Advice on trip to Australia

[Greetlander]

Sorry arrived late to this. Did you say which part of Australia you're coming to?
Most of Sydney's beaches are not rail served - but you're never more than a bus ride away. Sydney's commuter network is fantastic. If you want a waterside railway experience, get the Newcastle line north and get off at Wondabyne, only accessible by rail or boat, request stop only, plenty of spotting and watch out for snakes in Summer.
XPT worth a go before it's retired - don't do the full journey from Sydney to Brisbane or Melbourne. My nerd suggestion would be to go to Maitland, have an overnight stop in a little regional city and watch the coal trains on the Hunter Valley line. They run 24/7.

 

[parkender102]

Sounds like a trip we did in 1989 (18 Months) but you are squashing it into 4 Weeks! Upvotes for the Kuranda Railway in Australia (Spectacular) and also a trip to Cronulla on the train for the superb beach. Used to stop at the Cronulla Beach Hotel on the way home from work at the Kurnell Refinery. Beautiful Surf Beach backed by Pine Trees. On another trip also did Brisbane to Cairns return with stopoffs at Rockhampton, Great Keppel Island, Daydream Island, Port Douglas, Whitsundays.

The 1989 Trip - All Rail unless specified - Chester - London - Dover - Ostend (Jetfoil) - Vienna (Sleeper) - Budapest - Moscow (Sleeper) - Beijing (Trans Siberian Railway 6 Days) - Hong Kong (Sleeper) - Bangkok (Flight) - Surat Thani - Koh Samui (Boat) - Bangkok - Perth (Flight) - Sydney (Bought a campervan and drove for 3 Months via Port Hedland, Broome, Darwin, Kakadu, Three Ways, Mount Isa, Cairns, Mission Beach, Townsville, Brisbane, Surfers Paradise, Sydney - Auckland (Flight) - Christchurch (Flight) - Fiji (Flight) - Hawaii (Flight) - Los Angeles (Flight) - New York (6 Week Amtrak Ticket so criss crossed America including Los Angeles - Chicago, Chicago - New Orleans, New Orleans - Dallas, Dallas - San Francisco, San Francisco - Seattle, Seattle - Chicago, Chicago - Miami, Miami - New York - New York - Paris (Flight), Paris - Amsterdam, Amsterdam - London (Coach/Ferry), London - Chester (Coach). And relax...............

 

[185]

3 reasonably priced Australian day trains which were okay...

Brisbane - Sydney (14 hours, daily)
sometimes best to pick this up at Casino Station, 8.30ish to avoid the mega early start)
Sydney - Melbourne (12 hours, daily)
Some dual gauge, interesting line
Melbourne - Adelaide (13 hours, twice weekly)
Excellent scenery, good views of rural bush & desert Australia.

Avoided the luxury overpriced sleeper trains to Perth & Darwin - money wasted on those 'experience' nonsense services.

In the USA, I did the Zephyr San Francisco (ish) to Chicago. Two nights on the train, in a 1st class roomette, excellent value, all meals included.
Views of hot desert, snow, rivers, mountains, farmland, ice on the doors in Chicago - every climate in one journey.

 

[parkender102]

3 reasonably priced Australian day trains which were okay...

Brisbane - Sydney (14 hours, daily)
sometimes best to pick this up at Casino Station, 8.30ish to avoid the mega early start)
Sydney - Melbourne (12 hours, daily)
Some dual gauge, interesting line
Melbourne - Adelaide (13 hours, twice weekly)
Excellent scenery, good views of rural bush & desert Australia.

Avoided the luxury overpriced sleeper trains to Perth & Darwin - money wasted on those 'experience' nonsense services.

In the USA, I did the Zephyr San Francisco (ish) to Chicago. Two nights on the train, in a 1st class roomette, excellent value, all meals included.
Views of hot desert, snow, rivers, mountains, farmland, ice on the doors in Chicago - every climate in one journey.

It's a pity some of the long distance Trains in Australia are now strictly only 'Luxury Package' Trains. I worked in Perth, Western Australia for a while and one of the guys came over to work on our job on the Indian Pacific from Sydney. In those days normal passengers used it and you could just buy a Reserved Seat and do the journey cheaply - 3 days for just over 100 AUS$. I think he spent most of the journey in the bar though..............

 

[railfan99]

3 reasonably priced Australian day trains which were okay...

Brisbane - Sydney (14 hours, daily)
sometimes best to pick this up at Casino Station, 8.30ish to avoid the mega early start)
Sydney - Melbourne (12 hours, daily)
Some dual gauge, interesting line
Melbourne - Adelaide (13 hours, twice weekly)
Excellent scenery, good views of rural bush & desert Australia.

Avoided the luxury overpriced sleeper trains to Perth & Darwin - money wasted on those 'experience' nonsense services.

The early start from Brisbane is annoying, but if one joined at Casino, you'd miss lovely scenry including the Border Loop spiral (that as name suggests is close to the Queensland-New South Wales border).

If possible on the XPT, after booking online, ring the call centre and ask for a forward-facing seat in one of the sleeper compartments in car A (first class sleeper by night, but three across - no recelien on the seats - by day). I have been told NSW TrainLink no longer books day passengers into car A unless cars B and C are full but I've not tested this supposed policy change.

Agree that 'Indian Pacific' and 'The Ghan' are way overpriced: operated by USA-owned Journey Beyond.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

Genuinely not trying to self plug, but I've got about 30 trip reports from my six months living in Australia, including some amazing journeys in New Zealand also, in this thread here, loaded with pictures, in case it gives you some ideas:

DOWN UNDER with TT-ONR-NRN (+ other overseas ventures)

Edit 25/1/24: My Australian (inc. New Zealand) adventures continue to until around Page 16, and from then on reports are of my other adventures abroad since returning to the U.K. in June 2023. :) The corny writer inside of me really wants to begin this thread with "G'day," but that would be...

www.railforums.co.uk

It's of course MASSIVE, and with so much on offer, so you will no doubt find four weeks isn't enough, really!

 

[Brissle Girl]

In NZ if you can get down to Dunedin the Taieri Gorge railway is spectacular - run by Dunedin Railways.

 

[AdamWW]

A good day out from Sydney is to take the train to Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. It's quite a scenic route once you're out of the suburbs and the Three Sisters rock formation is just a short walk from the station.

Upside down hiking (appropriately enough?) - you start at the top and go down into the valley.

There's also the "Scenic Railway" - a ludicrously steep funicular (52° or 128% gradient), though looking at the Scenic World web site I'm not sure you can buy tickets to just ride on that any more, rather than a day ticket for the whole "attraction".

 

[Brissle Girl]

Upside down hiking (appropriately enough?) - you start at the top and go down into the valley.

There's also the "Scenic Railway" - a ludicrously steep funicular (52° or 128% gradient), though looking at the Scenic World web site I'm not sure you can buy tickets to just ride on that any more, rather than a day ticket for the whole "attraction".

Has to be for the whole attraction. I wouldn’t go out of my way purely to travel on it, although the whole site is quite interesting.

 

[AdamWW]

I wouldn’t go out of my way purely to travel on it, although the whole site is quite interesting.

Me neither but given I was in the area I thought it was worth doing. I think it would have been better going down rather than just up though.

I also went on the glass floored cable car and didn't consider it worth the money.

I enjoyed the hiking round there though.