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We are travelling from Vic to qld in 5 weeks with a 4 year old and a 9 year old. We are super organised with games, entertainment etc and have an idea of our route. Apart from the dubbo zoo, does anyone have any reccomnendations of places to stay, stop, visit, suggestions etc? Greatly appreciate peoples ideas :)
thinking of going up the middle on the way and up and the coast on the way home
Ahh, Vic to Qld!! I did that drive for about 15 years every summer with my family!
Basically if you go down the middle there isn't a whole lot to stop and see. There's the Dog on the Tuckerbox at Gundegai... Umm... You've already mentioned Dubbo Zoo... Not a great deal else.
There used to be plenty of little towns that were good to stop at along the way for a coffee or an overnight break - we stayed at Moree, Goondawindi, Euroa... I can't remember where else, I'll do some googling and come back...
As for the coast road, well that's much prettier!! Lots of lovely places to stay.
On the southern side, Merimbula is a must to stop a night, or Lakes Entrance. Merimbula is about 8hrs drive from Melbourne, Lakes is about 4hrs.
I guess overall it depends on how much driving you want to do each day! We were more about the destination so we'd do two or three days of hard driving to get there sooner. Mostly we did it in two days.
How long do you want the trip to take?
Some of the other towns we stopped overnight at were Narrabri, West Wyalong, Coonabarabran and Gilgandra. All those towns had nice motels to stop at, but not much to see. Moree was the furthest we made in one day, that was a hard drive for my dad but only 400kms from Brisbane so made for a really easy drive the next day.
This website has a great map...
http://www.coastshop.com.au/maps/3melbourne_brisbane_map.htm
ETA: there's the satellite dish at Parkes, that's interesting!
Done this one a few times now and can remember a few nice places. We mostly stop in parks to try to avoid the golden arches as much as possible.
I don't think these will be in order but we've stopped in Forbes, West Wyalong, Coonabarabran (is really pretty with a great park they can run wild in), Narranderra (similar nice big park), I'm sure we spent the night at Gilgandra like OP and Armadale, Glen Innes, Tenterfield, and I'm sure there are more but duty calls an I need to run off ;)
HTH
We did this last year with the 4 amigo's. We travelled to Coonabarabran the first night and made sure we stopped ever 2 hours to stretch legs ect. It was mostly parks to which was nice for the kids as us to get some nice fresh air. Dont forget that the big dish is on the way up to...I cant remember were exactly it was but the kids thought it was ace, especially when I took pics of what looked like J man holding it up
Thanks, we are planning probably 3 days driving, and didn't want to take too much time to get there, apart from the day stop at dubbo zoo. Its moew a case of if there is something interesting to see on the way up to plan to make time to stop and see it. If its all pretty uneventful apart from dubbo zoo then we'll pretty much just drive drive drive!
Mudgee? We went this way when we moved up here, good stop because of all the dairies, wineries and good food.
The possibilities are endless! If you go through Wagga, I loved the river beach as a quick stop.
My warm regards to the esteemed forum members here. Just by taking a look at the post counts some of you have made I am sure this is the right place for me to get my queries cleared.
That you people are engaged in talking about the trip to sunshine coast made me interested primarily. I have planned a family vacation there and this is going to be the first time that we are doing so. Maybe the required information to visit the place in most suitably would be found from the posts here but the safety issues are mainly making me worried. Can I be assured the trip would be risk free and we get to have the best possible vacation! Issues of violence heard in news has prompted me to ask this, hope you people do not mind.
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Hong Kong Hotels
The sunshine coast is pretty safe, I haven't heard of violence there. It is a lovely place for a family holidays, lovely beaches etc. Hopefully someone who lives there can come and give you more help.
We did this trip up to Wonga Beach four years ago, no children, and had a ball tenting almost all the time. We went up the centre way and back via the coast.
Have the RACV caravan parks book and become members of Big4 and Top tourist. It doesn't take long to recoup the cost of joining as you get discounts when you stay there.
We would head off in the morning and then about lunch/afternoon tea time decide where to stay the call ahead. As it's out of school holidays you should have no problems.
Have stayed at most of the places already mentioned and liked Forest Glen on the Sunshine Coast as it was central byt quiet. On the way back we stayed at Hastings Point, had the place nearly to ourselves, heating on the shower floor and heated pool.
Taking a thermos, milk etc saves on costs and time.
Have a great trip