Tag Archives: Lee Atkinson

Driving holiday along the south coast of New South Wales

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Grand Pacific Drive

Grand Pacific Drive

The November it’s-been-too-long-since-the-summer-holidays blues driving you up the wall? Get in the car and take a short trip with Lee Atkinson, author of Driving Holidays around Australia. Today Lee reveals her tips for driving the south coast of New South Wales.

Southern Highlands and Grand Pacific Drive, New South Wales

Combine mountain and coastal scenery on this drive through the Southern Highlands south of Sydney and along Grand Pacific Drive, a cliff-hugging, breathtakingly scenic coastal route. Most people do the cliff section of the drive heading south, but in the spirit of saving the best to last, and because the views are better heading north, we’ve approached the bridge from the opposite direction.

HOW LONG? An easy day drive from Sydney, or you can make a weekend of it driving through forgotten hinterland valleys and exploring the back roads of the Southern Highlands. For a shorter trip, drive straight to Wollongong via the Sea Cliff Bridge.

WHEN TO GO Any time of year is a good time to do this drive, although the Southern Highlands can be cold in winter: during spring and autumn the Southern Highlands’ parks and gardens are beautiful.

NEED TO KNOW Several sections of this drive are narrow and winding, particularly the drive down Barrengarry Mountain into Kangaroo Valley. If you suffer from travel sickness, take some medication before you set off.

SYDNEY TO BERRY, VIA THE SOUTHERN HIGHLANDS

From Sydney, head south along the Hume Motorway (M31), turn off at Mittagong and wind your way through the highland towns of Bowral and Moss Vale, stopping to browse the galleries, bookshops and antique stores.

From Moss Vale take the Nowra Road up through the mountains to Fitzroy Falls in Morton National Park. Here you can stretch your legs on the short walk to the lookout above the dramatic waterfall that tumbles 82m to the floor of the ravine below. Continuing south, follow the sign to Manning Lookout to enjoy spectacular views over Kangaroo Valley, one of the state’s prettiest valleys.

The road then descends through wild bushland, following a series of twists and turns down Barrengarry Mountain to reach the valley floor, before crossing historic Hampden Bridge. Stop for a swim at Flat Rock, at the end of Upper Kangaroo River Road, or have a picnic on the riverbank near the old hall in the village centre.

It’s not far from here to Berry, home to countless B&Bs, guesthouses, boutiques, antique shops and cafes.

BERRY TO WOLLONGONG

Continue east to hit the coast at Kiama and check out the blowhole in the rocky point below the lighthouse. Wollongong, the third largest city in New South Wales and a major coal, iron and steel producer is, despite all that heavy industry, a very attractive place to spend a night. Explore thehorseshoe-shaped cove of Wollongong Harbour, with its lighthouse, fishing fleet, fish markets and wonderful city beaches. Linger over coffee in one of the many cafes along the foreshore or stockpile some inner harmony at the eight-storey Nan Tien Buddhist Temple – the largest Buddhist temple in the Southern Hemisphere (180 Berkeley Rd, Berkeley; (02) 4272 0600; open Tues–Sun 9am–5pm; www.nantien.org.au).

WOLLONGONG TO SYDNEY, VIA GRAND PACIFIC DRIVE

The Illawarra Escarpment tumbles into the sea just north of Wollongong and marks the beginning of the signposted section of Grand Pacific Drive, as the road follows the coastline north through a succession of seaside suburbs and villages. Grand Pacific Drive crosses the famous Sea Cliff Bridge between Clifton and Coalcliff.

Beyond the bridge, the road climbs through ferny forest above the beach to Stanwell Tops, high on the edge of the escarpment. Paragliders and hang-gliders soar on the thermals rising from the ocean below. On a clear day, you can see as far south as Wollongong and enjoy a great view of the route, over the Sea Cliff Bridge and the beaches beyond.

Soon after Stanwell Tops, Lawrence Hargrave Drive turns west to join the Princes Motorway, which leads north to Sydney, but you should veer off to the right along Lady Wakehurst Drive.

