Discover Australia, New Zealand & The World

Cooee Tours — Australia's Best Guided Group Tours

Small Groups. Local Experts. Unforgettable Journeys.

Cooee Tours is a Brisbane-based travel company specialising in premium small group guided tours across Australia, New Zealand and the world's most captivating destinations. With more than 35 years of experience, a 4.8-star traveller rating, and over 50,000 guests welcomed, we've built a reputation for delivering journeys that go far beyond the standard tourist trail.

Our Australia tours range from snorkelling the Great Barrier Reef and watching the sun rise over Uluru to sipping Cabernet Sauvignon at a Margaret River cellar door and walking the wild coastline of Tasmania. Across the Tasman, our New Zealand tours showcase Milford Sound, the glaciers of the South Island, Maori culture, and some of the finest Pinot Noir on the planet.

What sets Cooee apart is genuine local knowledge. Every itinerary is designed by Australians who have travelled these routes personally — not assembled from a generic template in an overseas office. When you call or email us, you speak directly to the people planning your trip.

Whether you're seeking the best food in Western Australia, a Great Barrier Reef snorkelling adventure, a luxury Uluru sunset experience, or a fully customised private journey through New Zealand's South Island fjords, our tours are designed for travellers who value comfort, connection, and authentic experiences that go far beyond the standard tourist trail.

Based in Brisbane, Queensland, our team of local travel specialists has spent years building relationships with the best accommodation providers, restaurants, winery operators, cultural guides and transport partners across every Australian state and territory. That local knowledge is what sets a Cooee Tours holiday apart from generic international tour operators.

Why Our Guided Tours Rank Among Australia's Best

Australia is a vast country with an extraordinary range of landscapes, climates, cultures and experiences. Navigating it well requires genuine local expertise — and that's exactly what Cooee Tours delivers. Unlike large coach operators that pack 40+ passengers onto rigid schedules, our small group touring model is built around quality, flexibility and personal attention.

Here's what makes the difference when you travel with Cooee Tours:

• Small group sizes (typically 8–20 guests) ensuring personalised attention from expert local guides
• Premium accommodation hand-selected for location, comfort, character and guest reviews
• Flexible pacing that lets you linger at the places that matter — not rush through a checklist
• Exclusive access to boutique wineries, regional producers, Indigenous cultural sites and private experiences
• Seamless door-to-door transport and logistics planning so you never have to worry about a thing
• Meals featuring regional Australian cuisine, often at award-winning restaurants and local favourites
• Carbon-conscious travel practices including partnerships with eco-certified operators

Our itineraries are built with local expertise. We live and operate in Australia, which means your experience is shaped by real on-the-ground knowledge — not outsourced operations run from overseas offices. When you call Cooee Tours, you speak directly to the people who design and run your tour.

Who Travels with Cooee Tours?

Our guests come from all walks of life and all corners of the globe. We welcome solo travellers, couples, families, groups of friends, corporate teams and special interest groups. Many of our guests are Australian retirees exploring their own backyard, while others are international visitors from the UK, USA, Canada, Europe and Asia looking for a premium guided holiday in Australia or New Zealand.

We also cater to travellers with specific interests — whether that's food and wine enthusiasts seeking the best cellar doors in the Barossa Valley, birdwatchers hoping to spot cassowaries in the Daintree, golfers wanting to play Australia's top courses, or history buffs exploring colonial heritage along the Great Ocean Road. Whatever your passion, we can build a journey around it.

Australia Tour Packages

Great Australian Tours

Our 2026 departures feature carefully curated journeys across every major Australian region. Each itinerary is designed to balance bucket-list highlights with authentic local experiences, premium accommodation, expert guided commentary, and plenty of time to savour the moment. Below is a detailed overview of our most popular Australia tour categories for 2026.

Great Barrier Reef Tours

Stretching more than 2,300 kilometres along the Queensland coast, the Great Barrier Reef is the largest living structure on Earth — and one of the few natural wonders that genuinely exceeds expectations in person. Our Great Barrier Reef tours are based out of Cairns and Port Douglas, two of the best access points for the outer reef platforms where coral diversity and marine life are at their most spectacular.

