Gold Coast to Sunshine Coast

We took a road trip from Australia’s Gold Coast to the Sunshine Coast. Our first stop was Snapper Rocks. The large man-made sandbank, called the “Superbank”, creates a world-famous surf break. It is also home of the Quicksilver Pro surfing competition. It’s a fun place to grab a bite to eat from an outdoor cafe and watch the surfers in action.

Our next beach stop was Surfer’s Paradise. This is a beautiful urban beach with high rise buildings lining the wide stretch of golden sand. The beachfront night market is fun to visit, or you can take in the views from the Skypoint Tower.

We stopped at the Daisy Hill Koala Center on our way to Brisbane. This is a free educational center where you can visit adorable koalas in their natural setting.

We also enjoyed a nice picnic on their beautiful grounds.

We arrived in Brisbane that evening and immediately fell in love. Our favorite thing was taking the ferry down the river. The city offers a free hop-on hop-off City Hopper Ferry, or the City Cat Ferry is a little faster but charges a fee.

Brisbane is such a family-friendly city. New Farm Park was our favorite playground. We also enjoyed wandering around the Southbank Parklands riverfront. Streets Beach is an awesome beach with a man-made lagoon, and the Aquativity interactive water play park was also a hit!

Aussie World was probably our kids’ favorite stop. We loved visiting here because it wasn’t as crowded or as expensive as other amusement parks. We visited on a weekday in June and practically had the entire park to ourselves! It was the perfect ending to our road trip!