Australia budget

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Hi. We want to go to Australia but not sure of how much to save. We're a family of 4 (children under 6) and we want to go to the following cities in 3 weeks:

1. Sydney: + a zoo, bridge walk, blue mountains, general sightseeing.

Go on train towards...

2.Townsville/great barrier reef, possibly stay on an island for a night e.g whitsunday (is that possible?)

The get a car to go cairns (with a stop off a couple of places to stay on way.

1. Cairns/ faint tee/ kuranda

How would you get back to Sydney -- does it have to be a flight??

Posted too soon!!!

So how much ? Anyone done similar? I was hoping no more than 10k?!

Ugghhh. Mean Daintree not faint tee!!

The train between Sydney and Brisbane takes about 15 hours, really slow old train!
Train between Brisbane and Townsville about 19 hours.
Not really the cheapest way of covering ground in Australia.
Personally I would fly between the cities and have longer exploring and not dealing with small children on long train rides.

Oh I thought that was the charm of the trains and that you can see some of the landscape and stuff!

I would fly UK- SYD and then Cairns-UK
If you want trains then this is a good place to start
[http://www.railaustralia.com.au/index.php]
Look at Jetstar, Virgin, Rex and Tiger airlines for cheap internals

Yes there is a certain amount of charm to train travel but not with small children for hours and hours. You could hire a car and drive SYD-BRIS as there are good roads and NSW is pretty. do it over a couple of days and stop along the way in places like Forster, Coffs Harbour and Byron Bay.
I have driven Cairns-Sydney and you drive through a lot of sugar cane between Brissy and Cairns.

I get what you're saying about the train. I was thinking that we've all been on a huge flight, I don't really want to see another plane until we go home! Damn you Australia for being so far away!!!

Do you think Uk flights to Sydney (5 days + surrounds) flight to Great Barrier Reef (5 days + surrounds), flight to cairns+rainforest, cape tribulation 10 days) in average priced digs will cost £10000 or more. I know it's quite a broad question!

Does anyone recommend anything amazing that We should go to?

When do you want to go?

Are you including your uk-aus flights? They'd take at least half your budget I think.

I did a 4 week tour (independent rather than with a tour company) of Australia ten years ago, stayed in hostels but flew between most places (cheap with virgin blue) - it cost me £2000 not including uk-aus flights.

Depends when you want to go, what kind of place you want to stay, if you want to eat out every meal etc etc.

Have to go during school holidays. Around £50 hotel a night... Stretch a bit further for Sydney. I'd be happy to have a sandwich for lunch and eat out at night so maybe £35 a day per person?

Es I'm including uk-aus flights which are about £4000 for all of us in summer

Itscurtains £2000 pp is great but being 10 years ago I have no idea how to convert it for today!

Maybe more than 10k then.

I wouldn't do a train between nsw and qld, especially not cairns. It's longer than you think! It's a flight or 2 day drive at least (and as a holiday you'd do it over longer). Maybe a campervan hire? Stop at beaches and towns along the way? You could stop at port Stephens, Byron bay, Brisbane etc. in a campervan, buying food at supermarkets/bakeries could be fairly cheap plus you would see heaps.

In Sydney do day trips in the train. The blue mountains is a day trip, another is the south coast (stunning ocean scenery from the train to Kiama) or the central coast line goes through river and oyster farming areas.

Google Kiama, Scarborough, Stanwell park on the south coast...that's near where I live and there's some great places to visit via train. If you drive down there's places like minamurra rainforest, wattamolla, boneyards and Jervis Bay. (Google images they are all beautiful).

I'm not sure about Townsville but cairns is good. Kuranda is a nice day trip. You can visit the reef from there.

I went 4 years ago, I paid for no accommodation, or internal flights (family paid for this MEL - SYD, was there 4 weeks and spent 2.5k and I didn't do half the things I wanted to do...... Because I couldn't afford it!!!!! X

Sydney to cairns is several hours worth of flight in itself. But Cairns is also an obvious place to see the gbr, so do you need step two of your journey?

When I booked our self made tour Quantas website enabled various quotes of get on/get off flights. We did London - Cairns, Cairns-Sydney, (drove to Melbourne), Melbourne-Hobart, Hobart-Melbourne, Melbourne - London.

One thing that surprised us - food was more expensive than we expected, particularly main meals but even eg a box of cereal from the supermarket. So worth looking at current prices to help in budgeting for that. Having said that, 'brunch' is enough of a thing you can easily get away with just two meals a day.

Budget almost £1000 each (maybe more) just for flights.

Accommodation average £75-80/night - it will be more in Sydney but less up north.

Food approx £100/day if you are mostly eating out.

I also wouldn't bother with trains going that far north. There are some nice scenic trains up in Cairns/Kuranda if you want that kind of experience.

I think you could do it for £10K if you were sensible. I would factor in another £2-3k if you can to be comfortable.

From what you've said I think you're realistically looking at £15k.

I was quite frugal in eating and accommodation and the exchange rate was better 10 years ago. So in today's terms I think it would cost me £3-3.5k if I was to do it again.

Fwiw the approach I took was that this may be a once in a lifetime trip so I wanted to do everything I could - it's worth saving up the extra cash rather than regretting not doing stuff.

Yes it's curtains I totally agree this is once in a lifetime and I don't want to half arse it. Will take longer to save that much but it'll be worth it and something the kids can remember forever. Aussiemum thanks for the insider knowledge. Those places look great!

Thanks everyone else, I'm on my phone so I can't scroll back through your names.

If there is any major must see that We should do whilst we're there let me know. I don't think I could be bothered going all the way just to see Uluru. We're already spending loads and that would tip us over the edge although it does look beautiful.

Uluru was fabulous (as long as you don't mention the flies...) - it's like being on a different planet. But it might not be for everyone.

I did a great ocean road trip between Melbourne and Adelaide which was really cool.

Whitsundays and airlie beach were phenomenal - you really need to do a boat trip

I also loved Sydney and the blue mountains

Uluru - meh. Glad I went, but didn't really feel it in terms of spiritualism. I'd stick with skipping it, especially with children - too many flies, really hot and would be a very expensive trip to a big rock.

Best bits of my 4 week easy coast trip were whitsundays (boat trip and we slept on the boat) and airlie beach, Fraser Island trip from Hervey Bay (huge sandbank island that you explore by 4x4, or on 4x4 buses- you can stay on the island too which we did) and, depending on when you go, whale watching trips from Hervey Bay too.

Don't rule out hostels. Australia is pretty geared up for it and you can get private rooms which you would all fit in.

I can't give you much advice outside of Sydney, but you'd be pretty hard pressed to get a decent hotel in the city for less than £100 a night. Have a look at the Mantra on Bond. It's all apartments so you can keep costs down by having your own kitchen. There is a supermarket within walking distance, and a pool on site. It's also a 5 minute walk to circular quay or Pitt St mall for shopping.

I did a month in Australia by myself about 6 years for £5000 and that included staying with family in Melbourne and Sydney! Its an expensive country but worth it.

I also did Cape Tribulation on a 18-30 travel package and then did Cairns in a backpackers hostel, obviously not either not really an option with a family. By the end of the holiday i was feeling quite skint too. You are best off travelling by plane, trust me. I can't imagine doing long haul train journeys with young children. I wouls say you need £15000 i agree with someone else.