The Land Down Under is one of the great frontiers of travel for Americans. Because of its remoteness, it tends to be one of the last places Americans travel to. Yet, it has an irresistible draw. It has always rated high on the charts as an aspirational destination. Due to the long-haul trip required, there is usually a big gap between aspiration and pulling the trigger to really make the trip.
Today, however, long-haul flights have gotten much better, so the 15-hour flight from Los Angeles to Sydney is not nearly as tough as it used to be. It’s a time to watch a few movies or do some reading and, before you know it, you’re down there where the tap water spirals down the drain in the opposite direction. You are on the other side of the world, baby! You made it. And it is worth the trip.
Australia is a big space, with a lot of ground to cover, a highly diverse set of attractions, and many choices to make. It’s a trip where you really want some seriously qualified destination management to make the most of it.
One tour operator, AAT Kings, with a century of history specializing in travel in the Land Down Under, is well equipped to take care of you and deliver on whatever you want to experience in that huge, wild arena. If done right, it will be one of the most memorable travel experiences of a lifetime.
In spite of the remoteness, and the strangeness of the wildlife and landscapes, there is an undeniable affinity between Australia and America. Some of that is because of a parallelism in their respective colonial histories. Both were at one time British colonies. Australians, like Americans, have their own version of the English language, with a twist in the accent that Americans find charming and alluring. In spite of the foreignness of the land, the common language makes Australia an easy place for Americans to travel.
The Australians twist the vowels in a different direction from how we do it here. One Australian told me this evolved because “Australians talk out of the side of their mouths to keep the flies out.” I can’t guarantee the accuracy of that claim, but it did come from the mouth of an Australian.
Australia is about the size of the continental United States, so there’s a whole lot of territory to explore there. It has a population of 26 million, fewer than that of California or Texas. The United States packs 340 million into about the same area, and it’s still not a densely populated country. That leaves a huge amount of country that is wide open with virtually no one around.
Though it has a similar culture to that of America, there’s a freshness to it that feels new. The British settlement started as a penal colony in 1788, nearly two centuries after the founding of Britain’s colonies in America. The development of Australia was also slower because of its remoteness, and the North American landscape is more congenial to settlement than Australia, much of which is still not particularly hospitable for development. Most of the development is on the edges of the continent, leaving the great Outback in the middle practically unpopulated.
Even though relatively few Americans have traveled to Australia, nearly everyone knows something about Australia’s unique wildlife, which is markedly different from that of any other place. With kangaroos, wallabies, koalas, wombats and platypuses (or is that platypi?), about 80 percent of Australian species exist nowhere else. In terms of evolution, the continent seems to have evolved along its own track, separate from the other large land masses of the world. It is a unique land and it feels fundamentally different in ways that you can sense, but which are beyond description.
There are many similarities and many glaring differences when you’re traveling in Australia, and the combination of known and unknown makes it a lot of fun.
You’ll have to make some tough choices. Most people want to visit the great city of Sydney, and you’ll probably land there, so that shouldn’t be too difficult. Melbourne is another great city, and not too far from Sydney, so that could easily be an item on your itinerary.
There is the Great Barrier Reef, which is unique in the world and unfortunately under threat from climate change, so that’s an excellent place to include on your itinerary.
The Northern Territory, which reaches into the tropics, is a wonderful region with some places that are about as remote as anywhere on earth. There are places in Kakadu National Park where you have to watch out for crocodiles, which may grow to a length of about 20 feet, at the top of the food chain and can run faster than you. You can also see paintings in rock that date back 20,000 years. That gives you something to think about.
There are beaches in the city of Darwin that look gorgeous, but draw no bathers because of sharks, and jellyfish that sting, and that’s no fun. It’s wild country but, with local guides, you’ll know you’re safe.
In the central part of the Northern Territory is the desert, with the settlement of Alice Springs, and the great Ayers Rock, as the British colonists named it, or Uluru in the aboriginal tongue. That huge red rock juts out of the flat desert earth so boldly, it’s no wonder the natives see it as a holy place. It is something to experience and keep in your memory. You’ll breathe the freshest air you ever breathed, far from any serious sources of pollution.
There’s the island of Tasmania in the south, if you like devils, and so much more. Getting out to the west coast and the city of Adelaide is a big leap, and most likely not going to be on your first itinerary to Australia. There are multitudes of other choices to make to suit individual preferences.
AAT Kings can help make all these decisions because it has been organizing travel to this vast wonderland since 1918. Though it has obviously had some changes in personnel, management and ownership during that century, it retains its core capital: the intellectual property of tour operating. It’s a set of business practices and know-how that has been built upon year after year for more than 100 years. Since 1997, the company has offered New Zealand, but that’s as far as it goes. It concentrates all its efforts on these two countries.
The company now offers its tour products, or travel management packages, under four brands, each with its own style of delivery. As Margot Windenburg, senior sales manager for North America, told me, through its various brands and travel styles, AAT Kings can produce a package suitable for any client’s individual needs.
The AAT Kings brand is for the traditional style of guided group touring, updated, of course, to match the changes of preferences of modern travelers.
SEIT stands for Spirit, Emotion, Intellect and Task, and it’s the brand for small group touring some of the more remote areas of the center.
Inspiring Journeys is the newest brand in the stable, for higher-end small group trips.
Down Under Tours offers all kinds of travel arrangements in Tropical North Queensland and the rainforest.
These are rough distinctions and, within the brands and the destinations, there are many other subtle differences and choices to be made. To sort through them, it’s best to work with the tour experts of AAT Kings to sort out the details of your itinerary. Those experts are available during American business hours through the AAT Kings call center (866-240-1659), which is provided through the Travel Corporation, the parent company of AAT Kings since 1999.
The Travel Corporation brings an extra layer of value and security to AAT Kings’ product and delivery. As the parent company of Trafalgar, Insight Vacations, Contiki Tours and Red Carnation, the Travel Corporation has proven itself over decades as an expert in growing and cultivating the companies it has brought into its group. All while retaining their original value and intellectual capital, and making the most of the possible synergies among the companies.
There are many other things to talk about here, such as the conservation efforts of The Travel Corporation’s TreadRight Foundation, the relationships between AAT Kings and the hosts of the indigenous territories where the company takes travelers, and many other things. But time and space are short, so those other subjects will have to wait for another time.
So for now, I bid you g’day.
Editor’s Note, post-publication: TreadRight Corporation corrected to TreadRight Foundation.
David Cogswell is a freelance writer working remotely, from wherever he is at the moment. Born at the dead center of the United States during the last century, he has been incessantly moving and exploring for decades. His articles have appeared in the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, Fortune, Fox News, Luxury Travel Magazine, Travel Weekly, Travel Market Report, Travel Agent Magazine, TravelPulse.com, Quirkycruise.com, and other publications. He is the author of four books and a contributor to several others. He was last seen somewhere in the Northeast US.