Sunshine Coast to Barcaldine best route?

Its been a few years since ive been up that way but, once past Toowoomba its all flat, Cant remember how hilly it is from you up to Rocky, but after that its all flat, but i knows it hilly from noosa via gayndah, biloela. I'd go the toowoomba way. All freeway from your place to Toowoomba, and 1 big climb up the range then flat all the to the west coast.

Coming from the Sunny coast, i'd avoid the Warrego like the plague, it's about the worst rd in Australia.
Through Gayndah is a nice drive. and more interesting than straight up the Bruce, which can also be a nightmare run at times.

As you say you just want to get there so if I was doing the same I would go up the Bruce to Rocky then straight out on the Capricorn to downtown Barcaldine. 99% good (well for Qld that is) flat roads.

Have a good trip which ever way you decide.

RA.

From the Sunshine Coast I would choose the Burnett Hwy via Gayndah, Biloela & Emerald. But to get onto the Burnett I would go up the Bruce Hwy through Gympie and turn after 12 km onto the Wide Bay Hwy to Kilkivan to join the Burnett to Gayndah etc. This is a flat route and a good road through nice country.
The Bruce Hwy from Sunshine Coast to Gympie is in good condition with plenty of overtaking lanes so you won't hold others up if you want to take it easy. Besides, it is a divided highway from the Coast to Cooroy then a speed limit of 90 kmh to Gympie.

To reach the Burnett via Kilcoy and Yarraman would take you over some steep sections of the Blackbutt range.

Cannot fathom the suggestion of via Toowoomba from the Sunshine Coast!

Thanks everyone for your feedback! (and the tips about the rollercoaster road haha)

We've decided to take the Burnett > Capricorn route (ie: click here) and we'll be heading off in the morning.

Looking forward to staying in our first free camp along the way :)

Cheers!

Dave & Hayley

Hi

I also live on the Sunshine coast ( Tewantin ) and have done the Barcaldine run many times. The Gayndah, Biloela, Emerald way is my prefered option, although sometimes for a change we use the Roma, Morvan, Augathella route.

If going through Gayndah at the moment, watch out for the Bats!!

Jon

Hi all!

Well we made it ~330km in from Sunny coast and successfully stayed our first night at a free stopover. ABSOLUTELY loved it!

Silly us are still on the Camps4 book (will upgrade at next town) so we went to an old "free" spot 7km west of Edsvold (Tolderodden Rest Area) only to find it is now $5/person e-permit site (still very nice though and nobody around).

So on our mission to stay somewhere free we backtracked and continued on 10km past Edsvold to the Ceratodus Rest Area and that's where we stayed (and currently are at!) Having no power was great! About 8 other campers are here, one lovely couple even came over and started chatting to us (the next-g antenna we rigged up was the convo starter).

Cooked up some bangers and mash then curled up with a hot water bottle. The morning mist is amazing and apparently stays around until 10am. We'll post some pictures when better internet comes around.

Off to Emerald or nearabouts today. The roads in from the coast were very good. No complaints at all :)

See ya later!

Dave & Hayley