A common question we get is: what's the difference between the inner and outer reef? The inner reef — accessible on a day trip from Cairns — is more sheltered and suitable for first-time snorkellers and families. Our tours prioritise the outer reef, where visibility is typically 15–20 metres, coral coverage is denser, and encounters with reef sharks, manta rays, sea turtles and giant clams are far more likely. The difference in experience is significant.

Beyond the reef itself, our Queensland packages extend into the Daintree Rainforest — the oldest tropical rainforest on Earth at over 180 million years old, predating the Amazon. Guided walks with local naturalists reveal cassowaries, Boyd's forest dragons, and plant species that have evolved in near-total isolation. It's a genuinely humbling place to spend time, and a part of Queensland that many reef-focused itineraries skip entirely.

For guests who prefer not to snorkel, our reef experiences include semi-submersible tours, underwater observatories, scenic helicopter flights over the coral, and glass-bottom boat cruises — so the reef is accessible regardless of swimming confidence or fitness level.

Best time to visit: May to October is ideal — dry season weather, calmer seas, excellent underwater visibility, and no stinger risk in most reef areas. November to April brings the wet season and, in some coastal areas, marine stingers, though the outer reef platforms remain accessible year-round with appropriate protection.

Where we stay: Our reef packages use hand-selected eco-lodges and boutique resorts in Port Douglas and Palm Cove — both quieter and more scenic than central Cairns, with easier access to the outer reef departure points.

For travellers who prefer to stay dry, our reef packages include semi-submersible tours, underwater observatory experiences and scenic helicopter flights over the reef's turquoise waters. All tours include premium eco-lodge or resort accommodation in Port Douglas or Palm Cove.

Uluru & Red Centre Experiences

Uluru is one of those rare places that photographs cannot prepare you for. The scale, the colour — a deep ochre that shifts through burnt orange, violet and near-black as the light changes — and the profound stillness of the surrounding desert create an experience that consistently ranks as one of the most affecting of any Australia holiday. Our Uluru and Red Centre tours are built around giving that experience the time and context it deserves.

The base walk around Uluru is 10.6 kilometres and takes approximately three to four hours at a relaxed pace. Our guides draw on partnerships with Anangu Traditional Owners to bring the rock's cultural and spiritual significance to life — the songlines, the Tjukurpa (creation law), and the stories embedded in specific rock formations that most visitors walk past without knowing. This cultural layer transforms what could be a sightseeing stop into something genuinely meaningful.

Kata Tjuta — the 36 domed rock formations located 50 kilometres west of Uluru — is equally extraordinary and considerably less visited. The Valley of the Winds walk through Kata Tjuta's gorges offers perspectives and a sense of solitude that the main Uluru precinct, particularly in peak season, cannot match. We include both in our standard Red Centre itineraries.

Our extended Northern Territory tours add Kings Canyon — whose sheer sandstone walls rise 270 metres above the gorge floor — and the West MacDonnell Ranges west of Alice Springs, where a chain of ancient gorges, waterholes and Aboriginal rock art sites reveal a landscape shaped over billions of years.

The stargazing question: The Red Centre sits in one of the darkest night-sky zones in the Southern Hemisphere, with virtually no light pollution within hundreds of kilometres. Our field of lights dinners and after-dark experiences beneath the Milky Way are consistently rated by guests as the single most memorable moment of their entire trip — a detail worth mentioning when you're weighing itinerary options.

Best time to visit: April to September, when daytime temperatures are comfortable (15–25°C) and nights are cool and clear. Summer months (December to February) regularly exceed 45°C and should be avoided for active touring.

Extended Red Centre itineraries include Kings Canyon rim walks, the historic outback town of Alice Springs, and scenic helicopter flights over the MacDonnell Ranges. Accommodation ranges from luxury desert lodges to premium glamping under the stars.

