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The Best Things to Do in Queenscliff for a Coastal Weekend
Where to stay, eat and wander in Queenscliff, Victoria’s grand old Bellarine seaside town.
Queenscliff has always carried itself differently to Victoria’s other coastal towns. Set on Wadawurrung Country at the edge of Port Phillip Bay, this Bellarine Peninsula beauty has lighthouses, grand Victorian hotels, ferry horns, fisherman cottages, Swan Bay stillness and maritime history woven through its streets.
Once a serious defence post guarding the bay, today it feels newly awake, with restored heritage stays, destination dining, old pubs, galleries, harbour walks and that bracing end-of-the-bay air that makes even a short weekend feel consequential.
From Fort Queenscliff and The Blues Train to beach walks, boutiques, local restaurants and the revived Queenscliff Hotel, the best things to do in Queenscliff make a coastal escape feel rich in history, appetite and slightly weathered theatre.
Where to Stay in Queenscliff & Point Lonsdale
The Queenscliff Hotel
After seven dormant years and a meticulous three-year restoration, The Queenscliff Hotel is back as the Bellarine Peninsula’s grand seaside stay. The heritage-listed 1888 landmark now has 12 individually styled suites, bay views, verandah access, and period details that make checking in feel ceremonial. Downstairs, the revival continues with Miettas’ seven-course fine dining, The Conservatory for bistro-style meals, Cafe 1888 for coffee and pastries, and The Boat Bar for cocktails with coastal character.
Soon, a Bathhouse will bring steam, sauna and plunge pools to the mix, making this Queenscliff accommodation worth planning a coastal weekend around.
16 Gellibrand Street, Queenscliff
Book your stay with The Queenscliff Hotel
Benambra Boutique Accommodation
Benambra feels less like accommodation than a small act of Queenscliff continuity. Built in 1883 on Hesse Street, the boutique guest house still carries the town’s old maritime poise, all Victorian manners, high ceilings and the faint sense of trunks once arriving by steamer. The rooms have been refreshed with restraint, while Benambra Cottage, a self-contained former fisherman’s cottage from the 1860s, suits those who like their coastal stays with a little history underfoot. Step outside and the bookshops, cafes, harbour and salt-bitten streets are already within reach.
15 Hesse Street, Queenscliff
Book your stay with Benambra Boutique Accommodation
The Royal Queenscliff
The Royal Queenscliff has the improbable grandeur of a seaside town that once took itself seriously, and still can. Set on King Street in a restored heritage building, this adult-only stay has nine individually styled rooms and suites, some with verandah views towards The Rip. Downstairs, a cocktail lounge, contemporary art gallery, terraced garden and just enough Victorian drama make the weekend feel pleasingly removed from the calendar. Stay for the martini.
34/36 King Street, Queenscliff
Book your stay with Booking.com
Navestock
Navestock has the appealing oddness of Queenscliff at its best: a century-old former woodwork shed, reworked into a compact coastal stay between Hesse Street and the beach. Heritage rules mean there’s no built-in cooking, though the breakfast bar covers the essentials with a microwave, kettle, toaster and crockery. Besides, in Queenscliff, being gently nudged out for dinner is hardly a hardship. This one is all simplicity, texture and a stay that feels more found than manufactured.
Queenscliff, Victoria
Beechworth
Beechworth Queenscliff suits travellers who arrive with children, dogs, friends and the optimistic belief that everyone will behave beautifully. These two side-by-side Gellibrand Street homes can be booked separately or together, with three bedrooms, enclosed yards, fireplaces, deep tubs, full kitchens and breezy linen by Carlotta & Gee. Less heritage romance, more clever coastal basecamp, with the beach, Hesse Street and the town’s appetites within easy walking reach all weekend.
Queenscliff, Victoria
Book your stay with Beechworth Queenscliff
Mellow Days
Mellow Days is for the Point Lonsdale traveller who packs linen, swimmers and very little patience for admin. This mid-century beach house keeps things easy: three bedrooms with their own bathrooms, sun-catching outdoor spots, a private courtyard and a kitchen made for lazy breakfasts before Bellarine wineries, restaurants or beach walks call. Stylish without being precious, it’s a coastal pause with excellent furniture and no agenda.
