What are some great places to visit in Australia that are not the usual touristy places to see?

Question

What little gems have you discovered and what did you like best about them?

Answer 1

there is a place called crystal creek and paluma just north of townsville. great to go swimming, look for cassowaries and have a hidden getaway. good for camping, and devonshire tea!

Answer 2

Namadgi National Park, just south of Canberra. Overshadowed by the Snowy Mountains and hence relatively unknown. Alpine environment in a series of valleys with good tree cover, giving a wild but cosy feel missing from the more open topography of the more popular alpine areas.

Karijini National Park (Pilbara, WA). Most tourists stay on the featureless "coast" road and miss it completely. Hancock Gorge is the highlight for me, closely followed by the rock folds in Hamersley Gorge.

Melbourne's lanes & Fitzroy. Some personality on the streets.

Sofala, north of Bathurst. A bit of wild west. Walhalla in Victoria is also an old gold town and has a vaguely similar setting but a better-kept feel.

Cape Bridgewater, near Portland, Victoria. The cliffs are a stunning sight as you roll in. I like Port Fairy, too. Standing in the path of the shearwaters as they come in is worth experiencing.

Bungonia Gorge. Spectacular and accessible.

The Otway Ranges. Everyone passes through them on the Great Ocean Road, usually too obsessed with seeing the 12 Apostles to appreciate the mountain ash and rainforests.

Answer 3

There's a nice place up in the ACT near Yass I think (its south anyway) where the Murrumbidgee river starts there is/used to be a lovely pub there, platypus in the river and trout fishing as well as some beautiful bush. It may have changed since I was there but I loved it, camped for a while then drove up to the Snowy Mountains to Jindabyne Dam where the Snowy River starts from.
So many places, if you like the outback go north of Kalgoorlie towards Leinster which is a mining community some fantastic landscape around there as well watch out for the snakes too as well as the Bungarras (big goanna's) they'll chase you and have huge claws.

Answer 4

The Wollemi National Park in the Blue Mountains is very pretty. There is a place called the Glow Worm Tunnel which requires a very good map but once there.... Spectacular. It is an old railway tunnel that was abandoned and now has thousands of glow worms that are very pretty.

Requires a torch as it is very dark

Good luck

Answer 5

Qld: Near Cloncurry there is a little water hole with a waterfall I think it is called crystal creek or something like that (was 26 years ago I found it)
NT: Banks of the Katherine River get out of town a bit and really enjoy the river
NSW: Wollemi National Park.. any part of the park is just grand

Answer 6

We liked Kangaroo Island and absloutely could have gone without Uluru and Alice Springs but we loved Darwin and had the best night at the WaterBar on the pier and in Syndey - Fish on the Rocks was my favorite restaurant- very cozy, out of the way and absolutely delicious

Answer 7

there are so many they couldn't be mentioned ... the best way to find fantastic places that aren't on the tourist map is to stop at small towns/villages and hang out for a bit ... the locals will tell you about some amazing places ... or just try taking roads that aren't highways and take turnoffs ... the things and places you find this way are fantastic

once when doing this ended up at a farm way way out and the road in fact only went to their place; the people were lovely and we had tea on their verandah before heading off again :D

Answer 8

What do you want to do? Australia is such an excellent position, and there is soooooo a lot stuff to do... What time of year are you coming? what type of non-touristy journey do you want (assembly human beings or seeing / doing stuff)? I actually have countless recommendations notwithstanding it is not ordinary to inform except there is extra specifics... reckoning on the time of year, there are humpback whales that bypass up and down the east coast... there are a good number of places you could bypass to work out them (both from land or bypass out on a deliver). Hervey Bay is about as some distance north as they bypass. Fraser Island is merely close to there. both are in all likelihood somewhat visited (even even with the actuality that i'm no longer constructive i ought to apply "touristy"), yet you ought to spend it sluggish dealing with some places up there (eg Maryborough is the living house of the girl who wrote Mary Poppins) drop by the mild Coast (places like Caloundra and Mooloolaba are very "kinfolk pleasant" and a great number of locals bypass on holiday there). factors of northern NSW are gorgeous. The Gold Coast is rather touristy. Byron Bay is fairly touristy yet is in all likelihood nicely worth dropping into (and also you'll see whales in season). yet there are a great number of eye-catching cities (eg Bangalow) that are pleasant to drop by. maybechronic Sydney to Brisbane. you could do the peculiar "touristy" element (eg stop at Byron or close by coastline places on your youthful one to play on the coastline) or Currumbin flora and fauna Sanctuary on the southern end of the Gold Coast (in all likelihood the a lot less touristy end) and also you'll see a great number of Australian animals eg kangaroos and koalas and echidnas or maybe get pictures of / with them. perchance a NSW holiday. bypass into Sydney for some days thenchronic out to Katoomba (nicely visited yet there is a few stuff the following eg the three Sisters, the railway etc) and then bypass out to say Dubbo (effective zoo) and then down by Parkes, Forbes and Cowra and reduce back to Sydney. You get a great number of smaller cities... you ought to do this from merely about any capital city...

Answer 9

Check the national parks and the state parks these are beautiful.
Stradebrook Island in Queensland is nice....a quick ferry ride very very very long beaches
Tasmainia, all of it, nice towns..easy to get in and out of Hobart or Launceston
The great ocean road - Victoria
Townsville Qld. and the drive between townsville and Cairns

Answer 10

Skyhigh in Mt Dandenong near Melbourne. You get a great panoramic view of Melbourne.