UKC

Question for people who know Australia. 

If you had only about 10 days for a first visit to Australia once travel restrictions are lifted, where would you chose for a first taster fly/drive holiday on this vast continent? Not really interested in spending too much time in cities or beach holidays, preference for coastal scenery/mountain/bush/outback with scenic walking. Prefer car using motels/hotels/B&Bs to motorhome.

Suggestions welcome, and thanks in advance.

I think 10 days is a *very* short amount of time. I would question whether its worthwhile. 

Margaret River and general SW Australia fits the bill in terms of scenic walking. You also have Pemberton/Walpole/Denmark/Albany which have loads of walking options.

I've been twice to Oz and spent the bulk of both trips (several months) on Tasmania. The bush is true wilderness with mountains poking up. Think Assynt covered by trees. Fantastic coastal walking too. It's compact enough to get around without spending half your time travelling. There's a ferry from Melbourne to Devonport on the north coast.

Would agree that 10 days seems a bit too short....only been once and spent about two weeks in Western Australia with friends in Perth and explored the SW a bit....was really nice, Denmark, Albany etc! We then headed to Sydney for a week or so which was also great, spent a couple of days up in the Blue Mountains which were fabulous. Would love to go back as you realize just how huge Australia is and how much there is to see.

The highlight of our time in OZ for me was our time around Alice springs. We stayed at the secret garden hostel, which was quirky but centrally located and quiet. They do twin and double rooms if you don't fancy a dorm.

We booked an organised 3 day camping (glamping) trip to ullaru and the surrounding area. It's a long drive (6hrs?), so certainly not a day trip from Alice.

What time of year? We were there in Sep/Oct and it was HOT, certainly wouldn't want to go there in the Australian summer.

Agree 10 days is really short. But a great short trip would be drive from Adelaide to Uluru via the Flinders and Oodnadatta track. We did Alice Springs to Adelaide in a day so you just batter back down the highway. The Flinders are gorgeous and the Oodnadatta track visits some pretty remote spots. Borderline 4WD when we drove it in a Ford Cortina. Not really ‘walking’ country, more drive and stop, but having done it twice I wouldn’t hesitate to do it again. 

Tassie (fag to get to.).  Some great bush walks, and some lovely islands off the bottom.  Hobart is a beautiful city.  Climate is variable!  Cradle Mountain well worth seeing. 

Unless you want some Backpacker hostel action I'd recommend hiring a camper for a bunch of reasons I don't have time to go into here!

Also all the snakes there are deadly, so that helps your risk assessment when you come across them basking on the trails when you are bushwalking ; )

Haven't done Uluru yet, but you can write off 2 days for that, depending on where else you go on the way there/back.

You could do the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne towards Adelaide - fly the leg from Mount Gambier to save time. Also a visit to see the penguins on Philip Island.

Sydney to Brisbane via the Blue Mountains has good scenery.

Otherwise, I'd be looking barrier reef.

And beware the deadly drop bears...

We were really disappointed with the barrier reef, a real anticlimax after diving the red sea.

The following assumes from the wording of your post that this isn't a climbing trip. 

For me, the most exciting areas of Australia are the bits that are least like Europe.  So my highlights include the desert of the Red Centre, and the tropical Top End. 

If you really can't take more than 10 days, a nice itinerary might be fly to Darwin and take a road trip down "the Track" to Uluru, taking in some or all of: Kakadu and Litchfield national parks, Kings canyon, kata tjuta (the Olgas) and of course Uluru. From there we got internal flights back to Sydney for our homeward flight, hopefully you'd be able to do something similar.

It has the added bonus that the flight to Darwin is a couple of hours shorter than to Sydney!

As others have said, if you can take more than 10 days your trip will feel a lot more worthwhile, and time it carefully - travelling to escape the British winter will land you in the middle of the Australian summer, and temperatures too hot for comfort. 

That's climate change for you! 

I wouldn't go there for 10 days. It's just too much travel time and expense for such a short holiday (not to mention being environmentally irresponsible).

Also Australia is huge (obviously), if you posed the question "where should I go in Europe for a 10 day taster", there are literally hundreds of possibilities and the same is true for Australia (bearing in mind that you are looking for the nature rather than the cities). 

Thanks all for your suggestions. I confirm that this is to be a sightseeing trip with hopefully some walking thrown in. The reason for just 10 days or so in Australia, is that the main destination for this trip is New Zealand where we are planning to tour and stay for about 4 or 5 weeks. As we will be in that part of the world we were hoping to incorporate a whistle stop taster of Australia either on the way out or on the return, but for a number of reasons we can't really be away from the UK for more than about 6 weeks or so, if it is feasible to take in both? At my age I am not too keen on the very long flights more than once more in my life. Its also a matter of being able to only afford one return trip to the Antipodes, so if we don't do it soon, we never will.

Taking in to account what you say I’d plump for the Red centre. You haven’t said time of year though. Only go in their winter!

I/we (wife) have spent a lot of time in Oz. We've been there every year for 15 years and travelled almost all of it. Climbed a bit too.