This winding, narrow road will take you through the heart of Royal National Park, the world’s second oldest national park, founded in 1879 (Yellowstone in the United States is seven years older). En route to Sydney’s southern suburb of Waterfall, the road winds through eucalypt forests, over windswept heathland and across low-level river weirs. Sidetracks spear off to beaches and lookouts and there are dozens of great picnic and swimming spots along the way.

Being so close to Sydney, the park is a popular place on sunny weekends, when traffic snarls can be frustrating, but if you can time your drive for a weekday, you’ll pretty much have it to yourself.

     

Top 5 Australian road trips for summer

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Captain Cook Highway, courtesy of Tourism Queensland

Captain Cook Highway, courtesy of Tourism Queensland

Going on a road trip? Lee Atkinson, creator of the Australian Road Trips app, picks her five favourite summer holiday road trips

What makes a great summer road trip?

We’ve all experienced the holiday road trip from hell, stuck in a line of slow-moving traffic going nowhere fast.

It’s not my idea of fun, so first and foremost a good summer road trip is one where you won’t find holiday crowds. There also has to be plenty of places to stop and things to see and do – it’s a holiday after all, not a commute – great scenery and hopefully a few places where you can cool off along the way.

Here’s my pick of five great drives (in no particular order) that are better in summer.

Great Alpine Road, Victoria

Bogong High Plains, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

Bogong High Plains, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

The Great Alpine Road is one of Australia’s most spectacular driving routes, an alpine loop across the roof of Australia. The road snakes across the Victorian Alps from Wangaratta to Bairnsdale, and is one of the country’s best all-weather mountain drives.

The road climbs up into the snowfields from Bright, bend after bend twisting through forests of mountain ash and stringy bark that eventually give way to stunning views of the valley below.

Once you enter Alpine National Park the road sits atop the ridge of the mountain for about 30 km, giving spectacular views on both sides of the road as you drive high above the snowline. The drive winds through Hotham and Dinner Plain before descending again through rolling treeless hills towards Omeo.

Eyre Peninsula, South Australia

Driving in Coffin Bay National Park, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

Driving in Coffin Bay National Park, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

If your idea of a great summer road trip includes ocean views, then you’ll love the Eyre Peninsula, the triangle of land jutting into the sea between Adelaide and the Great Australian Bight.

It’s one of the best-kept beach secrets in the country, where you almost always have the beaches to yourself, the coastal scenery is some of the most spectacular you’ll find anywhere, there’s next to no traffic and the oysters aren’t bad either.

Sound too good to be true? The catch is that the Southern Ocean is usually icy cold and home to lots of big white sharks, but in terms of great coastal driving routes it gives the Great Ocean Road a run for its money.

Highlights are oysters and fresh seafood; the stunning 5 km cliff drive at Elliston; fishing from town jetties; four-wheel driving in Lincoln and Coffin Bay national parks; the Talia sea caves and Point Labatt sea lion colony; and swimming with the sea lions at Baird Bay. Just watch out for those sharks.

The Bass Coast, Tasmania

The Nut, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

The Nut, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

Anywhere in Tasmania makes for a great driving holiday, but the northern coastline is an unsung treasure, especially for a summer road trip.

It is a place of rugged beauty, where fertile farmlands spill into the wild waters of Bass Strait. The main route across the top of the island, along the spectacular coastal Bass Highway, travels through beautiful rainforests, some of the state’s best wine producing areas and past pretty fishing villages to finally reach the wild wilderness of the west coast at the aptly named Edge of the World lookout.

There’s so much to see and do on this road trip that you’ll need at least a week, even two. Good places to stay for a day or two are St Helens, Launceston and Stanley.

The Waterfall Way, New South Wales

Ebor Falls, Guy Fawkes River National Park, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

Ebor Falls, Guy Fawkes River National Park, courtesy of Lee Atkinson

The Waterfall Way is a classic touring drive that starts on the mid-north NSW coast at the beach resort town of Coffs Harbour.

It coils its way up through lush rainforest of the Great Dividing Range to the New England Tablelands, finishing in Armidale.

Highlights include Bellingen with its strip of cafes and galleries; mountain-top Dorrigo National Park, with its spectacular skywalk that leads out over the rainforest canopy; and the high plateau gorge country.

