Hilltops Retreat Motor Inn

Young is cherry country, and the Hilltops Retreat Motor Inn is the town's quiet-side base: a motor inn on the Olympic Highway at the top of town, set back from the main drag with a pool, established gardens and the kind of stillness that reviewers mention as a feature in its own right. It serves the cherry-pickers, the wine-trail crowd working the Hilltops cellar doors, and highway travellers who want a night that doesn't sound like a truck stop.

The dog position is a designated-rooms arrangement with a reported fee of 35 dollars per pet per night, per major booking platforms. Treat that as reported practice rather than gospel: some metasearch listings claim the motel takes no pets at all, so the only safe move is to confirm directly with the motel before you book. The designated-rooms model also means pet rooms are finite - during cherry season in December, they're the first to go.

The motel's own site confirms the open farm-style balcony layout, and guests travelling with dogs single out the rooms with back doors onto the grass - no corridors, no lobby, straight outside. Late arrivals need a phone call ahead: the desk hands over a room number and key location after hours, and that call is what saves a dog pacing in a car park in the dark.

The rooms themselves hold up: clean, comfortable beds, genuinely good showers, and a pool for the hot Hilltops afternoons. The name is accurate - the motel sits on a rise, and the quiet is the compounding benefit of position plus garden.

There's no fenced run, so the lead holds on the garden strips, and the quiet-street walks around the rise do the longer stretches. Check paws after outings near the outer scrub - burrs are the local tax.

For dog travellers, Young's layout is friendly: the motel is outside the town centre, so evening lead walks run along quiet streets with the range in view. The town's parks and the cherry orchards on the hills make for a scenic on-lead stroll, and the highway position means you're back on the road in minutes in the morning.

Close by with the dogs

On the highway north, Oliver Brown in Tamworth is a solid coffee stop, and The Courthouse Hotel handles dog-friendly dinner up that way. More pet friendly options sit under NSW stays.