Byron Bay

Byron Bay is Australia's most photographed small beach town and also its most gentrified. The lighthouse at the Cape is the easternmost point of the mainland; the main beach runs two kilometres south from there; the hinterland hills behind the town produce most of the country's Instagram-famous property listings. Saltrove covers Byron honestly: it's still genuinely beautiful, the surf is excellent, and the food scene has quietly become one of the best in regional Australia. It's also expensive, increasingly crowded, and caught in a multi-year conversation about short-term rentals and local displacement. Visit in autumn or winter (March through August), stay in Suffolk Park or the hinterland rather than the town centre, and come with a sense of humour about the yoga-influencer economy. Three days is plenty. A week is a lot.