Australia Hotel Reviews

We had a very fun experience at the Ironbar grill on Macrossan. They have Cane Toad races in the evening. We participated in the race and had a super fun and unique experience. Food was pretty good, too.

''Bills'' for breakfast. Hugos for Pizza! Bayswater Brasserie for dinner. All outstanding!

Places to visit whilst in Sydney are Darling Harbour, Toronga Zoo, Aquarium and Opera House just to mention a few.

Adelaide is a very beautiful city. We enjoyed a few days in the Barossa Valley also and will remember our South Australian holiday fondly.

We hired a car and visited Kakadu which we thoroughly enjoyed. We took an evening sail on the pearling lugger and enjoyed this. We were somewhat disappointed in the Tiwi Island tour. While it was interesting it was far too expensive at $175 for the land tour and the Tiwi Arts and Crafts Centres were not staffed by Tiwi artists with only two european people present. No pottery on sale.

Cairns is beautiful! Wonderful family destination. We highly recommend the Rainforest/Kuranda all day excursion.

Spent most time at Paddington shopping. The Rocks was also worth visiting (opera house, harbour bridge, bontanical gardens, craft market on saturday). Seafood w/ wine at fishmarket was fantastic.

We didn''t need any transportation if we would like to find stores or foods around the hotels area because they are so near to the hotels. We rented a car to go to Hunter Valley (Pokolbin etc), Blue Mountain, Gold Coast, Canberra, etc.

You have to try Artezen espresso bar in Dunsborough.. Best coffee in the world!!!

Hired 4 wheel drive in Alice (Avis) drove to Uluru, Kings Canyon back to Alice. Visited Rainbow Valley, Palm Valley, Simpsons Gap, Stanley Chisolm, Meteorite Craters. All great to see. Very good having own transport to go where and when you please. Also 4 wheel drive a plus being able to go to more places. Best restaurant in Alice is Rudi''s. Great food, service, attention and excellent value. Highly recommended.

The shopping in Melbourne is on a par with the best, I would rate it as a mini New York. A definite restaurant to visit is the Oyster bar at the Waterfront Casino. I ate there twice in a row.

Sydney is an expensive place. Its transportation is not as developed as one would expect for such a large city. Getting around the city is diffcult unless you drive or take the tour route. This is both expensive and can be inconvenient especially if you are drive. Parking space is limited and expensive. An hour''s parking at Paddy''s Market cost me AUD$14 cos I couldn''t find any street parking so have to park in its basement carpark. Also, hotels charge extra for parking even if you stay with them. A day''s parking can cost you AUD$10-$20 depending on the hotel. There are limited train services and NO Mass transit system outside of the few square miles within the city. (Even Melbourne has tram services that goes a distance outside of the city centre.)

Brizzie is a wonderful laid back destination, a very pleasant change from the hustle bustle of Sydney. Our group visited Chinatown for dinner, the Treasury Casino, Southbank Park, Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, Anzac Square, the Botanical Gardens, took River Cats up and down the river through the city, and the highlight, I must say was watching Queensland beat NSW in "The State of Origin", game I at "The Pineapple Hotel". Wow! What an experience!

I will recommend visitors to take a tour to Hunter Valley where you get to visit vine yard and taste some wine, visit the Blue Mountain, climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge, take a walk around the ROCK (early settlement of Europeans) which has been turned into a dining & shopping area.

All of our tours out of Cairns were handled by APT Touring. The company was reliable and punctual and the driver/tour guides were amiable and informative - a definite thumbs-up. We did a day-trip to the Great Barrier Reef (awesome), Kuranda via the Skyrail and a return by the Kuranda Scenic Railway (interesting), and the lava tubes at Undara (fascinating - our tour guide was excellent, giving us an equivalent of Geology 101).

I really liked being in Sydney. My favorite part was going to the markets especially in Glebe. I love the alternative culture so Glebe was up my alley. I found that eating Japenese food, which is my favorite, was very affordable. Make sure you try food from countries not found at home, for me that was nepalese and vietnemese.

Would recommend the On the Wallaby tour of Atherton tableland. Kurada skyrail trip is good. Reef is definitely recommended. Go with Reef Magic. Staff are excellent and you get a good amount of food. The tour is smaller so there aren''t loads of you and you go to a pontoon for those who don''t which to have to stay on a boat all day.

We visited both Kakadu and Litchfield National Parks. Very interesting, although a bit hot and humid for hiking. Great boat ride in Kakadu on the Yellow Water Billabong. A car was important for getting arround. We also enjoyed the Aquascene. A bit touristy, but fun nonetheless, and we got great pictures of the fish.

The Rocks is great for strolling, shopping and dining. Wolfies at the waterfront has great steaks. Wildfire is worth a try. But if you have time and money and you are a gourmet you have to try Tetsuya in Kent street. Book well in advance but it could be the experience of a lifetime.

Better stay away from Ackland street which is too rough. St. Kilda has nice restaurants in Fitzroy street, especially Cafe di Stasio.