Bundaberg with Kids
Bundaberg is known for rum, but is there anything fun to do with kids in Bundaberg?
After a canceled trip to the snow, I let my husband pick a weekend getaway from Brisbane, and we ended up in Bundaberg. I am well aware of Bundaberg rum, but what is there to do with kids in Bundaberg?
Bundaberg is about 300 kilometers, or slightly more than 4 hours, north of Brisbane.
As it turns out, there are plenty of fun things to do with kids in and around Bundaberg. I recommend not restricting yourself to the town of Bundaberg, as it is near beaches and the Mon Repos Turtle Centre.
Keep reading to find the best things to do in Bundaberg with kids.
Mon Repos Turtle Centre
It may seem weird to leave Bundaberg first thing, but we woke up and went to Bagara for breakfast. We ate at the Windmill Cafe.
Of course, there are plenty of things to do in Bundaberg with kids, but we didn’t want to be this close to the Mons Repo Turtle Center and not take the kids there.
We had a little time after breakfast before our tour at the turtle center, so we went to the playground on the beach. It is set up as a giant turtle. There are a lot of scooters nearby that you can rent by the minute.
Mon Repos Turtle Centre opens at 9 am, and that is the tour time that we booked. The tour that we took is only available at 9, 10, and 11 am.
If you are there November-March, there is a turtle encounter tour, but as we were there in July, we did not get to see any turtles.
Mons Repo Tour
Our tour began in an interactive room. It was like a children’s museum based on turtles.
After 20 minutes, we were invited into the theatre. There is a large screen, and it continues onto the floor. We watched a video about turtles being born and then coming back to lay their eggs 30 years later, when the process begins again.
Apparently, the female turtles return to the same location where they were born. From the research they have gathered, the turtles born on this beach swim to South America and don’t return to Australia for 30 years. The male turtles never return.
When the movie ends, there is a question-and-answer period. Many people asked questions, so our tour took slightly longer than 45 minutes.
At the end of the tour, we were free to walk the pier to the beach to see where the turtles come to lay their eggs, but as it was not the season, there were no turtles there.
Bundaberg Rum Distillery
We signed up for the 11 am tour of the Bundaberg Rum Distillery. Tours leave hourly and run every hour from 10 am to 2 pm on weekends and public holidays, and from 10 am to 3 pm on weekdays.
They tell you to get there about 30 minutes early, and that is so you can walk through the museum and watch a video. We did not get there 30 minutes early, but we had enough time to scan the information.
I wasn’t sure quite what to expect. Mark and I have toured lots of distilleries around the world, but never with kids. The Bundaberg tour claims to be family-friendly and even has a family ticket.
I am a firm believer in gearing most of the vacation towards the kids, but allowing one or two things that the adults want to do. This is where Bundaberg rum comes in. We wanted to learn about Bundaberg rum with or without the kids.
In the end, we were one of 4 families on the tour. Tours are not geared toward children, but my kids are interested in how things work. They handled things pretty well until the last room, but they were able to sit on the floor and entertain themselves.
If you are interested in learning more about the tour, here is my guide to the Bundaberg Rum Distillery Tour with Kids.
Bundaberg Barrel Tasting
We booked this in for the next morning, before leaving Bundaberg, but if you only have a day, add in the Barrel Tasting. It does not take long, less than 30 minutes, and we would have been able to add it in after the distillery tour. Of course, the kids were more excited about this one than the Bundaberg Distillery.
The Barrel is open M-Sat 9-430 and 10-3 on Sundays and public holidays.
Adult tickets include a 6-pack of any of the sodas that they sell. You can choose to take home all of one flavor, or one of each of your favorite 6.
First, you get to taste each type of soda, starting with their most popular, ginger beer.
We tried 13 flavors in all.
Bundaberg Barrel Tasting Options
- ginger beer
- apple cider
- peach
- passionfruit
- creaming soda
- traditional lemonade
- blood orange
- pink grapefruit
- pineapple and coconut
- tropical mango
- lemon, lime, & bitters
- diet sarsaparilla (regular is usually available, but they were out)
- Royal Crown Draft cola
You do not have to try every soda, but I did. As someone who does not drink soda, it was a lot! If you do not like a flavor or have simply had enough, you can pour the remains into a bucket, like during a wine tasting.
