How to travel in style in Queensland (no, really)

Step 1: Col­lect your sexy part­ner or other trav­el­ling com­pan­ion, maps and other essentials.

Step 2: Buy a run-down Toyota Hi Ace and have someone else con­vert it into a camper­van with a bed in back. Buy bins for clothes, med­ical gear, food tins. Buy a large esky; this will come in handy later.

Step 3: Go to a fab­ulous music fest­ival for six days. Pick brains of locals for advice on good places to visit up north; this will come in handy later. At the end of the fest­ival, stop by the organic fruit vendor and stock up on leftover pine­apples (5 for $5), and sweet lady finger bana­nas (50 cents each). Place into esky along with block ice bought at gen­eral store (told you this would come in handy).

Step 4: Stop at a good friend’s place in Bribie Island for a day or so. Install vents into van to avoid severe Queens­land heat. Buy eggs, corn thins, lemon barley water and other items from IGA. Hard boil eggs and place into esky (didn’t say a thing).

Step 5: Head north. When tired, follow signs to Coolum Beach. At end of road, turn left towards Noosa. Pull into some creek road and park near estu­ary. Sleep. Wake at dawn to gor­geous sands and beau­ti­ful view (unfor­tu­nately, also high winds).

Step 6: Con­tinue north. About 8km north of Gympie, follow tiny signs for Swiss Café (Tues-Sat only). Drive up dirt road for 500m or so. Admire walla­bies. Admire cows. Order amaz­ing roesti (fried potato dish with fried egg and swiss cheese, oh my) and good coffee.

Step 7: Search maps for secret loc­a­tions men­tioned by insiders. Find some but not all. Resolve to follow serendip­ity. Stop by the side of the road and buy a case of man­goes, a few rock­mel­ons, and a kilo of lychees; these will come in handy later.

Step 8: Con­tinue north. Detour via Bundaberg for brewed ginger beer. Dis­cover they make many more things than ginger beer. Pick up flyer for turtle con­ser­va­tion park. Eat at gour­met café Rosie Blu on Bour­bong St (excel­lent sun­dried tomato and fetta salad with salt-and-pepper pump­kin; reas­on­able medi­ter­ranean roast veget­able baguette). Buy a solar camp shower; this will come in handy later. Resolve to come back later for turtles and keep head­ing north.

Step 9: Cross the tropic of Capri­corn just south of Rock­hamp­ton. Cheer loudly.

Step 10: Pass through Rock­hamp­ton. Do not stop, do not col­lect $200.

Step 11: Stop for petrol fur­ther up the road. By chance, spot fridge magnet for secret loc­a­tion men­tioned by insider at fest­ival (told you this would come in handy later). Learn that secret loc­a­tion is 100km down dirt road. Advised that, as it is dusk and there are roos on that road, it would be a bad idea to attempt it now. Fool­hardy as you are, go for it anyway.

Step 12: After 2 hours, arrive at secret loc­a­tion. Do not, under any cir­cum­stances, park near the river mouth past the camp site in future. You WILL be eaten alive by sand­flies and suffer the con­sequences days later. Instead, park near the other beach. Shower using the camp shower (bliss).

Step 13: Spend a few days bask­ing in utter tran­quil­lity. You will have the entire beach to your­self most of the time. Be care­ful, because you are shar­ing it with log­ger­head turtles. When bored, head down to another com­pletely empty beach and pick oysters from the rocks. Eat. Wake at dawn, make a fruit salad of pine­apple, melon, lychees and mango. Eat while star­ing at com­pletely empty beach, crys­tal clear aqua­mar­ine water and blue sky. Drink brewed peach ale from Bundaberg. Remem­ber that life can be really good when you let it be really simple. Col­lect shells.

Step 14: Buy more block ice; this will come in handy later. Leave secret loc­a­tion reluct­antly. Swear not to reveal the secret to anyone. Decide to name van Serendip­ity. Travel south.

Step 15: To make leav­ing easier, indulge base urges in Rock­hamp­ton. This may include stop­ping at the Hog’s Breath Café for curly fries and Cold Rock for wicked ice cream.

Step 16: Drive full pelt for Bundaberg know­ing that turtle tours book out at start at 7pm. Miss turnoff, have a stupid argu­ment and agree to take a back­road back to the sec­ond­ary road fur­ther down; this will become sig­ni­fic­ant very soon.

Step 17: Spot bush­fire on back­road. Turn off inten­ded route to Bundaberg to inform someone. The someone will turn out to be an old coot with a boat full of fresh caught crabs. He will give you a whole live crab. Put it in your esky; told you the ice and the esky would come in handy! Gape at the idea that there is a live crab in your esky for a while and the bizarre set of coin­cid­ences that led to it being there. Thank Serendipity.

Step 18: Arrive at Bundaberg. Head east. At Bar­gara public school, turn left into Pot­ters Road. Follow signs to Mon Repos turtle rook­ery. Park van into late arrivals zone in Turtle Sands cara­van park (be aware, the entrance is out­side the national park as it is a private ven­ture). Follow the flash­ing lights down the jet black path to the inform­a­tion centre and beg into the last group of turtle watch­ers for the night. 

Step 19: Be abso­lutely amazed by the enorm­ous log­ger­head turtle who comes up onto the beach under the yellow moon to lay more than 100 trans­lu­cent leath­ery ping-pong ball eggs, patiently perched over the hole she has dug while research­ers meas­ure her car­a­pace and check which one she is and whether she’s been there before. Learn more about turtle repro­duc­tion than you ever knew before.

Step 20: Wake up and have hot showers at Turtle Sands. You will be for­given for over­in­dul­ging here. Head into Bundaberg for break­fast. We recom­mend Our Place, Your Place on Bour­bong Road; local, fresh foods, organic where pos­sible, gluten-free options avail­able, a range of home-made ice-creams that have to be seen to be believed. Scrambled eggs, mush­rooms, avo­cado, excel­lent latte. Part­ner will have free-range bacon and eggs, extra large water­melon juice. Go back to Bundaberg Barrel Brewed Soft Drinks. Buy cases of soft drink.

Step 21: Head south. Stop again at the Swiss Café out­side of Gympie. Why not? This time, have mush­room ragout and a selec­tion of salads. Head south.

Step 22: Arrive Bris­bane. Remove crab from esky. Take crab to excel­lent old friend mor­gan­jaf­fit for dinner. Eat crab (drool; lit­er­ally: Morgan did). Invite other excel­lent old friend sniffytherab­bit to join for drinks. Share the brewed Bundy joy. Enjoy Mor­gi­tos (Morgan-made moji­tos; mmm).

Step 23: Follow sniffytherab­bit home. Avail selves of clotheswash­ing facil­it­ies and real bed. Type up journal entry so lengthy no one will get this far.

Next stop: Lam­ing­ton National Park, then Mul­lumbimby to stay with Melinda, then the national park near Dor­rigo then Sydney for Coen­stock. Stay tuned.