What if we told you that, on your next getaway, the journey could also be the destination? Planes – they’re for getting somewhere. But these Australian train journeys are the somewhere.
Imagine a holiday where you unpack once, someone else does the driving, and the biggest decision you make each day is whether to watch the views roll by from the lounge car or your cabin.
Australia happens to be very good at this kind of slow travel – there’s so much country between the capitals. Some of these routes have even been running for the best part of a century.
From the Nullarbor’s famous straight to a 1950s rail motor in the Gulf, all-inclusive, sunset-drinks-in-the-desert affairs to honest overnight sleepers, here are six Australian rail journeys worth spending your annual leave on. One practically leaves from our backyard.
The Ghan
Adelaide to Darwin (or the reverse) | 2 to 4 days | Best for: the Red Centre without the road trip
This is the big one. The Ghan cuts straight up the middle of the country, providing access to the Red Centre since 1929. Today it’s an all-inclusive rail holiday: think private cabins, restaurant dining and a premium lounge car. But even with all that’s on board, it’s the off-train stops that earn The Ghan its reputation. Walk Simpsons Gap, cruise Nitmiluk Gorge or poke around the underground town of Coober Pedy. The highlight? For many southbound guests, it’s dinner at the Alice Springs Telegraph Station – the birthplace of Alice Springs and a key station on the telegraph line that first connected Australia to Europe. You don’t have to do the whole thing, either: Adelaide to Alice Springs, and Alice to Darwin, run as shorter legs.
Our tip: The Ghan books out well ahead, especially in the cooler dry-season months. If it’s on the list, start looking a year out. And if you want to see Uluru, add the paid upgrade from Alice.
Indian Pacific
Sydney to Perth (or the reverse) | 4 to 5 days | Best for: bragging rights
Spanning 4,352 kilometres ocean to ocean, the Indian Pacific first left Sydney in February 1970, and it’s still one of very few trains worldwide that runs coast to coast across an entire country. The route is a crash course in geography. Up through the Blue Mountains, out to the silver-mining town of Broken Hill, a stop in Adelaide, then onto the Nullarbor – and the 478-kilometre stretch of track that’s widely cited as the longest dead-straight railway in the world. There’s a stop at Cook, a former railway town now reduced to a handful of buildings and a lot of sky, before the goldfields and the run into Perth.
Our tip: Book the direction that suits your flight home. Flying one way and taking the train the other is the classic move – and the best way to underline the joys of train (versus plane) travel.
Great Southern
Brisbane to Adelaide or Melbourne (or the reverse) | 3 to 4 days | Best for: a summer holiday that starts an hour up the M1
The Ghan’s younger, beachier sibling, and one of two on this list you can board in Brisbane. The Great Southern runs between Brisbane and Adelaide in summer only, and it’s built less around sparse horizons and more around long lunches. Southbound, the journey starts with a welcome in Brisbane before the train heads down the coast. Day one ends with beachside dining at Coffs Harbour; day two is your pick of Hunter Valley cellar doors, Newcastle or Port Stephens by land or sea; then it’s regional Victoria or Melbourne before rolling into Adelaide. Northbound is a day shorter, taking in the Adelaide Hills, the Grampians and Canberra on the way to Coffs and home. There’s also a Brisbane-to-Melbourne option that finishes with lunch 89 floors up at Eureka.
Our tip: Departures are limited to the summer season, so the window is narrow. Get on the Journey Beyond mailing list early if you want first dibs.
Spirit of the Outback
Brisbane to Longreach (or the reverse) | About 24 hours | Best for: outback Queensland on a sensible budget
Not every bucket list journey needs a butler. Queensland Rail’s Spirit of the Outback is an overnight sleeper that leaves Brisbane and heads north, then west – via Rockhampton, through Emerald and Barcaldine – for roughly 1,300 kilometres of cattle country before pulling into Longreach. You get a berth, a dining car and a look at the parts of Queensland most of us city folk will never otherwise experience. Longreach itself is worth the trip, with the Australian Stockman’s Hall of Fame on the doorstep, and it’s a jumping-off point for Winton’s dinosaur country if you want to keep going.
Our tip: Queensland Rail has been known to run two-for-one outback fares over the warmer months. It gets hot out there in summer, but for the price of one ticket, you’ll cope.
The Gulflander
Normanton to Croydon (or the reverse) | About 5 hours | Best for: people who find The Ghan a bit mainstream
Queensland Rail describes it, with some affection, as a train that runs from nowhere to nowhere. The Gulflander is a 1950s rail motor, affectionately known as the Tin Hare, trundling across the Gulf Savannah between Normanton and Croydon on a line originally built to link the river port to the Croydon goldfields. There’s no dining car and no turndown service. What you get is a slow, rattly, one-of-a-kind trip through country very few Australians will ever see. It’s the rail equivalent of a great pub in a tiny town: you go for the story as much as the experience.
Our tip: It’s seasonal and shuts over the wet, so plan for the dry months. Getting to Normanton is half the adventure – plenty of people combine it with the Spirit of Queensland and Cairns, or book it as part of a Gulf Savannah tour.
Kuranda Scenic Railway
Cairns to Kuranda (or the reverse) | About 2 hours | Best for: maximum scenery, minimum annual leave
Proof that a bucket list train journey doesn’t have to take all week. The Kuranda Scenic Railway climbs from Cairns into the World Heritage-listed rainforest of Barron Gorge National Park on a line that opened in 1891 – 15 hand-built tunnels, 55 bridges and a climb to about 327 metres above sea level. The train passes close enough to Stoney Creek Falls to feel it in the wet season, then stops at Barron Falls (Din Din) so you can get off and take the photo everyone takes. At the top, Kuranda’s station is a Federation-era beauty in its own right – all ferns and heritage charm. Heritage Class offers timber carriages and open windows; Gold Class adds armchairs, local produce and drinks.
Our tip: Go up by train and come down on the Skyrail Rainforest Cableway. You get the gorge from the inside, then the canopy from above.