Bundaberg Barrel Self-Guided Tour
When you have finished with the tasting portion, there is a self-guided tour.
There is an area where you can smell the flavors and guess what they are.
Most groups were in and out of the museum fairly quickly, but my children spent time at each section, and we took the entire 30 minutes (15 tastings, 15 in the museum).
At the exit, there is an area to fill up your 6-pack, which you are given when you check in.
Kids do not get a Bundaberg soda 6-pack with their ticket, so we let each of the 4 of us pick out our 3 favorites.
Sugar Cane Railway
We stopped for lunch and then arrived at the Bundaberg Botanic Gardens with the intent to ride the Sugar Cane Railway.
There is a steam train and a diesel train, and they rotate depending on the day. I know Z would have preferred the steam train, but we were there on a diesel train day.
The train usually runs on Sundays and Wednesdays, but was it open due to school holidays. They run from 9 am to 3:30 pm.
The train ride is 2 kilometers around the garden, taking about 15 minutes.
The kids saw the large playground on the way in and, of course, wanted to go there next.
There is also the Hinkler Hall of Aviation at the Bundaberg Botanic Gardens, but it closes at 3 pm, so we did not have enough time.
Tinaberries Strawberries and Ice Cream
Bundaberg closes early.
Instead of hanging around the playground, as everything on our list was closed, we decided to go to the beach, but first stopped at Tinaberries.
Tinaberries is a strawberry farm.
U-pick was not available when we visited. They have a few ice cream flavors available, and you can enjoy them with the beautiful surroundings of the farm. They have set up a wide variety of lawn games, and there were many people there enjoying their ice cream and playing games.
M had the dragonfruit lime ice cream, Z tried the blueberry ice cream, and Mark and I split a passionfruit ice cream.
The kids didn’t want to leave, but we wanted to be able to walk to the tide pools before dark.
Elliot Heads
It is hard to get my kids to leave a playground, and it is hard to get them to leave a farm, but luckily, they will leave more easily if you mention that the next stop is tide pools.
Elliot Heads is just a short drive from Bundaberg and is worth a look.
It was low tide, and we walked across the rocks and down to the beach. There weren’t too many people on the beach, and most of them were leaving as we arrived, about an hour and a half before sunset.
There were tons of small holes in the sand with tiny sand balls all around them, which I now know are from sand crabs, though we did not see any.
The kids played in the tide pools for a while, and then we wandered to the end of Elliot Heads before turning and walking back through the sand.
We made it back to the car park before sunset, and the kids weren’t ready to go. Mark and I sat down at a picnic bench while the kids searched the beach for shark cartilage. They were determined to build an entire shark.
There was a lone surfer while the sunset, and a few families on the beach.
Downtown Bundaberg
Bourbong Street is the main street in Bundaberg and the street on which our hotel was located.
We had driven to get pizza from Bello Martino’s Italian the night before, mainly because it looked as though the restaurants on Bourbong Street weren’t open for dinner. Our second night was Friday, and more places were open.
We walked to the restaurant we had chosen, but learned that even though they are open until 10 pm on Friday nights, the kitchen had closed hours before. We didn’t want a grab-and-go salad, so we walked downtown.
All of the shops, except the pharmacy, were already closed. There are a few empty storefronts, but lots of shops as well. There were not many options for dinner, and we made it to the other end of downtown before settling on the pub, The Club Hotel. We did not have a booking, but they were able to seat us anyway.
We went back downtown for breakfast at Indulge before leaving Bundaberg.
Bundaberg with Kids
Despite this being a last-minute trip and despite my initial worry that Bundaberg is rum and therefore not for kids, all 4 of us had a great time in Bundaberg.
I wouldn’t be concerned with staying IN Bundaberg. The other towns are nearby and easy to drive to. We left our hotel early each day and did not return until dinner time.
The kids were interested in any sugar cane fields in the area, and I wish there were a sugar cane tour that we could have taken them on. They learned a little bit about sugar cane at the Bundaberg distillery, but I took a tour of a coffee farm and a sugar cane farm in Costa Rica and would love something like that (with obviously just sugar cane here) for them.
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