Great Ocean Road & Victoria

The Great Ocean Road is frequently cited as one of the world's great coastal drives, and the description holds up. Built by returned soldiers after World War I — and dedicated to those who didn't return — it stretches 243 kilometres along Victoria's Southern Ocean coastline, connecting Torquay to Allansford through some of the most dramatic cliff and beach scenery in Australia. Our Great Ocean Road tours cover the full route with a depth that a self-drive itinerary rarely achieves.

The Twelve Apostles are the headline attraction — and they genuinely earn it. Currently eight stacks remain standing (erosion has reduced the original number), and the best viewing is at dawn or dusk when the limestone glows amber and the coach tour crowds haven't yet arrived. Our pacing is intentional: we time our Apostles visit to avoid the midday rush that most day-trip operators don't bother to plan around.

What most visitors miss entirely is the Otway hinterland, just inland from the coast. Old-growth myrtle beech forest, waterfalls, and one of the most reliable wild koala spotting locations in Victoria — Kennett River — sit within easy reach of the main road. A slow morning walk through the Otways before the cliff-edge drama of the afternoon is a combination that consistently surprises guests who expected the road to be purely coastal.

Our Victoria tours extend the journey into Melbourne — one of the world's most liveable cities and Australia's undisputed culinary capital. We explore the laneways, rooftop bars, the Queen Victoria Market, and the First Nations cultural spaces at the Melbourne Museum, before heading into the Yarra Valley for cellar door visits at some of Victoria's finest cool-climate producers.

Best time to visit: October to April for the warmest and most stable weather. The Great Ocean Road is accessible year-round, but winter (June to August) brings cold winds and occasionally closed roads after storms. Autumn foliage in the Yarra Valley (April to May) is a genuinely beautiful bonus for late-season travellers.

Self-drive vs guided: Many travellers attempt the Great Ocean Road independently and find it more tiring than expected — the winding coastal roads demand concentration that leaves little room to actually absorb the scenery. A guided tour lets someone else handle the driving and the logistics while you focus on what's outside the window.

For wine lovers, we include the Yarra Valley and Mornington Peninsula, where boutique cellar doors produce some of Australia's finest Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.

Western Australia Food & Wine Tours

Western Australia produces just three percent of Australia's wine by volume — and arguably some of its finest. The Margaret River region, located 270 kilometres south of Perth, accounts for a disproportionate share of the country's premium Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay, partly because of its unique maritime climate (moderated by both the Indian and Southern oceans) and partly because the region attracted serious winemakers from the outset. Our Western Australia food and wine tours are built around accessing that quality at its source — not just the well-known labels, but the small-batch producers who rarely appear on restaurant lists east of the Nullarbor.

A typical day in Margaret River moves between cellar doors with genuine intention — an estate tasting with the winemaker in the morning, a long lunch at a hatted restaurant using produce grown within kilometres of the table, an afternoon visit to an artisan cheesemaker or chocolate producer, and an early evening at a boutique accommodation that understands why guests are there. It's a pace that rewards genuine food and wine interest rather than ticking off names on a list.

The wider WA itinerary includes time in Perth and Fremantle — a city that has developed a serious food culture of its own over the past decade, anchored by the Fremantle markets, the Little Creatures brewery, and a waterfront dining scene that takes full advantage of the Indian Ocean's extraordinary seafood. We also include Rottnest Island — a car-free island 19 kilometres offshore where quokkas (small native marsupials with a famously cheerful expression) outnumber humans, and the snorkelling over the island's artificial reef is excellent.

For guests interested in extending beyond Margaret River, our Western Australia tours can incorporate the Pemberton karri forests (home to trees exceeding 60 metres), the Manjimup truffle region, and the dramatic coastal scenery of the Dunsborough and Yallingup area.

Best time to visit: October to April for warm, dry weather ideal for long lunches outdoors and beach time. The Margaret River Gourmet Escape food and wine festival (typically held in November) is an excellent peg for travel planning if you can align dates.

Beyond Margaret River, guests explore Fremantle's vibrant seafood markets, cycle Rottnest Island to meet the famous quokkas, and discover the pristine beaches of the Dunsborough coastline. These tours are perfect for travellers searching for the best food in Western Australia combined with luxury coastal scenery and boutique accommodation.

