Townsville Region

Townsville builds its whole identity around Castle Hill, a granite monolith rising straight out of the CBD with a walking track to a summit view over the whole coast. A short ferry ride away, Magnetic Island holds genuine wild koala populations and some of the best snorkelling reachable without a boat charter from anywhere else on the mainland. Dive into the Museum of Underwater Art, sculptures submerged along the reef itself, or trace the city's wartime history at its military heritage sites. Reef HQ Aquarium keeps the world's largest living coral reef tank right in the city, a good primer before heading out to the real thing.