ProwlParks & green
The southside is stupidly lucky for bush and parkland. Actual forest, ten minutes from the house. Here are the good ones, roughly nearest first.
Toohey Forest & Mt Gravatt Lookout
260 hectares of proper bush a short hop from home, with tracks for every set of legs and a lookout café at the top. On a clear day you can see all the way to Moreton Bay, the D'Aguilar ranges and the Glasshouse Mountains. Koalas live in here if you look up and are patient.
Karawatha Forest
The big one. 900 hectares, more than 40 kilometres of tracks, lagoons, sandstone ridges, and a Discovery Centre to nerd out in. Go at dusk and listen for the tusked frogs, which sound exactly as silly as they are named.
Underwood Park
The crowd pleaser. An enormous playground, a creek to poke about in, shady BBQ spots, and room to do absolutely nothing all afternoon. Bring a picnic and low expectations of leaving early.
Rocks Riverside Park
Out at Seventeen Mile Rocks, on the river. Old cement works relics turned into a big green playground and splash park, with riverside paths for a wander. Genuinely lovely, weirdly under visited.
Minnippi Parklands
Wetlands and open green out Tingalpa way. Boardwalks, birds, and a lake that catches the light beautifully near sunset. A calm one for a slow loop.
Roly Chapman Reserve
A quiet pocket of Bulimba Creek bushland close to home, good for a short leg stretch and a bit of birdsong without committing to a whole expedition.
Daisy Hill Conservation Park
Southside koala country. Forest trails, a koala centre to visit, and a real chance of spotting one in the wild if you walk quietly and look up. Easy, close, and lovely.
Eat & drink
You live next door to one of the best Asian food scenes in the country. This is not an exaggeration and it is your greatest local asset. Go hungry, go often.
Sunnybank, the whole glorious mess of it
Market Square, Sunnybank Plaza and everything between them: hotpot, dumplings, Taiwanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Sichuan, and bubble tea in every colour. You could eat here once a week for a year and not repeat yourself. When in doubt, follow the queue of people who clearly know something.
Woodridge Market
Street food stalls that get about as close to a genuine South East Asian night market as you will find this side of the equator. Loud, cheap, delicious, a little chaotic. Perfect.
Mt Gravatt lookout café
Coffee with the whole city laid out below you. Worth the drive up on a clear morning purely for the smugness of it.
Rocklea markets
The Brisbane produce markets at Rocklea run a Saturday fresh market that is a rite of passage: mountains of fruit and veg for a fraction of supermarket prices, if you can handle an early start and a bit of a scrum.
Quirky & fun
The odd, the fun, and the mildly ridiculous. For when you want a day out that is not a bushwalk or a third bowl of noodles.
IKEA Logan
Yes, it is a furniture shop. It is also a maze, a meatball dispensary, and a whole afternoon if you let it be. Spiritual home of flat pack everything, including, fittingly, a certain spherical garden.
Mt Coot-tha
A bit west of you, but a classic: the Botanic Gardens, the planetarium, a rainforest boardwalk, and the lookout over the whole city. Do the lot and finish with an ice cream like a proper tourist in your own town.
Sir Thomas Brisbane Planetarium
Lie back in the dark and let someone explain the sky to you. Deeply soothing, faintly nostalgic, and cool on a hot day, which counts for a lot around here.
The Sunnybank bubble tea crawl
Not an official thing. Should be. Pick three places, one drink each, rank them with unreasonable seriousness, declare a winner, argue about it for a week.
Karaoke, Sunnybank style
Private rooms, questionable song choices, no judgement. The correct way to spend a rainy evening on the southside.
Eat Street Northshore
A night market built out of shipping containers by the river, all lights and food stalls and cheerful sensory overload. Ticketed at the gate, then eat your way around the world. Very photogenic, very fun.
Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary
The original, out at Fig Tree Pocket. Cuddle a koala, hand feed the kangaroos, and yes it is touristy, and yes it is still great.
Photo spots
The southeast corner is absurdly photogenic and most of the best of it is inside a two hour drive. Waterfalls, volcanic peaks, rainforest and coast, roughly grouped so you can chase the light.
Waterfalls
Cloudy days are a gift for these: soft light, no blown out highlights, and something to steady the camera on gives you that silky long exposure water.
Purling Brook Falls
Springbrook, about an hour and a half. One of the most dramatic falls in reach, a 40 metre drop with a 4km loop through World Heritage rainforest and a walk that takes you around and behind the gorge. The headline act.
Natural Bridge
Springbrook. A waterfall pouring through a rock arch into a cave, gorgeous by day and full of glow worms by night. The best long exposure subject near Brisbane, day or dark. Bring a torch and a tripod.
Twin Falls
Also Springbrook, on the Gondwana rainforest circuit. Two 40 metre falls you can walk behind, ferns and filtered light the whole way. Endlessly shootable.
Kondalilla Falls
Sunshine Coast hinterland, about ninety minutes. An 80 metre drop into a rainforest gorge, with a swimming hole up top for when it is too hot to care about photos.
