Jacaranda Holiday Park

It's a walkers' paradise in this part of New South Wales and trails up, down and through the thickly forested slopes of the Dooragan National Park start 10 minutes away in Laurieton: easy rambles and picnic spots with views make great family excursions while the more challenging Laurieton Track through the cloud-formed, subtropical rainforest ends with fab views from the North Brother summit. Wherever New South Wales' wilderness is, there's wildlife and the opportunities for nature-spotting are endless out here. It's a quarter of an hour's drive to the remote Kattang Nature Reserve, a clifftop peninsula home to wildflowers and an array of avian wonders, with dolphins and whales spottable from the headlands. For a different experience of this diverse landscape, head half an hour to the Sea Acres Nature Reserve for rainforest boardwalks and bushtucker tours, looking out for scarlet robins, goannas and diamond pythons. For rather more cuddly encounters, it's the same distance to the Koala Hospital in Port Macquarie and boats leave the harbour here for close-up meets with the dolphins and whales on the Pacific waves. For another kind of biodiversity altogether, the Hastings River, winding its way inland from Port Macquarie has provided lush turf for winemakers since the middle of the 19th century and renowned wineries such as Bago, Cassegrain and Douglas Vale are all within a half-hour drive from the park.