Tasmania Wilderness & Wildlife Tours

Tasmania is the kind of destination that takes visitors by surprise. Australians who've never been tend to underestimate it; those who've been once tend to go back. It's a compact island — about the size of Ireland — but it packs in a wilderness, a food culture, a heritage, and an arts scene that few places its size can match. Our Tasmania tours are deliberately unhurried, because the island rewards slow travel more than almost anywhere else in Australia.

Cradle Mountain is the visual centrepiece — a jagged dolerite peak rising above a glacial lake in the heart of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. The Overland Track departs from its base, but our tours focus on the day walks and loop tracks that give guests the full landscape experience without requiring multi-day camping fitness. On a clear morning, the reflection of Cradle Mountain in Dove Lake is one of the most photographed views in the country — and one of the few that looks better in person than in the photograph.

Wineglass Bay in the Freycinet National Park is a similarly striking destination — a near-perfect crescent of white sand framed by pink granite peaks — and the 45-minute walk to the lookout above it is genuinely one of the best short hikes in Australia. We pair it with time in the Freycinet Lodge and, for guests who want to go deeper, sea kayaking through the bay's calm waters.

Port Arthur is the most significant convict heritage site in Australia, and it's handled with a thoughtfulness that exceeds expectations. The guided tours here — particularly the evening lantern-lit history walks — are among the most memorable experiences on any Tasmania itinerary.

The food story in Tasmania has become genuinely world-class over the past decade. Bruny Island oysters (grown in the island's cold, clean channel waters) are considered among the finest in the world. The Tamar Valley produces outstanding Pinot Noir and sparkling wine. Hobart's Salamanca Market on Saturday mornings is one of Australia's best farmers' markets, and MONA — the Museum of Old and New Art — has transformed Hobart into a genuine arts destination that draws visitors from around the world.

Best time to visit: November to March for the warmest weather and longest daylight hours. Cradle Mountain can receive snow at any time of year, so layering is essential regardless of season. The Dark Mofo winter festival (June) draws a dedicated arts crowd and is worth considering for travellers comfortable with cold-weather touring.

Queensland Tropical North & Gold Coast

Queensland is Australia's most geographically diverse state for touring. Within a single itinerary you can move from ancient rainforest to coral reef, from volcanic crater lakes to island national parks, from the sophisticated restaurant strip of Noosa to the theme parks of the Gold Coast. Our Queensland tours are designed to capture that range rather than treating one region as a backdrop for another.

In the Tropical North, the Atherton Tablelands are a revelation for guests who arrive expecting flat coastal tropics. This fertile volcanic plateau, rising 700–900 metres behind Cairns, is home to crater lakes of extraordinary colour, waterfalls, dairy farms producing some of Queensland's best cheese, and small towns with a distinct character shaped by decades of farming and rainforest proximity. It's a completely different experience to the coast — cooler, quieter, and genuinely off most tourist radars.

The Kuranda Scenic Railway remains one of Australia's great train journeys — 34 kilometres of hand-carved tunnel, curved timber trestle bridges, and rainforest canopy from Cairns to the village of Kuranda. We pair the train ascent with the Skyrail rainforest cableway descent, giving guests two entirely different perspectives on the same landscape in a single day.

Magnetic Island — 20 minutes by ferry from Townsville — is one of Queensland's most underrated island destinations. More than half of it is national park, it has one of the highest densities of wild koalas in Australia, and its bays and forts offer excellent snorkelling and WWII history in equal measure. It's a sharply different experience to the better-known Whitsundays, and one that suits guests looking for something less resort-driven.

In Southeast Queensland, our Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast itineraries balance beach time with the remarkable hinterland directly behind it — the Gondwana rainforests of Lamington National Park and the Glasshouse Mountains are both within an hour of the coast and offer serious bushwalking, wildlife spotting, and a landscape with genuine geological drama.

Best time to visit: The Tropical North is best from May to October — dry season, minimal humidity, and no stinger risk on most beaches. Southeast Queensland (Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast, Brisbane) is pleasant year-round, with peak beach weather from November to March. School holidays (particularly December to January) bring significant crowds to the Gold Coast theme parks — worth factoring into your timing if you prefer quieter experiences.

