If anyone from the southern states were travelling up to the Whitsundays after Conondale , I think it would save a lot of time by heading inland at Rockhampton on the way home . A couple of us drove down to CD4 , at Broadford , from NQ ( about a 6500 km round trip ). We went through Sydney via the coast road on the way down ( because we had a few things to pick up & drop off along the way ) & came back via the inland route , crossing back into Queensland at Goondiwindi . Seemed like we saved a lot of hours on the way home , but you have to have a big fuel tank or carry drums of fuel as most of the fuel stations were shut in the middle of the night . We had to drain the fuel out of the bikes in the trailer at one stage , to get us through . I think that most GPS systems these days would give a route plan to track you the quickest way .