Hello,

I will be visiting from January 2009 - February 2009. It will be me and a friend and we were thinking about taking time to drive from Cairns to Brisbane. Any suggestions about doing this or places to stay while doing this would be great.

Chi - how much time would you have for the drive? Recommendations will be very different if was, say, 3 days versus a couple of weeks.

Here's a handy site. Just put in "get directions" then your departure & destination points - will give you an idea of times, distances.

You can drag & drop to change routes.

On the coastal route it's about 1700 km. No end of places to stay, just remember it is in the middle of our school holidays.

Sorry! http://maps.google.com.au/maps

.. and after the school holidays the floods kick in!
Still if you are not in a hurray it is a wonderful time of year to explore the Queensland coast.

i liked portdouglas north of cairns about an hour
i like cairns itself esp with the way the foreshore has been done up and the kuranda markets in the hinterland
i like mackay..thats a nice town
yeppoon is nice round rockhampton you can go out to an island there..by ferry keppel island ...really nice and has a lot of activities for the 18 - 35s

of course theres noosa and the gold coast with its theme parks ..movie world and sea world and dreamworld and wet and wild
i like sea world..it has animals and rides...and some fun waterslides

not just for kids either

brisbane is ok ...if you can dip down to byron bay in nsw...bit of a hike..could take about 2 and half hours from brisbane but an easy drive..maybe not even that long...

its about 40 mins from coolangatta which is on the border of nsw and queesland ... boy are the beaches there great!!!!!!could take a trip out to hippy town nimbin too...thats a real hoot!

hi

i would definitely make your first overnight stop mission beach. it's about three hours from cairns and very rural/laid back. the point is the many hiking trails to see the elusive cassowaries. there are paths connecting the town to beaches, and other trails in forests. there's a cute/funky little town with a nice caravan park and cabins, as well as upscale hotels and lovely b and b's in the area and meals at all price ranges.

if you're on the young side, i think you may never want to leave!

then you could visit dunk island from there for a day or an overnight.

i think that time of year it will definitely require a pre-booking.

kerikeri

We are thinking about taking about 4 days for the drive. We know we want to start up by Cairns and now considering starting at Port Douglas. We don't have to end our drive in Brisbane we would just like to take time out to do some driving and have a part of our trip not so planned out.

Thank you for the wonderful suggestions. I have been reading about the school holidays is there a way I can find out the holiday schedule?

http://www.australiatravelsearch.com.au/trc/hols.html

I hope you like sugar cane cos that's all you're going to see for two days... my advice is to fly.

How much time will you have around Cairns/Port Douglas before setting off south? You could easily spend 4 days driving in this area alone, say Daintree, Atherton Tableland and down to Mission Beach and back to Cairns. see www.greattropicaldrive.com.au

4 days isn't long enough to appreciate much on the way between Cairns and Brisbane, much of the road is slow and most places of interest are some distance from highway. Jan/Feb are not high season months in FNQ, in January you'll find more Australians holidaying in the more southern parts of Queensland.

Don't do it unless you need to transport the car south. Follow Pat's good advice. Spend the time in the north and then fly. if you had two weeks on the other hand...

Thanks for the wonderful advice. I think it will turn out better if we use our days between Port Douglas and Mission Beach.