Luxury & Custom Travel Experiences

For travellers seeking exclusivity and complete flexibility, our private and tailor-made tours deliver bespoke itineraries built entirely around your pace, interests, budget and travel style. Whether it's a milestone anniversary, a family reunion, a corporate incentive trip or simply a desire for total privacy, our custom travel team will design an experience that is uniquely yours.

Our luxury and custom tour inclusions can feature:

• Private guides and luxury vehicles with flexible daily scheduling
• Premium lodge, boutique hotel and five-star resort stays
• Helicopter transfers, scenic flights and private charter boats
• Gourmet dining reservations at hatted and award-winning restaurants
• Winery masterclass tastings, private vineyard dinners and cooking classes
• VIP access to cultural events, sporting fixtures and exclusive experiences
• Dedicated concierge support from enquiry through to return home

Custom tours are available across all Australian states and territories, New Zealand, and our world travel destinations. Contact our Brisbane team to start planning your bespoke journey.

New Zealand Tours

New Zealand sits three hours from Australia's east coast and occupies a category of its own in the minds of most travellers who've been there. It's a country where the scale of the landscape feels disproportionate to its size — glaciers descending to temperate rainforest, fjords carved kilometres deep into mountain ranges, volcanic plateaus surrounded by geothermal vents, and coastlines that switch between drama and pastoral gentleness within minutes of each other. Our New Zealand tours are built around experiencing that contrast properly, rather than racing between highlights on a tight schedule.

South Island

The South Island is where New Zealand's reputation for wilderness is most fully earned. Milford Sound — technically a fjord, carved by glaciers rather than rivers — receives more than seven metres of rainfall annually, which means the waterfalls feeding it directly from the cliff faces above are almost always running. The best way to experience it is by overnight cruise, when the day visitors have left and the sound settles into a stillness that the photographs rarely capture.

Franz Josef and Fox glaciers descend to within 300 metres of sea level — an extraordinary geological circumstance that makes them accessible on foot in a way that high-altitude glaciers elsewhere in the world are not. Helicopter landings on the upper glacier fields give guests access to a blue-ice environment that simply doesn't exist anywhere else at this latitude.

Queenstown is the adventure capital — bungy jumping, jet boating, white-water rafting, skydiving, heli-hiking — but it's also become a genuinely sophisticated food and wine destination. The Central Otago wine region immediately surrounding it produces some of the world's finest cool-climate Pinot Noir, grown in a high-altitude continental climate that is unlike anywhere else in New Zealand. Our Queenstown itineraries balance the adrenaline with the cellar door, and both sides consistently rate as highlights.

North Island

The North Island offers a fundamentally different landscape — geothermal, volcanic, and deeply shaped by Maori culture in ways that are immediately apparent to visitors. Rotorua sits at the centre of the most accessible geothermal zone in the country: boiling mud pools, silica terraces, erupting geysers, and a pervasive sulphur smell that visitors either immediately accept or spend the first hour complaining about. It's also the best base for Maori cultural immersion — traditional hangi (earth oven) feasts, kapa haka performances, and guided heritage walks through sites of genuine historical significance.

The Hobbiton Movie Set near Matamata is one of New Zealand's most-visited attractions and, despite its pop-culture origins, a genuinely well-executed experience — the detail of the set construction and the surrounding Waikato farmland backdrop make it more impressive in person than the films suggest. The Bay of Islands in the far north is where New Zealand's European history effectively began, and the combination of colonial heritage, sailing, and Maori cultural sites around the Treaty of Waitangi grounds makes it one of the most historically layered destinations in the country.

New Zealand Food & Wine

New Zealand's wine regions are less famous than Australia's but increasingly hard to overlook. Marlborough — in the north of the South Island — produces Sauvignon Blanc that has set the global benchmark for the variety for three decades. Hawke's Bay on the North Island's east coast makes powerful Syrah and Bordeaux blends in a climate more comparable to Bordeaux than most New World regions. Wairarapa, Central Otago, and Waipara round out a wine map that rewards exploration far beyond the Marlborough headlines.

