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What about a holiday where the accommodation is first class but very affordable, the kids can ride their bikes in semi-rural safety and maybe find others to play with, where their parents can lie around in luxurious peace and know they aren't going to be hassled by noisy neighbours, and is very close to beaches, Australian heritage by the bucketful, and even Fraser Island? Maryborough, on the Fraser Coast, is an ideal holiday area, but in peak times accommodation can be hard to find, so the enterprising Nevin family at Tinana, about five minutes away, has built an open-plan cottage on acreage, basically a tin shed (hence the name Tin Peaks) designed for relaxed luxury living, with plenty of quirky touches to add to its appeal - and it's proving a real hit for harassed families. We stayed there for a couple of nights after a busy time checking out the attractions of the Fraser Coast, and went back to Brisbane revived, having had time to sleep and relax. Which made us think about the whole issue of busy holidays and how you can sometimes go home just as tired as when you left. Many people give themselves a couple of extra days off to settle in when they get home, but I am beginning to think that a halfway place, where you're still on holiday but have time to wind down, is a good compromise, and Tin Peaks is perfect for that. Almost the best thing about Tin Peaks is the space. It's basically a huge rectangle with a verandah along the front, from which two sets of double glass doors open into a timber floored area that houses a king sized bed, at least three separate sitting areas and a kitchen just big enough to do basic cooking.	Wish you were here! Go Tin Peaks is five minutes from the Maryborough CBD and 24km from Hervey Bay. Maryborough itself is 255km north of Brisbane (three hours' drive) on the Bruce Highway. The closest airport is Hervey Bay, where Virgin Blue and Qantas have daily flights. There is a shuttle bus service to Maryborough which meets all flights. To get to Tin Peaks from Maryborough, head northwest on Kent St, turn left into Ferry St, continue on Gympie Rd, left into Woongool Rd, take first right into Springvale Rd, cross over Indah Rd, take first right into Berallan Dr. Tin Peaks is the fourth house on the right. Contact Kath Nevin, Tin Peaks B&B, 54 Berallan Drive, Tinana, Maryborough 4650. Ph (07)4123 5294, mobile 0407 587 821; email kath@tinpeaks.com.au; website www.tinpeaks.com.au Cost Cottage $85 a couple a night, extra adults $20 a night, children up to 16 years $10 a night. Breakfast hamper $15 a person. Weekly rates available. Pet friendly, including horses, although dogs must stay on the covered verandah. Local shops 10 minutes away. Do Tin Peaks is an ideal base for day trips to Hervey Bay, Fraser Island, the heritage attractions of Maryborough. The property itself is a semi-rural koala habitat and there is plenty of room for the kids to ride their bikes and hoon around in safe bushland. The back wall is timber-lined and features three very nautical portholes, one of which is a door that leads into a private loo-and-bathroom complex, with extra cupboards and shelves. One of the sofas opens out to make an extra queen-sized bed and fold-up single beds are available if you have the troops with you, as well as a cot and highchair. There's every kind of hi-fi equipment anyone could need, and when the kids are tired of rushing about outside in the Nevins' 0.8ha, or if it should ever happen to rain again, there's plenty of room inside for lounging around as well, rather than having to be cooped up in a motel-like bedroom. The verandah is also wide enough for games, or to just sit and sip a sundowner, before you either rustle up your own barbeque or nip down to the West Side Tavern for one of those cheap-and-cheerful meals that you can only get in small country establishments. One day we took a picnic, which we had assembled from purchases from the local store, down to Teddington Weir, a popular recreation spot where we found barbeques with plenty of wood, shaded picnic tables and the opportunity for a casual walk along the signposted Vineforest Trail through a patch of remnant vineforest (or hoop pine) scrub. It's still very dry, but of itself a very important closed ecosystem that supports bird and animal species, some of which are threatened. So although we didn't see the vulnerable ground-dwelling black-breasted button quail, we did catch a glimpse of a small mouse-like creature that my naturalist friend thought might have been a common dunnart, which was only identified as a forest-dweller in this area five years ago. Lots of reptiles, too, including fat lazy skinks and a dear little water dragon, which we saw by employing the old			never-fail trick of staying absolutely still for 10 minutes so that the fauna wasn't freightened away by tramping boots. A good excuse for a rest, too, for lazy people like me. Back at the weir itself, there were only a couple of families left, their kids resolutely refusing to leave the swings and the carefully fenced swimming pool, so we had the barbeques to ourselves and then practised the Michael Leunig cure for Life Ache: find two trees, sit under one of them and gaze at the other, and after awhile you'll begin to feel better. Life Ache, Leunig reminds us, cannot be cured, but the symptoms can be managed, and the results were still working when we returned to Tin Peaks. Tin Peaks works in all kinds of ways - as a halfway house on the way back from the exhausting attractions of the beautiful Fraser Coast, but also as a perfect base for a holiday that could include such things as a day trip to Fraser Island, fishing at Burrum Heads or the almost undiscovered beaches at Toogoom, so much quieter than the bustle of Hervey Bay itself. A day's drive inland will take you to the beautiful little village of Childers, listed by the National Trust, which is also famous for the terrible fire in the Palace Backpackers Hostel where 15 tourists died 10 years ago. The building was reopened in 2004 as an art gallery, and now has a moving memorial to the young victims. There's so much to do on the Fraser Coast that it can wear you out, but we can highly reccomend Tin Peaks as the perfect base from which to explore the region during the day but come back to sit and rejoice, like Clancy of the Overflow, in "the wonderous glory of the everlasting stars".

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