Australien

With mountains, rivers, lakes and bushland all within its compact boundaries, it's easy to see how the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) came to be known as Australia's 'Bush Capital'. At the territory's heart sits the cosmopolitan city of Canberra, a well-planned, leafy city with enough cultural cachet to match Australia's larger metropolises, alongside the laid-back feel of a regional centre. Sightseeing opportunities abound within the city limits – including several world-class museums – but there's also plenty to see and do in the wider ACT as well. Whether it's bushwalking and kangaroo-spotting in the nearby wildernesses of Namadgi National Park and Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, sipping superb shiraz at one of the many local wineries, or window-shopping in the quaint towns of Hall or Bungendore, you'll find plenty to occupy yourself among the hills and plains of this quintessential Australian region.

Melburnians have been making the drive down the Princes Hwy (Geelong Rd) to the seaside villages along the Bellarine Peninsula for more than a century. It's known for family-friendly and surf beaches, historic towns, and wonderful cool-climate wineries.

Scattered like emeralds on aquamarine velvet, the Whitsunday Islands are one of Australia's loveliest destinations, an unmatched playground for boaters, divers, campers, fishers and resort-loungers. Sheltered by the Great Barrier Reef, these warm, rarely ruffled waters are particularly perfect for sailing, as exploited by the 100-plus yachts that gather here each August for Airlie Beach Race Week. Traditional home of the Ngaro people, these 74 islands also shelter some of the oldest archaeological sites on Australia's east coast. Five of them have resorts, but most are uninhabited, and several offer back-to-nature beach camping and bushwalking. Whitehaven Beach on Whitsunday Island is acknowledged as the finest beach in the Whitsundays (some say the world), while mainland hub Airlie Beach, the major gateway to the islands, offers a wealth of tours and activities, plenty of eating and sleeping choices, and a hard-partying backpacker scene.

Far North Queensland is a remote tropical adventure where the Great Barrier Reef is tantalisingly close. It's a cliché, but the rainforest really does meet the reef up here. Steamy Cairns is the main traveller base and an obligatory stop on any east-coast itinerary. Divers and snorkellers swarm here – and to more upmarket Port Douglas – for easy access to the Great Barrier Reef. The cooler Atherton Tablelands – with volcanic craters, jungly waterfalls and gourmet food producers – is a short, scenic drive inland.

Welcome to the outback. As much a place of the imagination as an actual place, the outback goes by many names, among them the 'Back of Beyond', the 'Never Never Land' or simply 'the Bush'. At its core, it refers to that Aussie realm of Indigenous homelands and traditional lands, frontier towns and a horizon that never seems to end. There is no official definition of where the outback begins and ends. Some say you'll know it when you see it. One local reckons that you know you've left the outback when passing motorists no longer greet each other with a wave. It can be reduced to one simple formulation: this is the big-sky essence of Australia.

At the centre of the fertile Mid North agricultural district, two hours north of Adelaide, the wine bottle–slender Clare Valley produces world-class, sweet-scented rieslings and mineral-rich reds. This is gorgeous countryside – Ngadjuri Indigenous homelands – with open skies, rounded hills, stands of large gums and wind rippling over wheat fields. Towns here date from the 1840s; many were built to service the Burra copper mines.

Sitting almost within swimming distance offshore from Townsville, Magnetic Island (Maggie to her friends) is a verdant island and one of Queensland's most laid-back residential addresses. The local population, who mostly commute to Townsville or cater for the tourist trade, must pinch themselves as they come home to the stunning coastal walking trails, gum trees full of dozing koalas and surrounding bright turquoise seas.

With hot, dry summers and cool, moderate winters, the Barossa is one of the world's great wine regions and an absolute must for wine fans. It's a compact valley − just 25km long − but the Barossa produces 21% of Australia's wine, and it makes a no-fuss day trip from Adelaide, 65km away.

One of the Fraser Coast's most alluring honeypots, Hervey Bay unfurls itself lazily along a seemingly endless bayside shorefront, packing plenty of apartments, restaurants, pubs and tour operators into the streets behind. Young travellers with an eye on Fraser Island rub shoulders with grey nomads passing languidly through campgrounds and serious fisherfolk recharging in pursuit of the one that got away. Throw in the chance to see majestic humpback whales frolicking here from July to October, and the town’s convenient access to the Unesco–listed Fraser Island, and it’s easy to understand how Hervey Bay has become an unflashy, yet undeniably appealing, tourist hotspot.

Vidsträckta stränder, hippa stadsdelar och västkustens läckraste pizzeria – allt finns i storstaden som är granne med vildmarken.