Cairns to Alice Springs road trip: Best stops, distance & drive time

Cairns to Alice Springs road trip: Normanton to Camooweal

East of Normanton, National Highway 1 is unsealed, so the route towards the Northern Territory requires a southward turn.

From Normanton, many will choose to take the slightly longer route via Cloncurry and Mount Isa, but a shorter, even more lonely route brings you out at Camooweal and doesn’t take quite as long.

It’s 198km from Normanton the Burke and Wills Roadhouse at Four Ways. You can stay overnight here at the caravan park if required.

From here, turn north-west up the Wills Developmental Road towards Gregory. The distance from Four Ways to Gregory is 147km with nothing to see but a few river crossings along the route.

Gregory to Camooweal

The Gregory Downs Hotel offers accommodation, food and fuel, and can be used as a launchpad for tackling the rugged yet spectacular Boodjamulla National Park. Lawn Hill Gorge is the highlight here.

Otherwise, it’s a fairly uneventful 222km drive along the Gregory Downs-Camooweal road into Camooweal, the last town in Queensland before the Northern Territory border.

Things to do in Camooweal include discovering the cattle droving industry at the Drovers Camp, and seeing the cave mouths in Wiliyan-ngurru National Park.

But the most important thing to do in Camooweal is refuel your car, because there isn’t another chance for 260km.

Click through for the next section: Queensland border to Tennant Creek.