Our food and wine focused New Zealand tours pair cellar door visits with the country's outstanding seafood — green-lipped mussels from the Marlborough Sounds, Bluff oysters from the deep south, crayfish on the Kaikoura coast — and the farm-to-table restaurant culture that has developed strongly in Auckland, Wellington, and Queenstown over the past decade.

Best time to visit: December to March for warmest weather and longest days across both islands. The South Island's alpine regions are accessible for walking from November to April; outside those months, snow can close high passes. The North Island is genuinely pleasant year-round, though July and August bring the coldest and wettest conditions in most regions.

Combining Australia and New Zealand: Our most popular trans-Tasman packages pair the Great Barrier Reef with the South Island (two contrasting wilderness experiences), or Melbourne and the Great Ocean Road with Queenstown (two food and wine destinations with very different backdrops). Both combinations work naturally as two- to three-week itineraries without feeling rushed.

Our New Zealand journeys include:

• South Island fjords, glaciers and alpine scenery including Milford Sound, Franz Josef and Queenstown
• North Island geothermal wonders at Rotorua, Hobbiton film set tours, and the stunning Bay of Islands coastline
• New Zealand food and wine trails including Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc, Hawke's Bay reds and Central Otago Pinot Noir
• Adventure experiences in Queenstown and Wanaka — bungy jumping, jet boating, skydiving and heli-hiking
• Maori cultural immersion including traditional hangi feasts, ceremonial performances and guided heritage walks

Whether you're crossing the Tasman for a week-long escape or combining New Zealand with an Australian touring holiday, our packages are fully flexible and can be customised to suit your interests and budget.

World Tours

The same philosophy that shapes our Australian and New Zealand touring — small groups, genuine local guides, premium accommodation, itineraries paced for depth rather than distance — applies to every destination in our world travel program. The difference when you travel internationally with Cooee Tours is that you carry the logistical confidence of a team that has done the groundwork: the visas, the transfers, the local operators, the restaurant reservations, and the contingency planning that independent travel in unfamiliar destinations demands of you personally.

Europe Tours

Our Europe tours are designed for travellers who want to experience the continent beyond its most crowded postcards. We cover the classic capitals — Rome, Paris, Barcelona, Vienna, Prague — but the itineraries are built around the moments between the landmarks: a family-run trattoria in a Roman neighbourhood that hasn't appeared in a guidebook, an early morning in the Uffizi before the queues arrive, a day on the Amalfi Coast on a private boat rather than a shared ferry. The Greek Islands, Scandinavian fjords, and the Portuguese coast round out a Europe program that spans spring through autumn departures.

For Australian travellers in particular, Europe works well as an add-on to a longer Northern Hemisphere trip or as a standalone three-to-four-week journey. We handle the multi-country logistics — train connections, border crossings, currency, tipping conventions — so guests can focus on the experience rather than the administration.

Asia Journeys

Asia is the world's most varied continent for travel, and our Asia tours reflect that range. Japan remains our most-booked Asian destination — a country that rewards careful planning and guided access more than almost anywhere else. Cherry blossom season (late March to early April) and autumn foliage (November) are the peak periods, and our small group sizes allow access to ryokan (traditional inn) stays, private tea ceremony experiences, and temple visits timed to avoid the main crowds.

Vietnam's Mekong Delta, Bali's rice terraces and temple culture, India's Golden Triangle, and the ancient temple complexes of Cambodia and Thailand complete an Asia program built on depth rather than a surface-level sweep across the region. Many guests choose a single country focus — ten days in Japan, two weeks in Vietnam, a week in Bali — rather than attempting to cover multiple countries in one trip, and we consistently recommend that approach for a first visit to any Asian destination.

Africa Safaris

A guided safari in East or Southern Africa is, for many travellers, a once-in-a-lifetime experience — and one where the quality of the operation matters more than almost anywhere else in our program. Our Africa safari tours use experienced naturalist guides, small vehicle sizes (typically six to eight guests maximum), and camps that are positioned for wildlife access rather than proximity to airstrips or towns.

