The Drive North West Queensland campaign hopes to bring more overseas visitors inland. PIC: Tourism and Events Queensland
Many grey nomads already prefer to avoid the crowds and the costs associated with a coast-hugging Big Lap by heading inland … and a new tourism campaign is urging more overseas travellers to join them in the Outback.
Anita Clark, a tourism consultant involved with the Drive North West Queensland campaign said that while the majority of holiday visitors to Queensland’s outback were domestic travellers, there was real room for international growth.
“In outback Queensland as of June 2017, 97% of our outback visitors were domestic — which works out to be 251,000 holiday visitors,” Ms Clark told the ABC. “International visitors, we have 19,000 … and that’s taken as a three-year average.”
While a majority of those visitors came from Europe, there were signs of growth from the North American market, and there are high hopes that many more Chinese will soon be heading Outback.
The Drive North West Queensland campaign is being promoted worldwide through Trade and Investment Queensland offices. It was developed by local councils, economic development groups and the Outback Queensland Tourism Association, and includes two self-drive routes between Cairns and Townsville.
“There’s barramundi, fishing, lava caves, there’s big cattle stations, there’s fossils at Riversleigh, there’s dinosaurs at Richmond and Winton and Boulia,” Richmond Mayor Wharton told the ABC.
The two self-driving tours launch on the coast and direct tourists to remote regions in the north-west.
“The Discovery Drive, which departs Townsville, goes to Hughenden, Winton, Boulia, Mount Isa and right back down the corridor into Townsville,” Mr Wharton said. “And then there’s The North West Loop which starts in Cairns and comes out to Mount Garnet, Georgetown, Normanton, Karumba, Burketown, down to Cloncurry, back to Julia Creek, Richmond and Hughenden and back into Townsville.”
Philip Pearce, a foundation professor of tourism at James Cook University, said there were already small numbers of Chinese driving around remote parts of Australia, but with a market as big as China, small numbers could grow into big numbers very, very quickly.
“Driving in China is something like a nightmare because the big highways are so full of trucks and transport and crowds,” Professor Pearce said. “So the driving experience itself is quite enjoyable in Australia for many Chinese.”
More tourist dollars for the outback would be good im sure but if they want little NON Self contained vehicles out there. For goodness sake get some roadside toilets in place..
Also educate them with the procedures of using them when they first hit the country
All are welcome, they just need to know the road rules and be able to drive to the conditions. I’m not sure Europeans are used to the wide open spaces and the incredible distances we have here – so their driving habits will need some adjustments if accidents re to be avoided.
Vulcan is right our distances are not understood by many overseas visitors. In France I met a Dutchman towing his caravan from Spain, he had been to Australia he told me and rented a camper van . I asked him where he went and he said “I went to the outback, of the outback, of the outback”. He actually loved the wide open spaces and the big distances. On the other hand I’ve met overseas visitors who plan to drive to Sydney from Melbourne for the day, as they can’t get their head around the scale of our maps.