Australia trips

NotAGolf

NotAGolf

NotAGolf

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I'm thinking of doing some tours/trips on my way up the East coast of Oz. My ideas so far:

-Blue Mountains in Sydney, just a day trip
-Uluru, must include transport from Cairns (although this can be booked separately)
-Diving on GB Reef, just a day trip probably although a few days live aboard would be awesome
-Few days sailing in the Whitsundays

Has anyone done any of these trips? Any recommendations on companies (or ways to do it alone if possible)? And most importantly for me at the minute, a rough idea of price!

Thanks for any help.
 
Uluru will be a very long trek from Cairns

There are plenty of companies doing dives on the reef, I did one (day trip ,two dives)from Carins and it cost about £80, I really enjoyed it although there wasn't that much to see, I believe there are a lot better sites

My mates just done a Whit sundays sailing trip and said it's been one of the highlights of his 1 year world trip


Blue Mountains - me and 3 other mates hired a helicopter that took us around Sydney then over to the mountains where we saw all the main attractions and then flew back through the valleys , it was excellent and cost around £400-500 between us
 
Went to sydney. Bridge Climbed - very good.
Plane to Uluru - Stayed at Sails of desert resort for 2 days Visited Uluru/Olgas etc - Great experience.
Plane onto Cairns - 5 days - Quicksilver reef tour, dive, mini-sub - fantastic.

Recommend the lot to anyone.
 
If you've got time, hire a car. I'm not going to bother with Uluru but my plan is to drive from Adelaide to Cairns via Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and the Gold Coast. It should take about a month.
 
[TW]Fox;14050775 said:
If you've got time, hire a car. I'm not going to bother with Uluru but my plan is to drive from Adelaide to Cairns via Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and the Gold Coast. It should take about a month.
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Not fancy a campervan instead of a car?
 
[TW]Fox;14050775 said:
If you've got time, hire a car. I'm not going to bother with Uluru but my plan is to drive from Adelaide to Cairns via Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and the Gold Coast. It should take about a month.
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We did that a couple of years ago in a camper but the other way around, not quite as far as we started in Brisbane. It was brilliant, particularly the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne to Adelaide. Enjoy it but don't underestimate the distances involved.
 
Chasser said:
We did that a couple of years ago in a camper but the other way around, not quite as far as we started in Brisbane. It was brilliant, particularly the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne to Adelaide. Enjoy it but don't underestimate the distances involved.
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I'm starting in Melbourne so the Great Ocean Road is first on the list :)

6 weeks today I'll be at Heathrow :D
 
[TW]Fox;14050801 said:
No, campervans are slow and horrible and hugely expensive to rent. Going for a nice Falcon XR6 and using hostels for accomodation.
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Slow - yes.. but then again the max speed limit is 110kph - but more commonly 100 kph, and there are mobile speed cameras absoloutley bloody everywhere in Australia.

Horrible - Have to disagree with you there, sure they're no BMW but it's great having the ability to rock up somewhere and spend the night. Not being funny but I don't think you're the kind of person who takes fools lightly so you might hate the hostel scene. They're generally full of idiots who take great pleasure in urinating over everything and trying to steal what isn't bolted down.

Expensive - Again it can be, but we paid $45 a day for the camper - which is also your accomodation. Companies like Britz, Apollo & Maui are expensive, we used travellers-autobarn who were excellent and a lot cheaper.
How much do you plan to spend per day on the XR6 & Hostels?

Still not convinced? Take a minute to look at some of the pics of out camper
http://img7.imageshack.us/gal.php?g=dscf2929d.jpg&via=yfrog
 
Mr_T said:
Horrible - Have to disagree with you there, sure they're no BMW but it's great having the ability to rock up somewhere and spend the night. Not being funny but I don't think you're the kind of person who takes fools lightly so you might hate the hostel scene. They're generally full of idiots who take great pleasure in urinating over everything and trying to steal what isn't bolted down.
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True but I'll be booking double rooms only as I'm with the GF so no shared accomodation.

Expensive - Again it can be, but we paid $45 a day for the camper - which is also your accomodation. Companies like Britz, Apollo & Maui are expensive, we used travellers-autobarn who were excellent and a lot cheaper.
How much do you plan to spend per day on the XR6 & Hostels?
Click to expand...

Car hire is looking at being about $1000 for 28 days. Hostels are $60 a night for a double room so $2680 for the 28 days, split between two people.

Hmmm thats like.. twice the price of the camper option. I couldnt find campers at anything less than thousand and thousands of dollars, and the few cheap ones I did find were 7+ year old vehicles?
 
Great Barrier Reef is highly variable / over-touristy for diving, plus Cairns is a bit of a dump really so not great fun in the evenings. Might be better looking for somewhere else to go diving.
 
