Ernabella Arts
A full day from Longitude 131° across the border into South Australia, to meet the artists of Ernabella Arts in their community.
Outback, Rainforest and Reef
Australia's great landscapes in 12 nights, for a first visit.
- 12 nights
- Five stays
- Australia
- First visit, lodges, reef, wildlife
A first visit to Australia over 12 nights, from five bases, with time among the people who know each place. A day with the artists of Ernabella beyond Uluru, rock art reached by helicopter from the Daintree, a sail to Hook Island with a Ngaro guide, and the Sydney Opera House from the stage door at 7 a.m., with an easy continuation to New Zealand.
- Length
- 12 nights
- Pace
- Five stays
- Style
- First visit, lodges, reef, wildlife
- Route
- Melbourne to Uluru to The Daintree to Hamilton Island to Sydney
- MelbourneTwo nights
- UluruTwo nights
- The DaintreeTwo nights
- Hamilton IslandThree nights
- SydneyThree nights
01
Days 1 to 3 · two nights
Melbourne
Met at the airport and driven into the city. A private day out, with tastings on the Mornington Peninsula and a look at native wildlife, back in Melbourne for the evening.
Where you stay
The Ritz-Carlton, Melbourne
The Ritz-Carlton, Melbourne occupies the top of an 80-storey tower on Lonsdale Street, with rooms and suites on floors 65 to 79 looking towards the Dandenong Ranges and Port Phillip Bay. Atria serves modern Australian food, Cameo is the cocktail bar, and the spa on level 64 has an infinity pool.
02
Days 3 to 5 · two nights
Uluru
Small-group outings with the lodge's guides: a sunrise expedition to Kata Tjuta and Walpa Gorge, the Mala walk at the base of Uluru into Kantju Gorge, and Uluru at sunset. One night, dinner at Table 131° in the open desert, or privately on the Dune Top. For a full day, the lodge crosses the border into South Australia to meet the artists of Ernabella Arts in their community. With an Indigenous guide, a drive along remote bush tracks onto Patji, Aboriginal land, for stories of Anangu life.
Where you stay
Longitude 131°
Longitude 131° is a camp of 16 tented pavilions among the red dunes of the Central Desert, each looking out to Uluru from the bed. Dinner draws on produce from across the country, and Spa Kinara uses Aboriginal massage techniques and native healing plants.
03
Days 5 to 7 · two nights
The Daintree
A flight to Cairns. A private day at Mossman Gorge, beginning with the Ngadiku Dreamtime Walk and its traditional smoking ceremony, finishing with a drift down the river. On the lodge's Two Worlds Trail, the rainforest is read through both science and Kuku Yalanji knowledge; further afield, a helicopter sets down at a 20,000-year-old rock art site in Cape York, with an Indigenous-owned operator. Along the coast, a walk through the traditional homelands of two brothers who lead it, gathering and tasting mud crabs and mangrove mussels with damper and bush foods.
Where you stay
Silky Oaks Lodge
Silky Oaks Lodge looks over the Mossman River beside the World Heritage-listed Daintree National Park, with 40 treehouses finished in local timbers. Kuku Yalanji guides lead walks into the rainforest, the restaurant is open to the forest, and the Healing Waters Spa has six treatment rooms.
04
Days 7 to 10 · three nights
Hamilton Island
A pilot-guided small-group flight over the reef and down to Whitehaven Beach, and time on the water with the resort's non-motorised watersports. On Fridays, four hours aboard the motor yacht Pebble Beach to Hook Island, where Ngaro man Robbie Congoo walks the island and its millennia-old rock paintings, with canapés of native ingredients on the way back. In the Long Pavilion, the sommelier leads tastings of sake and sashimi or Champagne and oysters.
Where you stay
qualia
qualia occupies the northern tip of Hamilton Island, looking across the Coral Sea and the Whitsundays. Leeward Pavilions face bushland and sea, Windward Pavilions have their own plunge pools, and there are two restaurants: Long Pavilion among the eucalyptus trees and Pebble Beach at the edge of the sand.
05
Days 10 to 13 · three nights
Sydney
A private day in the city with lunch and a harbour cruise, and a private day in the Blue Mountains with a walk of about 90 minutes. Or a helicopter to the Hunter Valley for Brokenwood's Graveyard Shiraz from soil to cellar, with pre-release tastings in the barrel hall and a degustation in the winery's private dining room. After hours, a guided tour of the Yiribana gallery at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, home to its collection of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art, can be arranged, followed by a private dinner from a menu by an Indigenous chef, built on native ingredients. One morning, the Opera House backstage tour leaves the stage door at 7 a.m., 12 people at most, through rehearsal rooms and the orchestra pit to breakfast in the Green Room.
Where you stay
Capella Sydney
Capella Sydney fills the former Department of Education building of 1912 on Loftus Street, with 192 rooms and suites over eight levels. Brasserie 1930 and McRae Bar are on the ground floor, and Auriga Spa has heated indoor pools, a sauna and a steam room.
Arranged on request
Onto Patji
An Indigenous guide takes you along remote bush tracks onto Patji, Aboriginal land near Uluru, telling stories of Anangu life.
Rock art by helicopter
From Silky Oaks, a helicopter to a Cape York site and the stories of a 20,000-year-old outback gallery of rock art, with an Indigenous-owned operator.
Hook Island with Robbie Congoo
On Fridays, the motor yacht Pebble Beach to Hook Island, where Ngaro man Robbie Congoo leads a walk to millennia-old rock paintings; for those 16 and over.
Backstage at the Opera House
At 7 a.m. daily, a group of no more than 12 goes through the stage door to rehearsal rooms and the orchestra pit, ending with breakfast in the Green Room; not on December 25 or 31.
Mud crabs on the Daintree coast
A coastal walk through the traditional homelands of two brothers, gathering and tasting mud crabs and mangrove mussels with damper and bush foods.
Subject to availability.
Ways to make it yours
- Continue to New Zealand, for Queenstown, Milford Sound by helicopter and the lodges of the North Island.
- qualia's Journey to the Heart: a helicopter over Whitehaven Beach to land on Heart Island and snorkel Heart Reef.
- The Uluru-Kata Tjuta Signature Walk, five days and 54 kilometres from Kata Tjuta to the base of Uluru, with Anangu storytelling, chef-prepared meals, eco-camps and then Mala Lodge, the only visitor lodging inside the park; April to September, for those 12 and over with moderate fitness, with a four-day Lodge Walk as the shorter option.
This is a sample. The hotels, the pace and the order are where we start, not where we finish: every journey is designed around the people taking it.
Made around you
Most travel is bought. This is designed.
Before anything is booked, we talk: who is travelling, how you like to spend a morning, and the hotel preferences below the obvious, from the kind of bath you like to the time you wake and how much daylight you need in a room. You see options where options matter and clean recommendations where they don't.
The same person remains your point of contact from the first reply to the trip after next. No handovers. No team.
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