Australia

Upon arrival at Melbourne Airport, you’ll be met and transferred to our hotel in the center of the city. We’ll stay a short walk from Federation Square and a wonderful choice of restaurants and cafes. Our tour leader will be waiting to welcome you and help you settle in. Depending on your arrival time, you can rest or take an easy first wander nearby. Once everyone has arrived, we’ll gather for an orientation and a welcome dinner at a great Melbourne restaurant. It will be our first taste of Australian cooking and a chance to meet the women you’ll be sharing this journey with.

Melbourne is at its best when explored on foot. Alongside a guide, we’ll step into elegant covered arcades, lanes filled with ever-changing street art, and neighborhoods shaped by people who arrived from around the world. Coffee drifts from tiny cafes, murals cover entire walls, and independent shops appear in places you would never notice on your own.

We’ll visit the National Gallery of Victoria before heading to one of the city’s major food markets for lunch and time among its produce stalls, bakeries, and specialty counters.

Later we’ll travel to St Kilda, where palm trees, old seaside buildings, and Luna Park’s famous entrance line Port Phillip Bay. Following dinner near the waterfront, we’ll join an evening session on the pier and wait for penguins to return from the water and make their way toward their burrows.

Today the drive becomes a major part of the experience as we begin our journey along the Great Ocean Road. Around four to four-and-a-half hours of driving will be divided by beaches, viewpoints, lunch, forest walks, and wildlife stops. Melbourne will gradually disappear behind us as the highway reaches the Southern Ocean and begins curling above the surf.

At Bells Beach, we’ll look across one of Australia’s best-known surfing locations before stopping for a seafood lunch near the coast. We’ll leave the ocean briefly for a walk among towering ferns and forest to the Erskine Falls. Near Kennett River, we’ll scan the eucalyptus branches for wild koalas and watch for colorful parrots overhead.

By late afternoon, we’ll reach Apollo Bay and check into our accommodation close to the beach, with time to walk along the foreshore or choose a restaurant for dinner.

West of Apollo Bay, the rainforest gives way to the Shipwreck Coast. Roughly three hours of driving will be spread across a full day of short walks and lookout stops, with limestone cliffs, sea caves, and the force of the Southern Ocean waiting around each curve.

We’ll stand above the Twelve Apostles and watch the waves break around enormous rock stacks rising from the water. At Loch Ard Gorge, we’ll hear how two young passengers survived the 1878 shipwreck that gave this stretch of coast its name. If the steps are open, we’ll also stop at Gibson Steps before continuing to the Grotto, London Arch, and the Bay of Islands. After lunch near the quaint community of Port Campbell, we’ll make our way to Warrnambool and check into our hotel.

The drive from Warrnambool to Adelaide will carry us across two states and several very different landscapes. We’ll spend around seven hours on the road before breaks, making this a full travel day. Along the way, dairy farms and fishing towns will give way to former volcanic country, vineyards, broad fields, and the long horizons of South Australia.

We’ll pause for coffee in Port Fairy, a coastal town of nineteenth-century cottages and a working harbor. Our main break will be around Mount Gambier, where we’ll have lunch and see the volcanic landscape surrounding its crater lake. From there, the road continues through the farming towns of the Limestone Coast.

By evening we’ll reach Adelaide, South Australia’s compact capital, known for its parklands, markets, food, and nearby wine regions. Our hotel sits beside the southern parklands, with restaurants and the city center within easy reach.

Adelaide may feel relaxed, but its streets hold a powerful history of protest and social change. During a guided walk, we’ll hear about the women, workers, First Nations leaders, and migrant communities who challenged inequality and shaped South Australia. The stories will include the campaign that made the state one of the earliest places in the world where women could vote and stand for parliament.

We’ll then enter Adelaide Central Market, where cheesemakers, bakers, growers, spice merchants, and family-run eateries have gathered beneath one roof for more than 150 years. Lunch will give us a taste of the many cultures that have influenced the city before we browse the stalls. The afternoon will involve free time for a museum, gallery, garden walk, or more time discovering Adelaide at your own pace.

Just half an hour beyond Adelaide, the road climbs into eucalyptus-covered hills dotted with vineyards and country towns. Our first stop will be Cleland Wildlife Park, where kangaroos and wallabies move freely through the bushland and koalas rest in the branches above us. We’ll walk through their habitat and look for wombats, emus, and native birds as well.

From there we’ll continue to Hahndorf, a town founded by German settlers in the 1800s. After lunch, there will be time to wander past its stone cottages, bakeries, galleries, and small shops. We’ll also visit a chocolate maker before stopping at a local winery for an included tasting of Adelaide Hills wines.

