Brisbane to Cairns by campervan: a 1,680km route that works

Brisbane to Noosa is 140km. Noosa to Bundaberg is 250km. Bundaberg to Agnes Water is 190km. Agnes Water to Rockhampton is 220km. Rockhampton to Mackay is 340km. Mackay to Airlie Beach is 150km. Airlie to Townsville is 280km. Townsville to Mission Beach is 230km. Mission Beach to Cairns is 140km.

Two of those days are long — Rockhampton to Mackay in particular is a highway day with little to see. Everything else is comfortable at a relaxed pace with an afternoon stop.

Noosa for the national park walk and the surf, not the shops. Rainbow Beach for the coloured sands and the Carlo Sandblow, which is a twenty minute walk from the car park and worth the whole detour.

Agnes Water and Seventeen Seventy for the quiet. Bundaberg for the rum distillery if that is your thing. Airlie Beach for the Whitsundays, with the sailing booked before you leave.

Mission Beach is the stop people rush past and should not. The campground at Wongaling Beach sits between the reef and the rainforest, cassowaries walk through it, and it is ten minutes from a boat ramp to the reef.

Queensland has a good network of national park campgrounds, most with basic facilities and low fees booked through the parks service. They are usually a short detour off the highway and vastly better than a roadside rest area.

Rest areas are legal for a night in most of Queensland provided you are not setting up camp, but rules vary by council and some are signed no-camping. Check the sign where you stop rather than assuming.

All of this is sealed road, so a two-wheel-drive campervan is entirely adequate. A 2-3 berth van handles two people comfortably and three at a push. Only book a 4WD if you are adding Fraser Island or the Bloomfield Track, both of which genuinely require one.

Brisbane to Cairns is one of the cheapest one-way routes in the country because the fleet needs to move north for the dry season. Pricing a one-way from Brisbane with a Cairns drop-off is often barely more than a return, and it saves you two days of driving back.

Northbound from May to October is the dry season and the right answer for most people. November to April is the wet: hot, humid, and the coastal road south of Cairns can flood. The reef is still good in the wet, but the driving is harder and some tours shut for cyclone season.