Four of your most-loved travel articles in 2025

Calm, easy planning guides that helped shape some of your favourite road trips in 2025.

As holidays approach, we’ve taken a moment to curate your 2025 Travel Well Wrapped – the travel ideas you engaged with most this year. These were the guides that sparked ideas, shaped weekend plans and helped you uncover quieter, easier ways to explore Australia.

1. Late-winter escapes worth lingering over

When the temperature dipped, you didn’t stay home. You looked for trips that made the most of the colder months: forest cabins with fireplaces, hot springs, quiet towns that come into their own once the summer rush has gone.

Some of the most loved routes follow winding roads through the Huon Valley outside Hobart, into Victoria’s spa country, or up into New South Wales’ high country for gentle, family-friendly snow play.

These journeys weren’t about chasing alpine resorts. They were about soft mornings, slow walks, early dinners and the feeling of being tucked in somewhere you could really rest. A reminder that winter can be just as rewarding for road trips as summer.

Read more: five winter getaway road trips perfect for August

2. Scenic stops worth pulling over for

A reader favourite was our guide to the quiet moments between A and B – the places to pull over, stretch and reset along some of Australia’s most loved coastal routes.

These stops weren’t complicated: a lakeside foreshore with shady grass, a headland lookout with an easy path, a small jetty town where you can wander for half an hour and feel like you’ve had a proper break.

Built-in breaks like these are good for your body, for concentration and for the mood in the car. Which might be why so many of you clicked on this story for future trips.

Read more: scenic stops on Australia’s coastal drives

3. Making the most of back-to-back long weekends

You also gravitated toward drives that made good use of precious public holidays. With two long weekends side by side, trips that were easy to reach, simple to plan and flexible enough to suit different tastes, inspired autumn travels.

For some, that might have meant a coastal loop with short walks, good coffee and plenty of time by the water. For others, it might have been a food-focused escape that caught their eye. Think the gentle circuit around Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula, where farm gates and sea views all sit within comfortable driving distance.

The common thread was choice: using the extra time to match the drive to your mood, whether active, relaxed or somewhere in between.

Read more: how to make the most of two back-to-back long weekends

4. Swap hotspots for quieter getaways

Despite being a little quieter than the usual destination favourites, these hidden gems of leafy hill villages, smaller coastal communities and relaxed wine regions drew your interest.

Imagine swapping packed Noosa foreshore for the calmer curve of Currumbin, or drifting down to South Australia’s Fleurieu Peninsula, where coastal walks, local markets and farm-to-table lunches fall easily into one unhurried day.

These swaps weren’t about missing out. They were about choosing drives that felt manageable, parking that felt simple and stops where you could actually hear yourself exhale.

Read more: underrated spring road trips near Australia’s capitals.

Looking back at what you clicked and read in 2025, a clear theme emerges: travel that feels calm, close and achievable. Trips you can plan in an evening, drive in a day or two, and enjoy at your own pace.

As you start thinking about 2026, these ideas are here whenever you’re ready to get back on the road.

_Disclaimer

_{Viva Energy Australia Pty Ltd (“Viva Energy”) has compiled the above article for your general information and to use as a general reference. Whilst all reasonable care has been taken by Viva Energy in compiling this article, Viva Energy does not warrant or represent that the information in the article is free from errors or omissions or is suitable for your intended use.}