A flight of approximately two hours will carry us from Adelaide into Australia’s Red Centre. From the air, green farmland gradually gives way to rust-colored earth, dry riverbeds, low mountain ranges, and a horizon that seems to stretch forever.

Alice Springs, known as Mparntwe to the Arrernte people, is a remote town surrounded by desert and the MacDonnell Ranges. After checking into our hotel and stopping for lunch, we’ll visit the town's main cultural precinct. The galleries hold an important collection of Aboriginal art from Central Australia, including watercolors and works connected to the Western Desert art movement. We’ll then take part in a Welcome to Country led by an Arrernte Elder and Traditional Owner of Mparntwe. This ceremony will introduce us to the region and the importance of visiting these lands with respect.

The old Telegraph Station marks the place from which modern Alice Springs began to grow. Inside its restored stone buildings, we’ll learn how messages once crossed the continent along the Overland Telegraph Line. We’ll also hear about the site’s later use as The Bungalow, where Aboriginal children removed from their families were housed during the twentieth century.

The afternoon will offer several ways to experience Alice Springs. You could visit Desert Park, where recreated habitats, red kangaroos, endangered desert animals, and a free-flying bird presentation reveal how much life survives in this demanding environment. Another option will be an outing to a nearby swimming hole if access and water conditions permit. Those who prefer to remain in town can browse Aboriginal art galleries, independent bookshops, and cafes. Our tour leader will help you arrange the afternoon that suits you best.

The scale of the Red Centre will become clear today. We’ll spend close to eight hours driving, with a full day overall once walks, lunch, and cultural stops are included. Red mountain ridges, desert oaks, dry riverbeds, and vast plains will keep changing outside the windows as we travel deeper into Central Australia.

Our first stop will be Simpsons Gap, where a short path leads between tall red rock walls to a waterhole surrounded by ghost gums. We’ll then travel to Ntaria, also known as Hermannsburg, for a prearranged visit to a pottery center run by Western Arrarnta artists. Here, we’ll see hand-built terracotta vessels painted with wildlife, landscapes, memories of Country, and scenes from community life.

The road will then stretch south toward Yulara, the small resort settlement outside Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. We’ll check into our hotel among native gardens and ghost gums before gathering for dinner.

Before sunrise we’ll enter the national park and find our place as the first light reaches Uluru. In the quiet of the morning, the rock will shift from shadow to deep orange while the desert slowly comes into view around it.

After sunrise, we’ll follow the Mala Walk along part of Uluru’s base. Our guide will share Anangu stories connected to the land and explain the caves, rock-art shelters, and natural features along the route. We’ll also spend time at the Cultural Centre, where exhibits created with the Traditional Owners offer a deeper understanding of their culture and continuing relationship with Country.

After lunch, the rest of the day will be yours to relax. That evening, we’ll come together for an included cultural dinner beneath the desert sky, bringing our time in the Red Centre to a memorable close.

Before flying east, we’ll take part in a guided dot-painting workshop. We’ll learn how symbols can represent people, animals, water, journeys, and more before using what we have learned to create a small piece of our own.

In the afternoon, an approximately three-hour flight will carry us from the desert to Sydney, a city spread around beaches, coves, and a vast natural harbor. Upon arrival, we’ll be transferred to our hotel and keep the evening easy. There will be time to unpack, find dinner nearby, or take a first walk through the city.

Sydney will come into view from its oldest streets, its harbor, and its famous coastline today. We’ll begin in The Rocks, where sandstone warehouses and narrow lanes sit beneath the Harbour Bridge. An included cruise will then carry us across the water, passing sheltered coves, waterfront neighborhoods, and the white sails of the Sydney Opera House.

Back on shore, we’ll step inside the Opera House for a guided look at its bold design, performance spaces, and complicated construction story. We’ll also sit down beside the harbor for a seafood lunch, with fresh fish, prawns, and other Australian favorites on the menu. Later, we’ll head to picturesque Bondi Beach to watch the surfers, walk along the golden sand, and enjoy Sydney’s easygoing coastal atmosphere.

With no fixed schedule today, Sydney will be yours to enjoy in whatever way suits you best. Our tour leader will be available to help with ideas, directions, and transportation. You could ride a ferry across the harbor to Manly, wander through the Royal Botanic Garden, visit an art museum, or explore the boutiques and cafes of another neighborhood.

You might also return to Bondi for part of the clifftop walk or spend more time around Circular Quay and The Rocks. In the evening, we’ll all come together for a farewell dinner and one final taste of Australia before this spectacular trip comes to an end.

After breakfast, it will be time to check out and say goodbye to Australia. Based on your departure flight, you will be transferred to the Sydney airport by the convenient airport shuttle bus.