[TW]Fox;14051164 said:
True but I'll be booking double rooms only as I'm with the GF so no shared accomodation.
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Yeah we stayed in double rooms too, the rooms themselves were generally ok - but it's all the other ***p you have to put up with. Filthy kitchen areas & Toilets is one thing, but people just being blatent idiots at all hours of the morning screaming etc just boiled my head. Maybe I'm just a miserable fart :D


[TW]Fox;14051164 said:
Car hire is looking at being about $1000 for 28 days. Hostels are $60 a night for a double room so $2680 for the 28 days, split between two people.

Hmmm thats like.. twice the price of the camper option. I couldnt find campers at anything less than thousand and thousands of dollars, and the few cheap ones I did find were 7+ year old vehicles?
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Yeah I was supprise with the quote from Travellers Autobarn - then again we hired for over 2 months, durring the off peak season. Oh and the van in the pics was a 2001 model. So yeah 7 years old and a nifty (220,000 km's) on the clock, but it was clearly well maintained and cleaned before we got it.

http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/3580/dscf2908.jpg

That's the only picture & time that we had with the table & chair setup. The rest of the time we kept the bed out.

If the van's a rockin don't come knockin!!! :p


To the OP - If you want to go diving you should definetly do the SS Yongala, best place to dive it is from a litle town called Alva. Otherwise you can do fairly short (3 day) livaboards from Cairns with ProDive who have a good setup (cost about ~500 dollars, for all the gear, dives, food and bedroom on the boat). The big plus with the livaboards is the fact that you get to go to the outer reefs which are stunning!
 
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[TW]Fox;14051263 said:
Hmmm I'm slightly tempted now. Did you need to book it in advance? How much was it for 2 months?
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My mate and cousin are touring in a camper as they got sick of the hostels, I think they booked it only a few days in advance but are loving being able to stop off anywhere
 
caff said:
Great Barrier Reef is highly variable / over-touristy for diving, plus Cairns is a bit of a dump really so not great fun in the evenings. Might be better looking for somewhere else to go diving.
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How can you say Cairns is a dump ? Are we on about the same place ?

It's one of the nicest places I've visited & most people I know who have been there agreed. It was spotlessly clean...no chewing gum, dogs allowed etc. There were free barbies along the promenade, a fantastic free outdoor pool (policed with a lifeguard) & the marina and pier are wonderful to walk along & safer than anywhere I know.
On top of that you have the breathtaking views of the Daintree forest and Antherton tableland mountains around it as well as the best selection of seafodd restaurents I have ever seen.

http://www.tropiccitytoastmasters.org.au/Images/cairns-esplanade.jpg

Does that compare to anywhere you know in England ?
 
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I've just had a look at the invoice they e-mailed me, turns out we did 51 days and it was more than I thought - I think if we'd done 60 it would have gone down to $50 a day.

HERE IS THE PRICE :
Rental For Period (inc GST)
Days $ 2805.00 51 @ $ 55.00
Detailed Quotation
Rental Charges $ 2550.00
PROTECTION PLUS $ 681.50
TYRE WAIVER $ 45.50
LIVING EQUIPMENT $ 40.91

Total $ 3317.91

There are a few optional extras you can pay for such as extra waiver insurance etc. Glad we paid for the extra waiver because the girlfriend misjudged the height of the van and knocked one of the air vents pots. Some duct tape sorted it out for the rest of the journey! ;-)


Just noticed that you wanted to go from Adelaide to Cairns - Unfortunatly they don't have a location in Adelaide, but what I'd recommend doing is getting the van from
Melbourne - driving to Adelaide via the Great Ocean Road - Then from Adelaide to Canberra through some of the outback - Canberra to Sydney - Sydney up the east coast

The advantage of doing the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne to Adelaide is that you're on the correct side of the road to see everything (Ocean on your left)
 
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divosuk said:
How can you say Cairns is a dump ? Are we on about the same place ?

It's one of the nicest places I've visited & most people I know who have been there agreed. It was spotlessly clean...no chewing gum, dogs allowed etc. There were free barbies along the promenade, a fantastic outside pool (policed with a lifeguard) & the marina and pier are wonderful to walk along & safer than anywhere I know.

Does that compare to anywhere you know in England ?
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Agreed, I really liked Cairns , very clean and laid back

I've not met anybody who has been that has a bad word about it


The diving maybe a bit touristy but all popular accesible sites will have that problem
 
[TW]Fox;14050775 said:
If you've got time, hire a car. I'm not going to bother with Uluru but my plan is to drive from Adelaide to Cairns via Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and the Gold Coast. It should take about a month.
Click to expand...

If you need any help to find anything or places to stay while you are in South Australia let me know and ill see what i can find to do or help:)

DEfinatly go head down to Deep Creek Conservation park.
You have to hear the black cockatoos, Such a weird small noise for a big bird :D

Edit: Once you get to the Vic/SA border alogn the Great ocean road stay to the ocean, Maybe popping up to Mt Gambier and Narrcourt try some wine in Penola and sourounding region. But then go back to beachport robe and Kingston. Its a much better drive then heading through kieth and ki ki.
 
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