Time to spare go by air, if no time to spare, go by car, as i did, and many others, from as far away as Adelaide, Melbourne and Brisbane.
Unfortunately there was a lot of whinging around the place, and its hard not to get caught up in it, but myself, and a lot of others are trying to turn that around, and after this years Ausfly, and the change in attitude from CASA, hopefully, things will only get better.
i have bene told by others well more travelled than i, that this negativity in general aviation, and the division between RAA, GA and commercial, only exists in Australia.
for things to improve, so must attitudes, and fortunately, CASA has seamed to change, now its up to us.