Queenstown 19-Day Tours and Trips

This was an ambitious tour that covered the highlights of New Zealand's south island, the Great Barrier Reef, and Sydney. The New Zealand portion of the trip was my favorite. The scenery is stunning, and the excursions were unique and interesting, including a cruise on Milford Sound and a trip to a working sheep ranch. Our Collette guide was fantastic--she went out of her way to answer every question and address every concern. Our time in Sydney was great. The only disappointment was the day spent at the Great Barrier Reef, which felt rushed. All in all, though, it was a great tour!

The tour was overall--excellent. Our tour guide, Clare Martin, was exceptionally good. She was knowledgeable, organized, friendly and had a great sense of humor. There were times I was aware that she was rearranging things because something seemed to have gone wrong, but she never made it obvious, or bragged that she was the one fixing things. We had one really dud bus driver in Queenstown who did some pretty significant damage to both dinner one night and to our daytime activity the next day, but drivers were good other than that guy. We loved getting to snorkel the Great Barrier Reef, taking the extra trip to see where parts of the Lord of the Rings were filmed, and visiting the nature and animals parks. Our visits with the Maori and the Aborigines were fascinating and very well-planned. We loved both New Zealand and Australia. We booked extra time before our trip in NZ to see Hobbiton and wished we had done the same in A. to see more of Sydney.

My wife and I have been on several trips with the Trafalgar group (AAT Kings / Insight / Trafalgar). We have not had a bad experience yet. The travel directors were like personal concierges to us. Our travel directors, Tony and Marty, were fantastic people. Funny, professional and helpful. Bus drivers were excellent, optional experiences were great. We look forward to going on future tours with the Trafalgar group.

All of N. Zealand is beautiful from north to south, from the Bay of Islands to Milford Sound with mountain and ocean and lakes galore. How can you choose just one favorite. Now it's the land of Hobbits as well as sheep and cows, and even a lot of very nice people.

The Fiji people were SO friendly , beautiful, happy and caring!!! I got to attend La Traviata at the Sydney appears House!!! Wow!! Loved the beauty of the places we saw and loved the animals!!! Amazing number of trip activities - it was packed with highlights!!! Awesome tour!

We learned about the history of the people and sites. The ancient and current use of the geothermal areas, even eating food cooked in the hot pools was memorable. We rode on 6 different boats in beautiful waterways, seeing native plants and vegetation as well as animal species. The water was glacier blue, clean and clear. Staying in the same hotel for 2 nights in a row, not having to have our bags out early every morning was a treat. We traveled in Land Rovers in the hillsides and rivers of the south NZ island. I loved the Mrs Jones fruit stand stop on the way to the picturesque Milford Sound. Tourists were well received and cared for at all locations. I wished we had more time in Auckland and the north island of NZ. Australia had its own wonderful flavor of living. It was great to experience it as well.