Local holiday and caravan parks are feeling the pinch of rising fuel prices

Rising fuel prices are beginning to take their toll on visitor numbers at holiday and caravan parks across the Rural City of Wangaratta, with operators reporting cancellations and a downturn in revenue, particularly from interstate travellers. Painter’s Island Holiday Park managers Kirk Edgar and Deb Daniel are feeling the impact with business down 10 per cent on last year. "That might not sound huge, but for a regional business it’s a decent hit," Kirk said. “Easter was fully booked, we had over 450 people each night in the park, but that was largely because people had already booked and paid before petrol prices really started to rise.” Kirk said since then, interstate bookings, particularly from New South Wales, had dropped sharply. “We had some really big caravan groups cancel entirely,” he said. The park’s 162 cabins and sites, which cater largely to travellers towing caravans, have been hardest hit, while cabin accommodation has remained steady. “It’s the people travelling with vans, especially diesel users, who have pulled back,” Deb said. “A lot of our guests usually stop here on their way north for winter and then again on the way back south, and many have told us they’re not making that trip this year.” Rising fuel costs were also flowing through to operating expenses. “Most of our suppliers have also introduced fuel levies,” Kirk said. With no clear end to fuel price rises in sight, Deb said the uncertainty was making planning difficult. Visitors staying at Painter’s Island Holiday Park, Gaylene and Phillip McDiven, travelled with their caravan from Geelong on their regular trip north for the winter but have adjusted their plans due to fuel costs. “We still want to travel and decided that we couldn’t cancel all of our holidays so instead of travelling to the top of Queensland we have decided to base ourselves here,” she said. “It’s our regular trip, we like to get away for the winter, but we couldn’t justify it. “It’s funny how we have acclimatised to the price increase, seeing diesel at $2.50 a litre we think that’s a great price because it was $3 when we left Geelong but it’s not cheap at all compared to prices a couple of months ago. Gaylene said the silver lining of the situation is getting to full experience the North East. “The upside is staying in one place means you actually stop and see the places you usually drive straight through,” she said. BIG4 Wangaratta - North Cedars Holiday Park NCHP reported a slight impact to business with the loss of group bookings from Western Australia who were planning to visit the area for Winton Motor Raceway but are yet to see a significant impact. Sandy Slattery, who purchased the Wangaratta Caravan Park with her husband James in July 2024, said they are also yet to see a big impact with only a few cancellations so far but expecting to see changes. “Coming off the busy period we haven’t seen it drop off much yet, but we are expected to see a change in the coming months,” she said. “Mainly it will be if we see the grey-nomad types who usually travel north up to Queensland for the winter still doing their big trips.” Sandy said unlike some other parks they have consistent bookings of workers from local companies in the cabins. “This means we aren’t as affected by the tourist side, but we have 35 sites and we are seeing about 20-25 vans per night,” she said. “One trend that we are seeing is people staying put for a few days instead of just the one and then doing a big drive rather than visiting a lot of places.”

Local holiday and caravan parks are feeling the pinch of rising fuel prices

Wangaratta Chronicle, Wednesday, 9 September, 2026

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