Australia offers unparalleled natural beauty and stark contrasts, captivating travelers. From the vibrant Great Barrier Reef to the ancient Uluru, it’s a “greatest hits” of geological wonders and unique ecosystems. Prepare to be awestruck by Australia’s most iconic natural attractions.
Whether you’re diving into crystal-clear reef waters or standing in the shadow of the Outback’s red heart, Australia delivers unforgettable moments at every turn. At Bellhopping, we help you experience these bucket-list destinations with ease, curating seamless itineraries, local insights, and travel tips that let you focus on what really matters: the adventure. Start planning your reef-to-rock journey today (and have every perk infused into your trip, with cash deposited into your account upon your return for booking with Bellhopping!)
Virtuoso on-site tour connections craft bespoke journeys across Australia. Intrepid Travel can create a custom itinerary to complement the route below; work with your Virtuoso travel advisor to book this experience.
Australia casts a wide spell, from its cosmopolitan-cool coasts to red-earth deserts, Technicolor reefs, and tangled emerald rainforests. For first-time visitors, the urge to take it all in can be irresistible, which makes shaping a well-paced itinerary necessary.
This 18-day tour Down Under stitches together Australia’s iconic stops, starting with a warm welcome from Sydney’s harbor attractions and surf beaches, and finishing at the UNESCO-listed Great Barrier Reef and Daintree Rainforest.
Along the way, weave through Melbourne’s art- and food-filled laneways, retreat to the spiritual heart of the Red Centre, and stop for sips at award-winning vineyards striping the Barossa Valley. It’s a trip that captures Australia’s full spectrum, and one that may inspire another visit – to, say, sail the ancient West Coast or discover under-the-radar destinations.
Australia | 18-Day Itinerary
- Days 1-4: Sydney and Surroundings
- Days 5-8: Melbourne via Canberra
- Days 9-11: The Barossa Valley
- Days 12-14: Uluru and Kata Tjuta
- Days 15-18: Daintree Rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef
Days 1-4: Sydney and Surroundings
Lock in a suite with a balcony at the 155-room Park Hyatt Sydney, suggests Virtuoso travel advisor Gabrielle Thackray, for front-row seats to Sydney Harbour and the opera house’s architectural “sails.” Marvel further at the World Heritage building on a guided Sydney Opera House tour or, better yet, ask your Virtuoso advisor to book tickets to a marquee performance.
Spend sunny days exploring the city’s cultural giants: the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and the Art Gallery of New South Wales, which impresses with its new building, Naala Badu, celebrating renowned Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, Australian, and international artists.
Take a supreme beach day, learning to surf at Bondi Beach or swimming in the postcard-worthy Bondi Icebergs ocean pool. Or escape the hot spots on a ferry to Manly’s Shelly Beach, where snorkelers enter the clear, shallow waters to witness wobbegongs, stingrays, and schools of tropical fish.
Reserve a day to venture into Blue Mountains National Park, a 90-minute drive west of the city; here, “sandstone cliffs meet the ancient forest,” says Intrepid Travel’s Brett Mitchell, managing director of Australia and New Zealand. Australia’s first cable car, the Scenic Skyway (it debuted in 1958) glides above tiered Katoomba Falls and the Three Sisters sandstone rock formation studding the Jamison Valley.
Back in the city for sunset, sleuth out the Central Business District’s hidden drinking dens: Door Knock serves playful, tropical cocktails and features a zero-proof menu; steps below York Street, Hustlers is known for its lemongrass-and-yuzu cocktails and bone-marrow fried rice.
Between stops, scope out the city’s best vantage points: Mrs Macquaries Point provides views of the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge in a single, sunny frame; Observatory Hill appears bathed in golden-hour light; and, on most Saturday nights, the skies above Darling Harbour crackle with fireworks.
Days 5-8: Melbourne via Canberra
From Sydney, hop on a four-hour train to Canberra: Australia’s small but mighty capital city provides a tranquil intermission before continuing on to Melbourne.
Still underrated, Canberra offers travelers slower-paced discovery, says Virtuoso travel advisor Lena Nielson. Take your pick of 40 regional wineries and spend an afternoon sampling cool-climate shiraz and riesling. Or retreat to Lake Burley Griffin and ply its calm, glassy waters on a stand-up paddleboard. In winter, Nielson recommends The Truffle Farm’s hunts, followed by tastings or a long lunch.
If time allows, slip away to the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, an hour outside Canberra, to hike trails that weave through snow gum (aka eucalyptus) forests, revealing grazing kangaroos and koalas hugging tree forks. End in Canberra on a culinary high note at Inka, a Peruvian-Japanese restaurant where ceviche and sashimi highlight tasting menus.
An easy up-and-down, one-hour flight links Canberra to Melbourne, which hums with cool, creative energy and an art scene that starts with Australia’s oldest and most-visited gallery – the National Gallery of Victoria – and evolves with street-art vignettes lining Hosier Lane.
Drop your bags in a loft suite at the 94-room Royce, an art deco-inspired boutique stay housed in a reimagined Rolls-Royce showroom. “The design and decor make you feel like you’ve stepped into an old Hollywood film,” Nielson says.