Point Lonsdale, Victoria
Lon Retreat & Spa
Lon Retreat & Spa is the Bellarine with the volume turned down and the minerals turned up. Set across 250 acres of family-held farmland and conservation land, this adult-only retreat trades beach-house busyness for spring-fed bathing, steam rooms, contrast therapy and seven suites made for disappearing from your own calendar.
25 Gill Road, Point Lonsdale
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The Best Cafes, Bars & Restaurants in Queenscliff & Point Lonsdale
Early Nancy
Early Nancy is the Point Lonsdale coffee stop with a locals-first type of charm, small enough to feel found rather than promoted. House-made breads, bright salads, wraps and Coffee Supreme keep the mood easy, especially after a beach walk or before a slow drift towards Queenscliff. It does not strain for coastal glamour; it just gets the morning right, which is often rarer.
Shop 1/67 Point Lonsdale Road, Point Lonsdale
TARRA
TARRA is the smart waterfront lunch you book when Queenscliff needs to feel a little dressed. Set in the ferry terminal building, it pairs broad bay views with seasonal local produce, seafood and a menu that knows the value of a well-timed scallop. Breakfast is available, but lunch is the move: king prawn rolls, Southern rock lobster, regional drinks and that clean, glassy feeling of eating almost on the water.
Ground Floor, 1 Wharf Street East, Queenscliff
Noble Rot
Noble Rot is for the excellent hour when the beach has done its work and dinner can wait a little longer. This Point Lonsdale wine store and bar keeps the mood intimate and bottle-minded, with seasonal, local-leaning plates built for grazing rather than grandstanding. Slide in for a glass, let the shelves talk you into something new, then stay for oysters, cheese, charcuterie or whatever the blackboard is making hard to resist.
51 Point Lonsdale Road, Point Lonsdale
Basil’s Farm
Basil’s Farm is the Bellarine long lunch with Swan Bay in its peripheral vision and the kitchen garden earning its keep. Start with house-made crab cakes or butterflied king prawns, then settle into lamb rump, confit duck or market fish with estate wine in hand. The view is all vines, lawns and water, but the pleasure is practical too: generous plates, garden-led produce and no sensible reason to hurry back.
45-53 Nye Road, Swan Bay
The Esplanade Hotel
The Esplanade Hotel feels like Queenscliff, remembering the point of a pub. Back under its original name and standing since 1879, The Espy has the practical grace of a place built for ferry arrivals, post-walk lunches, family dinners and Sunday music in the beer garden. Order calamari, a parma, fish and chips or Portarlington mussel spaghetti, then let the afternoon decide what it wants from you. Heritage, here, has its sleeves rolled up.
2 Gellibrand Street, Queenscliff
Na zdraví
Na zdraví understands the coastal dinner brief: feed the children, charm the date, forgive the beach hair. Czech for “cheers”, Jana Adamsova’s King Street woodfired pizza bar runs on blistered bases, burrata, polenta chips, meatballs, lasagna and crowd-pleasers from Margherita to Gamberi, Calabrese, Capricciosa and seafood-laden Pescatora. Order widely, finish with tiramisu, and let the oven solve the evening.
51 King Street, Queenscliff
The Best Things to Do in Queenscliff & Surrounds
Tour Fort Queenscliff
Few things to do in Queenscliff explain the town quite like Fort Queenscliff. Dating to 1860, this coastal artillery fort stands at the mouth of Port Phillip Bay, all bluestone walls, lighthouses and brine-edged vigilance. Guided tours trace gun emplacements, military buildings and museum displays, revealing a town shaped by ships, soldiers and the uneasy glamour of the Heads. For history lovers, architecture devotees, and anyone chasing the Bellarine’s deeper texture, this is the place to begin.
Sitchu Tip: Bring photo ID, arrive early, and let the bay’s old defences do the talking.