Kenya's Masai Mara during the Great Migration (July to October) is the headline — approximately 1.5 million wildebeest, zebra and gazelle crossing the Mara River in one of the most dramatic wildlife events on Earth. Tanzania's Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater, South Africa's Kruger National Park, and Botswana's Okavango Delta (traversed by mokoro canoe through papyrus channels) offer contrasting safari ecosystems that reward multi-destination itineraries for guests with two weeks or more.

For Australians, the Africa add-on that consistently surprises is the Zambian and Zimbabwean side of Victoria Falls — approximately twice the width of Niagara and generating a spray cloud visible from 50 kilometres away. It fits naturally into a southern Africa itinerary and requires no additional long-haul flying.

South America

Our South America tours centre on the continent's three most compelling long-haul experiences for Australian travellers: the Inca Trail and Machu Picchu in Peru, Patagonian glaciers and trekking in Argentina and Chile, and the Galapagos Islands — the most extraordinary wildlife encounter available on land anywhere in the world.

Machu Picchu rewards a slower approach than most visitors allow. Arriving the evening before, staying overnight in Aguas Calientes, and entering the site at opening (5am) before the day-trip crowds arrive from Cusco transforms the experience from a crowded viewpoint into something closer to a private audience with one of humanity's most extraordinary achievements. Our Peru itineraries are structured around this timing.

Patagonia — shared across the southern tips of Argentina and Chile — is one of the world's last great wilderness frontiers. Torres del Paine, the Perito Moreno Glacier, and the Carretera Austral together constitute a landscape so dramatic it can feel implausible even while you're standing in it. The logistics of getting there and around it are genuinely complex, which is where a guided tour pays for itself most clearly.

Middle East

Our Middle East tours focus on the region's depth of history and the contrast between its ancient heritage and its contemporary transformation. Jordan's Petra — the rose-red Nabataean city carved from sandstone cliffs — is the region's single most impressive archaeological site, and the Siq approach (a 1.2-kilometre narrow gorge that opens suddenly to reveal the Treasury facade) is one of the great theatrical moments in travel. We pair it with a night in the Wadi Rum desert, where Bedouin camps beneath the sandstone towers offer a stillness and a star-filled sky comparable to Australia's outback.

Egypt's pyramids at Giza remain genuinely awe-inspiring despite their familiarity — the sheer scale registers differently in person. Luxor's Valley of the Kings and the temples along the Nile between Aswan and Cairo constitute one of the most concentrated collections of ancient human achievement anywhere on Earth. Dubai serves as either a gateway or a destination in its own right, and Marrakech's medina, souks and riads provide a sensory contrast to every other destination in the program.

All world tours include: international flights from Australian capital cities, comprehensive pre-departure information, visa guidance where required, travel insurance recommendations, and the support of our Brisbane team before, during and after your journey.

• European cultural capitals and Mediterranean coastlines — Rome, Paris, Barcelona, the Amalfi Coast, Greek Islands and Scandinavian fjords
• Asian heritage, culinary and temple tours — Japan's cherry blossom season, Vietnam's Mekong Delta, Bali's rice terraces and India's Golden Triangle
• African safari and wildlife experiences — Kenya's Masai Mara, Tanzania's Serengeti, South Africa's Kruger National Park and Botswana's Okavango Delta
• South American adventures including Machu Picchu, Patagonian glaciers, the Amazon rainforest and the Galapagos Islands
• Middle Eastern history, architecture and luxury — Dubai, Jordan's Petra, Egypt's pyramids and the souks of Marrakech

All world tours include international flights from Australia, comprehensive travel insurance guidance, visa assistance where required, and the support of our Brisbane-based travel team before, during and after your trip.

Why Choose Cooee Tours for Your Australia Holiday?

There's no shortage of tour companies offering Australia packages. The difference with Cooee Tours comes down to three things: genuine local expertise, small group quality, and a team that genuinely cares about the places we take you to.

