Travel guides
Written by our own team, not spun from listings — practical guides to choosing and booking tours across Australia and beyond.
Great Ocean Road day trip vs 2-day tour from Melbourne: which one
Honestly, most people booking a Great Ocean Road day trip from Melbourne don't realise how much windscreen time they're signing up for. Here's the actual trade-off between one long day and a proper two-day version.
Best Kakadu National Park tours from Darwin
Three hours each way in a troopy is a lot to ask of a day trip. I've done the Kakadu run more times than I can count, and here's which tours actually justify it.
How to choose a Broome and Kimberley tour that's actually worth it
I've sat through enough tour pitches in Chinatown to know the pattern: same red dirt photo, same "iconic" adjective, wildly different inclusions. Here's how I'd actually pick.
Hunter Valley wine tours from Sydney: worth it or not?
2.5 hours in a coach seat for a long lunch and some semillon — is it worth it? After a decade of dragging friends and family up the M1, here's my honest answer on Hunter Valley wine tours from Sydney.
Best day tours from Hobart: what's actually worth your one free day
Most visitors to Hobart get one, maybe two days to see something outside the city. Here's how I'd actually spend them, inclusions list and all.
Best day tours from Perth: what's actually worth your Saturday
I've sat down with the fine print on a dozen Perth day tours over the past year, mostly because I'm the sort of person who reads the inclusions list twice. Here's what's genuinely worth booking, and what's just a bus ride with a good Instagram caption.
How to choose a Jenolan Caves tour from Sydney
Jenolan gets lumped in with "Blue Mountains tours" so often that people book expecting Echo Point and end up three hours further west, underground, with no phone signal. Here's how to pick the right trip.
Sydney BridgeClimb vs the free lookout: what you actually get
The Bridge Climb will run you a few hundred dollars and three and a half hours. Pylon Lookout costs about the price of a coffee and takes forty minutes. I've done both more times than I can count on one hand — here's what the extra money actually buys you.
How to actually judge a tour's star rating and reviews
Star ratings get gamed, review counts get padded, and "4.9 stars" means almost nothing on its own. Here's the short version of how I actually read a tour listing before I book it.