Once-in-a-Lifetime Australian Vacation

Yearning to experience something truly rare and magical?  If so, consider visiting Australia’s Lake Eyre Basin (map), the lowest point on the continent for an event that happens only every 50 years.  Normally deserted, the Basin fills with water creating a lake that is roughly twice the size of Texas (map)!  Incredible! 

A great package has been put together by award-winning travel wholesaler Down Under Answers beginning September 11, 2010.  For just $6,099 per person (based on double occupancy), travelers will receive the following:

• Round-trip airfare on Qantas Airways from Los Angeles or San Francisco to Sydney and REX Airlines from Sydney to Broken Hill.
• One night accommodation in Broken Hill.
• Nine days of small group touring with an experienced guide and driver. Breakfast, lunch and dinner meals on the tour. Best available accommodations and all national park entry fees also included.
• Two nights’ accommodation at Sebel Pier 1 in Sydney.
• Round-trip seat-in-coach transfers from the Sydney airport to the hotel.

The tour of the Eyre Basin is bound to be spectacular as the lake goes from a barren desert incapable of hosting wildlife to being an oasis for flora and fauna and providing breeding grounds for six million birds, some of which from as far away as Japan (map) and China (map)!  The scent of the water also attracts frogs and other amphibians that have hibernating for five decades or and even wild camels have been known to appear.

The tour of the area sounds incredible, especially for nature-loving travelers, and includes stops in:

• Broken Hill, an isolated mining city of the outback known as the ‘Oasis of the West,’ and Tibooburra, established at the height of the Australian gold rush.
• Mutawintji National Park, with its breathtaking gorges and Aboriginal rock art, and the rolling red-sand dunes and grass-covered plains of Sturt National Park.
• The town of Innamincka, majestic red gum trees along the banks of the famous Cooper Creek, and a monument to Burke and Wills, explorers who perished in the desert of starvation and thiamine deficiency.
• The Diamantina River and Birdsville, in the heart of the Outback at the edge of the vast Simpson Desert, home to exotic wildlife including dingoes, red kangaroos and other marsupials, falcons, eagles, lizards and snakes.
• The old settlement of Marree, possible flights over Lake Eyre and the award-winning Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary, home to more than 160 bird species and the endangered yellow-footed rock wallaby.
• Gammon Ranges National Park, which offers spectacular scenery teeming with wildlife and a wealth of cultural heritage both European and Aboriginal.
• A return to Broken Hill where travelers can relax and enjoy the town.

For a detailed itinerary or information about booking, visit www.duatravel.com.