Queen Mary Falls
Scenic Rim near Killarney, just over two hours but worth the stretch. A 40 metre cascade off a cliff face with an easy loop to the base. Dramatic, green, and cool up there.
Elabana Falls
Deep in Lamington, out from O'Reilly's. A tiered, cascading fall that is a genuine photographer's dream, earned with a proper rainforest hike past several other falls on the way.
Curtis and Cedar Creek Falls
Tamborine Mountain, the easy close ones. Short walks, rock pools, dappled rainforest light. Perfect when you want falls without the full day mission.
Peaks, lakes and big views
These face west or sit high, so they are sunset and golden hour spots. Get set up half an hour before.
Glass House Mountains
About an hour north. The lookout gives you the whole run of volcanic plugs, and the Mount Ngungun hike gives you the postcard from above. Early morning and late afternoon are kindest to the light. Expect company at sunrise.
Lake Moogerah
Scenic Rim, just over an hour, and the spiritual home of Brisbane astrophotography. Still water, the peaks of Mt French and Mt Edwards, glorious sunsets, and dark skies for the Milky Way once the sun is gone.
Mt Coot-tha lookout
The city skyline classic. Come for sunset and stay for the lights, the whole of Brisbane laid out and glowing. Close, easy, reliably lovely.
Lake Wivenhoe and Somerset
Big inland water about an hour and a bit out, calm mornings, mist off the surface, and space to breathe. Underrated for a quiet dawn shoot.
Kooroomba Lavender Farm
Fassifern Valley in the Scenic Rim, about ninety minutes. Rows of lavender running toward the mountains, best in bloom over the cooler months, with a vineyard and cafe for after the shot. Check the season before you drive out.
Coast and bay
These face east, so this is where you go for sunrise and for whales from June to November.
North Stradbroke Island
Ferry from Cleveland. The North Gorge Walk at Point Lookout is one of the best short walks in the state: headlands, turquoise water, turtles and rays below, and whales off the point in season. Sunrise here is the shot.
Wellington Point and Cleveland
Bayside and close. A jetty, big skies, and the walk out to King Island at low tide for a foreground nobody else has. Gentle golden light, minimal effort.
Redcliffe foreshore
A little north, but a clean easterly outlook, a long jetty, and sunrise over Moreton Bay with the water going pink. Grab a coffee after.
Cleveland Point Lighthouse
A little red topped timber lighthouse on the bay, right where you catch the Straddie ferry. Lovely at sunset with pandanus and mangroves for foreground, and ten minutes from the jetty fish and chips.
Shorncliffe Pier
Further north, but Brisbane's longest timber pier and made for sunrise: long leading lines out over the bay and soft early colour. Worth the early alarm.
City frames
Across the river and close, for when you want skyline and street rather than bush.
Kangaroo Point Cliffs
The classic city view, the whole skyline across the river, glorious at sunset and again once the lights come on. Shoot from the top or walk the base.
Wilson Outlook and the Story Bridge
A clifftop reserve that frames the Story Bridge beautifully at dusk. The bridge lit up over the river is a reliable winner.
Fish Lane and the Valley laneways
Street art, neon and colour packed corners. Fish Lane under the railway and the Fortitude Valley laneways are the spots for an urban, graphic shoot.
Further out
Worth the drive when you fancy a proper day trip. All within a couple of hours, all southside friendly since you never have to cross the river to reach them.
Tamborine Mountain
Gold Coast hinterland green: rainforest walks, a glow worm cave, wineries, the odd distillery, and a whole village of shops that want to sell you fudge. Cool, leafy, and an easy day.
North Stradbroke Island
Straddie. Ferry across from Cleveland and you are on white sand and headland walks, with whales off the point in season and gorge boardwalks that do not feel real. The best big day out within reach.
Scenic Rim
South and west into farm country and mountains: Mount Barney, waterfalls, farm gate stalls, and air that is a few degrees cooler than the plain. Big skies, slow days.
Springbrook and Natural Bridge
A rainforest plateau of waterfalls and lookouts, with a night time glow worm show under a natural rock arch that is genuinely magic. Take a torch and warm layers.
The Bunya Mountains
Further out, cool and ancient, full of enormous bunya pines and wallabies on the grass at dusk. A proper get away from everything. Worth the longer drive at least once.
Bayside pottering
Wellington Point and Cleveland for a low key seaside afternoon: a jetty, fish and chips, a walk out to King Island at low tide if the timing is right. Gentle and close.
Mount Glorious and Mount Nebo
Less than an hour into the D'Aguilar range: cool rainforest walks, little country cafes, and lookouts back over the city and out to the bay. The easy green escape when you do not want a whole day in the car.
Scenic drives
Sir Samuel Griffith Drive winds through Mt Coot-tha forest to the lookout. Samford Village takes you into rolling green country to the north west. Both are short, pretty, and best with the windows down.