The best things about this drive is that most of the attractions are free and, as the name suggests, there are plenty of waterfalls along the way, with the pick of the bunch being Dorrigo’s Dangar, Ebor and Wollomombi (one of the highest in Australia).

Great Tropical Way, Queensland

Victoria’s Great Ocean Road might get all the glory, but the Captain Cook Highway from Cairns to Port Douglas is every bit as stunning, and a whole lot warmer and less crowded.

Most people tend to avoid far-north Queensland in the steamy summer wet season, but, contrary to popular opinion, it doesn’t rain all day, the waterfalls are thundering, the roads and campgrounds are empty and you can pick up some great deals on accommodation. All excellent reasons to head north for a road trip in summer.

Continue north through the Daintree rainforest to Cape Tribulation. In the dry you can keep going to Cooktown on the 4WD Bloomfield Track, but in summer you’ll need to backtrack to Mossman and head west on the sealed Mulligan Highway and head to Cooktown which, unlike Port Douglas, still has a last frontier feel to it. Circle back via Mareeba and the Atherton Tablelands.

Lee Atkinson is the author of 11 travel books, including eight guide books on travelling in and around Australia. Her Smartphone app, Australian Road Trips is available from iTunes and Google Play: see www.ozyroadtripper.com.au for links.

 

     

Creating the ‘Australian Road Trips’ app

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Driving the coastal route near Esperance, Western AustraliaTravel writer and guidebook author, Lee Atkinson, talks about creating her best-selling ‘Australian Road Trips’ app

The last thing I intended when I launched my app, Australian Road Trips, was to upset my partner. After six months of hard work, I was keen to show it off and hopefully get some praise. But the more he looked at the app, the darker his face grew, before he finally exploded, ‘Why did you have to put that in the app? Now everyone is going to go there!’

Being a travel writer is one of the best jobs in the world. You get to travel all over the place, see great things, meet amazing people and then share the stories with your readers. But occasionally it has a downside.

Sometimes, you find a place so special that you want to keep it yourself, so that your hidden hideaway stays secret. Spots like the lonely beaches near where we live on the mid-north coast, the free camps beside the Darling River in outback NSW and the riverside camps we found last summer on the Old Grafton Road, breathtakingly beautiful but inexplicably deserted in the middle of the Christmas holidays. We love them because nobody knows about them and there is never anyone else there.

To share or not to share – that’s the travel writer’s dilemma.

Driving on the way to Alice SpringsIn the end though, I usually can’t help myself, and the hitherto hidden gem gets an entry in my app.

One of the things I enjoyed most about creating an app is that you are not limited by the amount of pages you have. When I first launched the app back in December last year it included 25 great driving routes around the country. There’s now 40, with around 100 new entries since then, and it keeps growing.

Every time I find somewhere new that I think is worth going to or a little bit special, I add it to the app, so it just gets bigger and bigger. And for the user who has already downloaded the app, all those updates are free.

Lee Atkinson, author of Australin Road TripsAnd users can leave a comment on the app so that everyone can see if something has changed since my last visit, or temporarily closed (which is very important when it comes to roads and road trips!), or even if they just want to share a favourite spot that I might have missed.

People often ask me how I choose the best road trips, but it all depends on what you like. I love camping and roughing it in remote deserts, but there are probably a lot of people out there who would much prefer to be driving along the coast and staying in luxury B&Bs (I must admit, I like that too!).

The great thing about the app is that you don’t have to follow my advice, you can use the app to plan your own unique road rip according to your interests using the sorting filters: you can create a family-friendly road trip, a gourmet road trip, 4WD, outback, coastal … whatever you want really. Or, it will just tell you the best foodie finds or great camping spots near you, if that’s all you want to know.

Finding great places and good drives to put in the app is the easy bit… it’s deciding what not to include that’s tricky. I’ve never been good at keeping secrets!

Lee Atkinson is the author of 11 travel books, including eight guide books on travelling in and around Australia. Her app, Australian Road Trips is available from iTunes and Google Play: see www.ozyroadtripper.com.au for links.