We prioritise experience over volume. Every tour balances iconic highlights with local stories, regional cuisine, and cultural depth. We don't try to see everything in one trip — instead, we focus on helping you experience each destination properly, with enough time to connect with the places and people that make travel meaningful.

Our reputation is built on consistency, expert planning, and delivering unforgettable journeys for travellers from Australia and around the world. We are proudly Australian-owned and Brisbane-based, and every member of our team has personally travelled the routes we sell. That firsthand experience means we can offer genuine recommendations, insider tips and honest advice — not scripted sales pitches.

We also believe in responsible travel. We partner with eco-certified operators, support local communities and Indigenous tourism enterprises, minimise single-use plastics on our tours, and actively choose suppliers who share our commitment to preserving the extraordinary destinations we visit for future generations.

What Are the Best Tours, Cooee has in Australia?

The best tours in Australia combine iconic destinations, premium accommodation, expert local guides, small group sizes, and seamless logistics. For travellers researching which tour company to book with, key factors to consider include group size, guide expertise, accommodation quality, included meals and experiences, flexibility, and genuine traveller reviews.

According to traveller demand, independent review platforms and 5-star guest feedback, the top-rated Australia tours include:

1. Great Barrier Reef & Tropical North Queensland Tours
2. Uluru & Red Centre Luxury Experiences
3. Great Ocean Road & Melbourne Scenic Journeys
4. Western Australia Food & Wine Tours
5. Tasmania Wilderness & Wildlife Tours
6. Kimberley & Top End Outback Expeditions
7. Sydney, Blue Mountains & Hunter Valley Packages
8. South Australia Barossa Valley & Kangaroo Island Tours

Cooee Tours consistently ranks among Australia's highest-rated small group tour providers, with a 4.8 out of 5 aggregate traveller rating and repeat booking rates that speak to the quality and consistency of every journey we deliver.

How to Choose the Right Australia Tour

With so many options available, selecting the right tour can feel overwhelming. We recommend starting with the experience you want — relaxation, adventure, food and wine, wildlife, cultural immersion, or a mix of everything. From there, consider the time of year (Australia's seasons vary dramatically by region), your budget, your fitness level, and whether you prefer a set-departure group tour or a custom private itinerary.

Our Brisbane-based travel team is available by phone, email or video call to help you choose the perfect tour. There's no obligation and no pressure — just genuine advice from people who know Australia inside out.

Australia Travel Trends 2026 & 2027

Demand for small group tours in Australia continues to grow strongly into 2026 and 2027. Post-pandemic, travellers are increasingly prioritising immersive experiences over packed itineraries, sustainable and eco-conscious travel options, luxury boutique accommodation over large chain hotels, and curated food and wine journeys that showcase regional producers and local flavours.

Several key trends are shaping the Australian travel landscape. First, there is growing demand for off-peak and shoulder-season travel, with savvy travellers choosing autumn and spring departures to enjoy lower prices, fewer crowds and ideal weather conditions. Second, multi-generational family travel is booming, with grandparents, parents and children exploring Australia together on tours designed to offer something for every age group.

Third, interest in Indigenous cultural tourism has surged, with travellers seeking deeper connections to Australia's 65,000-year-old First Nations heritage through guided cultural walks, art workshops, bush tucker experiences and storytelling sessions. Cooee Tours is proud to partner with Indigenous-owned tourism operators across Australia to deliver these experiences respectfully and authentically.

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Cooee Tours is positioned as a premium provider for 2026 and 2027 departures, offering early release itineraries, flexible booking options, interest-free payment plans and a best price guarantee on all published tours.

Explore Our Most Popular Australia & New Zealand Tours

Our most-booked guided travel experiences — from reef to rainforest, outback to fjord. Browse by destination or build your own custom itinerary with our Brisbane travel team.

• Great Barrier Reef Small Group Tours
• Uluru & Red Centre Luxury Tours
• Great Ocean Road Scenic Tours
• Western Australia Food & Wine Tours
• New Zealand South Island Guided Tours
• New Zealand North Island Explorer Tours
• Europe Small Group Tours
• Asia Guided Journeys
• Private & Custom Travel Experiences
• Early Bird & Seasonal Travel Deals