To catch the beat of the city, join Intrepid’s creative neighborhoods walking tour. Check out the eclectic streets of the Fitzroy and Collingwood districts while learning about the post-World-War-II immigrants who shaped them, and sip the city’s famous coffee at the social enterprise Streat Café.
For dinner, settle into Tipo 00, an intimate pasta bar serving modern Italian dishes such as rigatoni with nettles and uni-and-scallop agnolotti. Cap off the evening at Caretaker’s Cottage, a candlelit cocktail bar named for its previous incarnation as a church sexton’s house, or peruse the Queen Victoria Night Market’s food stalls amid live entertainment.
Days 9-11: The Barossa Valley
Home to the world’s oldest continuously producing shiraz and grenache vines, and renowned for its bold reds and fortified wines, the Barossa Valley more than earns its place on any oenophile’s must-visit list. Beyond exploring more than 80 cellar doors (tasting rooms), wine-country wanderers can soar above the vineyards in a hot-air balloon, hike through nearby national parks, and sample just-picked produce at the lively Saturday farmers’ market.
After a quick 90-minute flight from Melbourne to Adelaide and an hour-long car ride from the airport, arrive at the exclusive 15-room Louise, a chic wine-country spot where checking in feels like receiving a backstage pass to the Barossa.
Seppeltsfield Road is flanked by more than 2,000 palm trees that line the three-mile stretch into the valley’s vineyard heartland, and guests of The Louise enjoy access to Seppeltsfield Estate, a prime stop on the route, for tastings of tawny straight from the barrel – with the vintage matched to their birth year.
Between helicopter tours over the vines and chauffeured tours of the vineyards, hotel guests master gnocchi making at an Italian cooking school and attend a gourmet “Breakfast with the Roos” in Kaiserstuhl Conservation Park. At The Louise’s Appellation restaurant, a four-course tasting menu caps stays (and celebrates the region) with dishes such as kingfish tacos and Wagyu steaks.
Days 12-14: Uluru and Kata Tjuta
Pop back to Melbourne for a flight with a cinematic descent into Ayers Rock Airport – ask your Virtuoso advisor to book a window seat on the plane’s left side to behold the aerial view of Uluru. The colossal sandstone monolith seemingly shifts from fiery orange to deep crimson to dusty pink and purple, depending on how the sun hits.
The Outback meets opulence in this swath of Australia’s Red Centre: Under a pincushion of stars, travelers “glamp” among rolling red sand dunes at Longitude 131°, an all-inclusive wilderness camp with 16 white tents draping open to views of the great rock. Wind, erosion, and the flow of water over 550 million years shaped and smoothed the rock that’s sacred to the Indigenous Anangu people. Roughly 25 miles west, Kata Tjuta, a mysterious collection of 36 dome-shaped boulders, rises from the desert like a riddle in stone and qualifies as Uluru’s iconic sibling.
As the sun comes up, Longitude 131° guests set out with guides into Walpa Gorge, where towering walls give way to a surprisingly green, tree-lined creek. At the Kata Tjuta viewing platform, they pause for coffee and baked goods, taking in views of the domes and Uluru. The excursion wraps up with a visit to the Anangu-designed Cultural Centre at Uluru, which offers insight into the region’s heritage and an opportunity to browse local artworks.
For art on a larger scale, the resort shuttles guests to the nearby Field of Light: Installation artist Bruce Munro’s 50,000 solar-powered, glass-sphere-tipped stems light up at dusk with ever-changing colors, “blooming” and swaying gently into the evening.
Days 15-18: Daintree Rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef
Experiencing the world’s oldest tropical rainforest and its largest reef system in a single stretch of coastline makes for a fitting crescendo to the trip. In Tropical North Queensland, travelers find themselves conveniently situated between the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rainforest, accessible from Uluru via nonstop, two-and-a-half-hour flights into Cairns.
The Reef House, a breezy, 67-room retreat just 25 minutes north of Cairns Airport, fronts a ribbon of white sand at Palm Cove shaded by melaleuca trees and palms. Kick off this tropical finale by borrowing vintage cruiser bikes, casting a line in the sea, or browsing the hotel’s book bar before crashing at the beach.
Plan to dedicate a day to the Great Barrier Reef. One of the world’s Seven Natural Wonders, it spans more than 133,000 square miles and shelters thousands of marine species in an ecosystem so vast it’s visible from space. Your Virtuoso advisor can arrange a catamaran to some of the reef’s best snorkel and dive sites, where sea turtles, clownfish, and bright corals await. Many excursions are led by marine biologists, offering deeper ecological insight.
The next day, trade the reef for rainforest with an exploration of the 180-million-year-old Daintree, about two hours from Cairns. Raised boardwalks wind through lush undergrowth and help protect the fragile forest; during a leisurely stroll, keep your eyes peeled for electric-blue Ulysses butterflies flitting about. For more action, cruise the Daintree River in search of saltwater crocodiles. In a historic 2021 deal, ownership of the rainforest was returned to its Aboriginal custodians, the Eastern Kuku Yalanji people. Your Virtuoso advisor can arrange a tour of this ancient land with its most experienced and knowledgeable guides.
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Reference: [https://www.virtuoso.com/travel/articles/australia-greatest-hits-travel-itinerary]