Australia, New Zealand & the South Pacific - Tasmania, Western Australia

The parents are making Trip #2 to Australia - arriving mid Feb and leaving end of May.

Trip #1 - Sydney based.
Lots of Sydney / Sydney area travel
Cairns / Port Douglas
Melbourne (incl. eastern and western bay trips)
Adelaide
Alice Springs to Uluru
South Island New Zealand


This trip they will be Melbourne based (even more opps to see Victoria). My initial plan is to get them to Tassie, WA & the North Island of NZ. The North Island I know - many business and holidays - but I have little to no experience of the others (1 weekend trip to Perth doesn't/shouldn't count).

My initial thoughts are to try Tassie first, right at the end of Feb, for potentially a week. End of March I was going to plan for a 10 day trip, flying into Perth, heading down to Margaret River. Return to Perth, fly up to Broome, and possibly over to Darwin. I'll leave NZ till April (I may cancel it completely, though, as they would like to revisit Pt Douglas again). Timings are completely flexible, though, as they will be here for so long.

Any recommendations? Sightseeing, routes, places to stay or see? Any and all suggestions or thoughts are greatly appreciated...

Finely someone staying long enough to real see something. We believe Australia can be visited in about 120 days and New Zealand in about 40 days.

Unfortunately not everybody has the luxury of being able to take extended vacations. My 34 days away from work required negotiation eight months in advance, and during that time I spent two weeks circling the South Island and the remaining two and a half weeks covering the east coast of Australia from Sydney to Cape Tribulation in addition to Melbourne.

Did I miss a lot of things along the way? Of course.

Do I have any regrets about going on a whirlwind tour? Not at all.

In any event, jrk1998, you mentioned Cairns and Port Douglas. Did your parents make it beyond Port to Cape Trib? If not, I would highly recommend the journey if they are going to be in the area.