Visiting friends get this itinerary verbatim — I've refined it through a dozen guests and it works. The principle: the coast rewards early starts, and the good stuff is never where the crowds are looking.
Friday night
Arrive, drop bags, eat late and light. Whatever you do, don't do the big dinner on arrival night — you're tired and you'll waste it. Small plates, good wine, early night. Save the appetite.
Saturday morning
The beaches before eight belong to locals and look entirely different — swim at Kurrawa or Burleigh before the day builds. Breakfast at a surf club; coffee from the lane roasters. Then the Hinterland drive if you've got a car — Tamborine's an hour inland and the views reset your sense of where you are.
Saturday afternoon
Back to the coast for the afternoon light. The Broadbeach foreshore walk is underrated; the Pacific Fair window-shop is not worth your time. If you want a structured afternoon, our mixology class runs Saturdays — shaken, stirred, built, drunk.
Saturday night
This is the dinner night, and the reservation should have been made weeks ago — Saturday at any serious room on the coast books out. Our honest suggestion is the degustation at Level 19, then the floor below if the night's still young. If you didn't book ahead, the dumpling counters never let anyone down.
Sunday
Slow morning, farmers market if it's the right Sunday, a long lunch somewhere that does seafood without pretension. Leave before the traffic builds at four. The weekend's arc — quiet Friday, full Saturday, soft Sunday — is the whole point.
