The Backyard Bucket List Australia

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Gareth Meade
28 Jan, 2022
4 minutes to read

The top 100 true hidden gem locations in Australia

It's time to dust off your bucket list in 2022 because GoSee has crunched the data to reveal the true top hidden gems in Australia and they're sure to ignite your wanderlust!

We've created the ultimate 'Backyard Bucket List' that contains 100 of the most unusual, hidden, fantastic and awesome locations in the country, to encourage Aussie's to 'GoSee' these hidden gems that await on our very own doorstep.

By analysing data from Atlas Obscura, a global travel community and database of the world's most wondrous places, we discovered the most coveted and popular, but least actually visited locations, revealing a list of true hidden gems that a relative few have actually seen with their own eyes.

Forget the stereotypical Sydney Opera House and venture instead to a charming hand-built Spanish-style castle hidden in the tropical jungles of Queensland. Or, explore the magic of nature by adventuring into the Helensburgh Glow Worm Tunnel, an abandoned railway that's now home to a host of bioluminescent beetles.

A map of Australia with locations highlighted on it.

Check out GoSee’s full Backyard Bucket List below and discover the top true hidden gems broken down by every state. Save the maps links below to your phone, or make sure you’ve got a pen and paper handy and let’s ‘GoSee’, go explore and go adventure!

New South Wales

  1. Glow Worm Tunnel Helensburgh
  2. Newnes Glow Worm Tunnel
  3. Balls Pyramid
  4. SS Ayrfield
  5. Mungo National Park
  6. Wedding Cake Rock
  7. Styx Valley Forest
  8. Ancient Aboriginal Astronomy
  9. Museum Of Human Disease
  10. Wendys Secret Garden
  11. The Giant Stairway Katoomba Australia
  12. Mad Max 2 Museum
  13. The Lex And Ruby Graham Gardens
  14. Dreamers Gate
  15. Burning Mountain
  16. Empire Of Atlantium
  17. Purikura Photoland
  18. Badu Mangroves
  19. Aboriginal Carving Whale
  20. Mermaid Inlet Cliffs
  21. Weird Echo Spot Former Newcastle City Morgue
  22. Gould's Books
  23. Lillipad Cafe Sydney
  24. One More Go One More Go
  25. Broken Hill Sculpture Park
  26. The Big Poo, Kiama
A rock formation in Mungo National Park.
A black swan on a lake in Gippsland, Victoria.

Victoria

  1. Lake Gippsland
  2. Redwood Forest Tree Art
  3. William Ricketts Sanctuary
  4. The Witches Garden Mitta Mitta Australia
  5. Larundel Asylum
  6. Ashcombe Maze
  7. Melbourne Storm Tunnels
  8. Flinders Street Station Ballroom
  9. Melbourne Medical Museum
  10. Wunderkammer
  11. Melbourne Glowgolf Docklands
  12. Bruno’s Art And Sculpture Garden
  13. Box Hill Brick Works
  14. The Johnston Collection
  15. Enchanted Maze Garden
  16. The Limelight Department
  17. Tumuli Lava Blisters

Queensland

  1. Paronella Park
  2. Undara Lava Tubes
  3. Lake Mckenzie
  4. Whitehaven Beach
  5. Museum Of Underwater Art
  6. Capricorn Caves
  7. Dularcha Rail Tunnel
  8. Pitch Drop Experiment
  9. Logical Unsanity Books Miscellaneous Phantasmagoria
  10. Ballandean Pyramid
  11. Lark Quarry Dinosaur Trackways
  12. The Birdsville Hotel
  13. Marineland Melanesia
  14. Daintree Entomological Museum
  15. Wax Museum And Chamber Horrors
Wave Rock resembles just that, a wave made out of rock.
The pink water of Lake Hillier contrasted against the blue ocean in the background.

Western Australia

  1. Lake Hillier
  2. Wave Rock
  3. Wolfe Creek Crater
  4. Horizontal Falls
  5. Gnomesville
  6. Inside Australia
  7. Shell Beach
  8. The Stromatolites Of Hamelin Pool
  9. Atlantis Marine Park
  10. Strelley Pool
  11. Gwalia Ghost Town
  12. Bungle Bungle Range
  13. Hamelin Bay Beach
  14. Skylab's Remains
  15. Disappointment Rock
  16. The Academy Of Taxidermy

Northern Territory

  1. Cage Of Death
  2. Drunken Australian Parrots
  3. Gosse Bluff Tnorala Conservation Reserve
  4. Lambert Centre Of Australia

South Australia

  1. The Butterfly Room, Frewville
  2. Magnetic Hill
  3. Coober Pedy
  4. Crocodile Harry's Underground Nest Dugout
  5. Marree Man
  6. Umpherston Sinkhole
  7. The Grave Of The Taman Shud Man
  8. Z Ward
  9. Santos Museum Of Economic Botany
  10. Archer’s Arcadia
  11. Queen Adelaide Restaurant
  12. Something Wild
The crater at the middle of Gosse Bluff.
Crabs climbing on a rock on Christmas Island.

Tasmania

  1. Cape Pillar
  2. Eaglehawk Neck Tessellated Pavement
  3. Little Blue Lake
  4. Macquarie Island
  5. Tasmazia And The Village Of Lower Crackpot
  6. Wycliffe Well
  7. St Columba Falls
  8. Bay Of Fires
  9. The Ruins Of Hobart Zoo

Other territories

  1. Crabs, Christmas Island - Christmas Island

Research Methods

GoSee analysed Atlas Obscura data for over 400 hidden, bizarre and unusual Australian locations (Hobart, Melbourne, Sydney, and many more) to discover the places that the most people ‘wanted to visit’ but the least people had actually ‘been’ to reveal the true hidden gems of Australia! The top 100 were then used to compile GoSee’s backyard bucket list and were categorised by location type and state. Data correct as of January 2022.

See also our New Zealand Backyard Bucket List for inspiration from across the ditch.

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