Ping me via the ukc email and I'll send you my phone number. Very happy to talk. 

Driving between any two cities in the eastern half will get you all that as even Sydney and Melbourne become scenic wilderness pretty rapidly. As a quaint holiday Tasmania would work, or the area down around Kosciusko for the closest thing you'll get to mountains. Don't expect much 'mountain' in the Blue Mountains, as scenic as the area might be. 

'Outback' is almost a cliche used by tourists that could mean anything from rural to true wild desert, so getting beyond the coastal green fringe will get you some version of it. Likewise don't worry too much about a grim city experience, even Sydney feels very small compared to somewhere like London and you can be in pleasant bush/coastland etc quickly.

Personally I'd go conservative on your idea of a car trip. Australian highways are endless tracts of wilderness out the window and unlike the US, not much in between, away from the coast it can be half a day. This a place where people can die of thirst because their car broke down.... You could easily spend 10 days driving 8hrs for each of them and not see much.

I reckon within the Adelaide-Melbourne-Sydney triangle as a decent first trip. Doable distances, a good range of landscapes, no box jellyfish or crocodiles.

I grew up in Australia and with family still there I have spent many, many years travelling a back and to. Australia is vast with so many great, interesting and varied places to visit. A lot depends on the season ... if you are going in the winter (way too hot in the summer!) Uluru is great - stay in Alice Springs, hire a 4 wheel drive and travel to Uluru (wonderful to watch at sunset), Kings Canyon and Kata Tjuṯa. Another option is the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne to Adelaide - some great places to visit and explore along the way. 12 Apostles is not great these days, no longer 12 and loads of visitors but places like the Ottways and Bimbi are great.

Port Douglas, Daintrees and out into the hinterlands. The Blue Mountains - great bush walking and fabulous scenery. So many great places so it depends on season and what activities you are wanting to do. 

Have a great time and enjoy New Zealand - if you are there in lupin season they are fabulous..!!

Swap your ticket for New Zealand ?

Agree with this. If you are looking for ‘adventurous’ tourism that is completely different to Europe then the northern territories (kakadu, Catherine gorge,  Uluru) and north of Western Australia (kimberleys, broome) fits the bill. 
But definitely go in the Oz winter. 
When I was there 20 years ago, the kimberleys was not a self drive location though 

Kangaroo Island off South Australia is pretty amazing. You can say in the old lighthouse keepers cottages https://southaustralia.com/products/kangaroo-island/accommodation/cape-du-c... 

In the evenings you can walk down to the lighthouse and see the seals who come to rest on the rocks in the evening.

Tasmania is amazing as well. So much wilderness to explore. It too often gets missed from trips.

The Blue Mountains are really accessible from Sydney and have so many awesome walks. So depending on where you fly into could be a great choice. 

I grew up in Sydney and go back every other year. I always make time to head to the Blue Mountains.

Tasmania is a wonderland all right but, to get the best out of it you really need to put in some time, and properly go bush.

To the OP: what time of year are you thinking of? That really matters, in what is a huge and climatically-varied country.

I may be a bit biased (I live in NZ) but I’d recommend spend all the available time in NZ on this trip, and save Australia for another. You’ll almost certainly want more time for NZ.

Possibly the exception to this, if you can stop off anyway, would be a few nights in Sydney at the end: it’s a more vibrant city than any in NZ, and I always enjoy time spent there (I’m usually just as happy I don’t live there with the traffic etc though.)

We are looking, hopefully, at Feb/March 2022, which appears to the best for NZ, but from what I am beginning to realise from posts here that may be too hot for much of  northern Oz, leaving the south or Tasmania with a more comfortable summer climate? It appears that the best months for NZ are not necessarily the best for Oz!

To damowilk and others: I am also taking in the comments about 10 days or so being too short a time, and wondering whether we should be thinking about a separate longer trip to Australia for another year.  The problems for us are not just the additional expense, but also a number of increasingly restrictive health issues.

Thanks again to everyone for your helpful suggestions and advice

Not sure if you've seen, but the Aus government has said it's unlikely borders will open until the middle of 2022. NZ hasn't been so definite, but it's unlikely we'll be much different from Aus. Vaccination programmes are rolling out much more slowly here. But you never know. I'm sure as soon as borders open, tourists will be very welcome!

As for the weather, Jan/Feb/Mar is best for here in NZ, especially down south, but can be pretty hot (or in my experience, floody/firey) in Aus. I went to Alice, Uluru etc once in July, and the weather was perfect.

I'd second focusing on a decent NZ trip. You can, however, fly direct to/from Tasmania from Auckland, and the weather there matches the best time for NZ. Hobart is nice for a weekend, or longer if you're going hiking or want to travel around a bit.

Good luck with the planning!

Thanks Helen, no I hadn't seen that. All the more reason to use a reputable travel company like Trailfinders who will put together a bespoke trip and have a good reputation for refunding if trips have been cancelled due to Covid.

Definitely. The best time to visit both the outback areas and the tropics is the Australian winter. At the times you mention, the outback will be very hot, and the tropics will still be in the rainy season.

February and March would be a good time to visit Tasmania though.