Alternative Australia land tour to cruisetours

[David]

Hi:

 

Can anyone recommend a private tour that will take us from Sydnay to Cairns, Ayers Rock, and back to Sydney as an alternative to the 5-day cruisetours offered by the cruise lines? The price of these cruisetours is more than twice the cost of the 12-14 night cruise from Sydney to Aukland. There must be a less expensive, but still excellent way to spend a week touring Sydney, Cairns, and Ayers Rock (including domestic air costs) than that.

 

Any suggestions are most welcome. Thanks.

 

David

[Host Walt]

Hi:

 

Can anyone recommend a private tour that will take us from Sydnay to Cairns, Ayers Rock, and back to Sydney as an alternative to the 5-day cruisetours offered by the cruise lines? The price of these cruisetours is more than twice the cost of the 12-14 night cruise from Sydney to Aukland. There must be a less expensive, but still excellent way to spend a week touring Sydney, Cairns, and Ayers Rock (including domestic air costs) than that.

 

Any suggestions are most welcome. Thanks.

 

David

 

You don't say which cruise you are on. Consider contacting the airline you will be using to fly to/from your embarkation/disembarkation and see if they have any flights to Cairns and/or Sydney and/or Ayers Rock that you can add to your flight plans at a good fare. Qantas and Virgin both fly to Ayers Rock from both Cairns and Sydney, but the fares from Sydney are significantly lower than from Cairns.

 

By the way travel agent recommendations or tour organizer recommendations are not permitted on Cruise Critic.

[Aus Traveller]

If Princess is offering this itinerary, then the flights must be available. Just check out the internet for flights and accommodation. If you have time I suggest making your tour longer than five days. You could probably make it eight or ten days and still not cost more than the Princess tour.

[chookie65]

Hi:

 

Can anyone recommend a private tour that will take us from Sydnay to Cairns, Ayers Rock, and back to Sydney as an alternative to the 5-day cruisetours offered by the cruise lines? The price of these cruisetours is more than twice the cost of the 12-14 night cruise from Sydney to Aukland. There must be a less expensive, but still excellent way to spend a week touring Sydney, Cairns, and Ayers Rock (including domestic air costs) than that.

 

Any suggestions are most welcome. Thanks.

 

David

David

If you go onto tripadvisor.com and then go to the forums for sydney, cairns and ayers rock you can post questions and there is no restrictions on naming TAs and other operators. It is also a good land based travel website full of very useful information. Like cc to post on there you will need to register.

 

There are 4 airlines in australia ... QANTAS, Jetstar (lowcost airline set up by Qantas), virgin australia and tiger airways. Tiger has limited schedules/routes though. Also there are many bus lines as well that travel all over australia and there is a interstate train network between sydney and cairns.

 

The places you want to visit have a lot to offer and you could spend 3-4 days or more in each place.

[tickford]

Just a tip if you decide to arrange something yourself, do not go with Tiger, their on time record is poor and they do just cancel flights without any apologies if the need/want to. That is not to say the others do not run late or cancel from time to time but if on a schedule you need to keep go with one of the others. BTW, the trip advisor suggestion is a good one.

[Aus Traveller]

Just a tip if you decide to arrange something yourself, do not go with Tiger, their on time record is poor and they do just cancel flights without any apologies if the need/want to. That is not to say the others do not run late or cancel from time to time but if on a schedule you need to keep go with one of the others. BTW, the trip advisor suggestion is a good one.

I agree about Tiger. We also don't use Jetstar - they are absolutely 'deadly' on check-in time. Even if you are held up in their queue, if you don't get to the counter on time, you miss your flight and have to pay for another flight.

 

Our first choice is Qantas even if they are a bit more expensive. They serve meals (and drinks) and the luggage allowance is reasonable (23kg + 2 x 7kg hand luggage per person) You can pay extra for another suitcase if you need it. This is cheaper than excess baggage fees.

 

With Virgin luggage is not included in the basic fare and meals cost extra.