Hi Team,
Driving from the southside of Brisbane to the Southern Highlands on the weekend, we're probably looking to leave late morning/midday on Saturday and stopping somewhere halfway. 11.5-12 hours of driving time plus stops down the pacific according to the omnipresent google, which sees us around Port Macquarie.
I made the trek semi regularly in 2012/13, and always preferred the coast route despite the roadworks at the time (which were mainly north of Coffs)… I found it easily an hour quicker than the inland route. Someone I work worth however drove to Sydney via the pacific just before christmas, and said the roadworks were quite slow around Byron, and coming back found the new england quicker.
Has anyone driven the pacific highway recently? What are the roadworks like at the moment? If the Pacific highway is a s**tstorm at the moment what would be a good spot to stay on the new england route?
The tunnel is now open at Byron so shouldn't be bad like it was. I drove from Albury to Lismore (near where I live)and the slowest parts were North of Kempsey to Coffs where the towns have not been bypassed yet. Still much quicker than going inland via New England highway which we drove down on and we had to do it in two days despite leaving at 4am.