Corner of King & Gellibrand Streets, Queenscliff
Ride the Bellarine Railway or The Blues Train
Queenscliff has a way of making time feel beautifully elastic, and the Bellarine Railway is part of the spell. Board the Swan Bay Express at Queenscliff Station for a heritage carriage ride beside the wetlands of Swan Bay, where old timber seats, stamped tickets and black swans do most of the talking. By night, The Blues Train turns the same railway into a rolling live music ritual, with four blues acts, dinner and carriages full of grown-up cheek. Nostalgia, sea air, a little brass and plenty of soul.
Boutique & Book Browsing
Hesse Street is Queenscliff at its most browseable, a compact run of heritage shopfronts, coastal colour and excellent excuses to buy something small but entirely necessary. Start at Homebody Orchard for French perfume, Cire Trudon candles, jewellery and design-minded homewares, then make for Frankie Say Relax for gifts, ceramics, accessories and cheerful domestic finds. Vintage & Collectables On Hesse gathers a dozen vintage dealers under one roof, while Remarketable keeps the antique, retro, and homewares hunt going at number 77.
The Bookshop at Queenscliff is the prize: literary fiction, cookbooks, politics and children’s titles in a salt-air indie bookshop. There’s sweetness at Queenscliff Sweet Shop, harbour-side homewares at House Warming and smart casual womenswear at Tilia, giving Queenscliff the rare gift of a shopping strip worth slowing down for.
Spend Time at Queenscliff Harbour
Queenscliff Harbour is where the town stops being purely pretty and remembers it has work to do. Boats nose in and out, divers talk in practical sentences, ferry passengers trail salt and luggage, and lunch suddenly seems like the most intelligent plan available. The boardwalk runs past restaurants, shops, charter operators and bike hire, with the 42-metre observation tower rising above it all like a useful exclamation mark. Climb up for views across Port Phillip Bay, Swan Bay, the Heads and the Bellarine’s pale, weather-cut edge, then return to sea level for seafood at Mi Shells, coffee, a browse and the pleasing theatre of a harbour that has no interest in sitting still.
Get on the Water
Queenscliff makes most sense from the water, where the town’s old edges fall away and the bay becomes the main event. Sea All Dolphin Swims takes you out into the Great Southern Reef for wild dolphin encounters, Australian fur seals, reef snorkelling and the strange, bracing pleasure of seeing the Bellarine from below the usual line of sight.
For something less wetsuit, more deck rail, the Queenscliff to Sorrento ferry does the 40-minute crossing across Port Phillip Bay, carrying cars, bikes, dogs, day-trippers and anyone with a weakness for windburn and horizon. Fishing charters, dive trips, shipwrecks and reefs round out the case for getting off dry land.
Dive Into Queenscliff’s Maritime History
Queenscliff is too old, salty and self-possessed to be treated as merely pretty. Start at the Queenscliffe Maritime Museum, where lifeboats, sea pilots, steamer trade, lighthouses and boatbuilding tell the larger story of a town shaped by dangerous water, skilled hands and the daily nerve of the Port Phillip Heads. From there, take the Queenscliff Heritage Walk through Victorian-era hotels, churches, shopfronts and grand seaside houses, letting the streets do their slow reveal. Together, the museum and heritage stroll turn Queenscliff from a handsome Bellarine Peninsula escape into something far more interesting: a place where every pier, weatherboard and window seems to remember the sea.
Maritime Museum, 2 Wharf Street, Queenscliff
Wander the Queenscliffe Community Market
If your Queenscliff weekend lands on the last Sunday of the month, let the morning belong to the Queenscliffe Community Market. Held at Lower Princess Park from September to May, this long-running local ritual brings together art, jewellery, homewares, plants, baked goods, fresh produce, and street food beneath the trees, with the bay never feeling too far away. Since 1979, the market has poured serious money back into local community projects, giving this Sunday wander a little ballast beneath the pastry, pottery and impulse linen.
Princess Park, Queenscliff
Queenscliff is only one chapter of the Bellarine Peninsula, where wineries, beaches, ferry rides and coastal villages keep the weekend happily moving. For more ideas, head to our Bellarine Peninsula guide, then plot your next slow-track escape with our guide to the best train rides across Victoria. The region rewards anyone willing to take the long way around.
