In a place like Burleigh Heads, which offers the saltwater attractions and beachside mellowness that many coastal escapes do, the quality of accommodation can be persuasive. Which is why the Anna Spiro-designed Bon Sol has been instrumental in putting it on the map.

On a clear, breezy June night in 1770, the Great Barrier Reef’s coral talons tore into the hull of the HMS Endeavour forcing it ashore. The layover, intended to take mere days, would become one of the most momentous in the history of modern Australia. Learn all about it in Cooktown.

Cairns, best known for its reef and rainforest, is ready to take flight again thanks in no small part to Crystalbrook Collection’s renovation of the city skyline with its new accommodation offerings, all of which have been designed with distinct personalities and sustainable luxury in mind: there’s the Riley, a ‘live in the moment’ resort; the Flynn, ‘a social butterfly’; and Bailey, ‘a thoughtful and arty’ option.

Brisbane is the newly anointed capital of cool thanks to a whole heap of design-driven restaurants, hotels and bars popping up all over the city.

Fraser Island’s 75 Mile Beach disappears completely at high tide, but when the water recedes it morphs into a surprisingly busy road with speed limits and even booze buses during the summer holidays.

The titan monolith – Ngarrabullgan, or Mt Mulligan – jutting out of Tropical North Queensland’s outback landscape stretches 18 by 6.5 kilometres, making it almost 10 times the size of Uluru. Although Mt Mulligan (located only 150 kilometres west of Cairns) sits beyond the modern consciousness of most, radiocarbon dating suggests Indigenous Australians inhabited the mountain as far back as 37,000 years ago, making it the oldest dated site in Queensland.Despite its historically low visitation, a new luxury resort is helping to put Mt Mulligan on the map.

While iconic outback rail journeys The Ghan and the Indian Pacific are both bucket-list items for most Aussies, consider adding the Savannahlander – a 1960s ‘silver bullet’ railmotor that rattles once a week through the Queensland outback – to that list.

Ever since the green shoots of tourism began here in the 1920's, the archipelago of 74 islands off the tropical coast of North Queensland has become synonymous with the quintessential Australian holiday.

Jarramali Rock Art Tours might have only been operating for three years but the ground it covers, the Quinkan rock art sites found in the sandstone escarpments outside of Laura in Tropical North Queensland, is eternal.

Townsville will soon lay claim to the Museum of Underwater Art (MOUA), the only museum of its kind in the southern hemisphere. MOUA will act to highlight reef conservation, restoration and education on a global scale, sharing the stories of the region’s First Nations people and providing plenty of creative inspiration in the process.

The traditional country of the Yugambeh people, with World Heritage-listed rainforest and six national parks spread over an area of some 4000 square kilometres, driving Queensland’s Scenic Rim offers up scenery and surprises aplenty.

Rising up to 1200 metres above sea level, Queensland’s Granite Belt region is home to some of Australia’s most dramatic scenery and offers surprises at every turn of the New England Highway between Stanthorpe and Tenterfield. Discover some absolute highlights.

Reefsuites, Australia’s first underwater accommodation, is part resort, part aquarium – providing a front-row seat to the watery wonderland of the Great Barrier Reef.

From city to jungle, the short but sweet Great Barrier Reef Drive takes in some of Tropical North Queensland’s most famous spots and offers up spectacular coastline along the way.