reason we decided to drive our own car was because of the pick up time from the theme parks back to the accommodation. Ooh, that just reminded me, you can also book yourself onto a bus that does theme park/accomm pick up and drop offs.

If you make it to seaworld, just down the road a bit is the Q1 building and the observation deck. They also have a website you can check out. DH and I went there about 18 months ago when we were down there for a concert and had some time to kill. I think it was somewhere around $26 per person, not sure on kids prices, DD wasn't with us. I'm not a fan of heights, so didn't stay up there for long, but just for the pure experience of being on the worlds fastest lift.... Wow!

Ok, just googled for the theme park buses, and there is one called Con-X-ion coaches and they also do airport transfers. I just googled buses to theme parks. Maybe also check out if there is a gold coast tourism website? It might have some helpful info.

That's about all I can think of ATM. will come back if I can think of anything else

Nic