Home > Compare Tour & Adventure Operators > AAT Kings vs Travelmarvel
AAT Kings vs Travelmarvel
Compare the travel styles, pricing, destinations and popularity of AAT Kings and Travelmarvel.The Low Down
AAT Kings have partnered with Global Journeys since our inception, and as a result we have an in-depth understanding of all their trips, through both Australia and New Zealand. Our team have journeyed with them on 9 tours through New Zealand, Tasmania, South Australia, Northern Territory and Queensland. That close relationship also means we can deliver fantastic savings throughout the year. AAT King's core multi-day coach tours cater mainly for those over 55+, whilst their short breaks in the Northern Territory tend to attract a more diverse range of ages. All coaches are first class, and AAT Kings pride themselves on their tour guides - many of which have been with them for decades!
The lesser known, but equally popular Travelmarvel, is the sister brand of APT. Positioned as a premium Operator, but a level down from APT with regards to pricing, inclusions and the age of it's river ships. Travelmarvel & APT share the same past passenger Rewards Scheme, and many of our clients like prefer to spend a little less, knowing they are still backed by one of Australasia's premier touring companies. With it's roots in coach touring through Australia and New Zealand, Travelmarvel now offer river cruises in Europe & Asia, tours and cruises in Canada and trips around South & Central America. As Platinum Partners of APT & Travelmarvel, our consulting team have an in-depth knowledge and have personally experienced travelling with Travelmarvel and would relish the opportunity to help organise your next holiday.
Stats
No. of Trips
78
No. of Departures
4,304
Avg. Trip Length
9 Days
Avg. Price Per Day
$508
Accommodation
3.5 - 4 Star
Budget
Affordable & Premium
Trip Styles Coach ToursShort BreaksCity Breaks
No. of Trips
257
No. of Departures
1,793
Avg. Trip Length
15 Days
Avg. Price Per Day
$548
Accommodation
4 Star
Budget
Affordable & Premium
In Their Own Words We asked the travel companies themselves why you should travel with them
Choosing AAT Kings for your Australia or New Zealand holiday guarantees you’ll benefit from the insider secrets, off-the-beaten-path destinations and authentic interactions with local characters that only 100 years of experience can provide. With over a hundred years’ experience in sharing Australia with our guests, AAT Kings holds exclusive access to some truly unique locations, secret trails and roads less travelled that add so much value to the overall travel experience.
At AAT Kings, our on-road staff are best in class. Our Travel Directors, Driver Guides and Drivers are hand-picked for their passion, experience, and enthusiasm for the spectacular countries we live in. There is truly no one better to share with you the best destinations across Australia and New Zealand. We have been perfecting our itineraries and products for over 100 years, so the benefits gained from travelling with us are unrivalled. With over 150 expertly crafted holiday itineraries to choose from, we offer something for everyone.
Holiday memories are not just shaped by the incredible places you visit, but also by the wonderful people you meet along the way. At Travelmarvel, we know that great service is about going above and beyond, and that’s why our staff are regarded as a holiday highlight in their own right.
Travelmarvel holidays offer the perfect combination of all the highlights of the destination with outstanding quality and value for money - you won’t go wrong choosing Travelmavel for your next holiday adventure.
Recent Reviews
4.5
Wow..what a great trip we have just enjoyed with AAT Kings, thanks to Hannah and her colleagues at Global Journeys. We met some wonderful people and were in the capable hands of two lovely young ladies..Anna and Ash. Too many highlights to mention, but on a very personal level, travelling along the Stuart Highway past the stations our son worked on ...read more as a teenager in 1998 comes to mind. Thanks for all your help. The trip of a lifetime.
Loved the trip. A bit rushed. Too many early mornings and long days. Would love it if it was more spread out. The accommodation was excellent. Food and drinks were great. Fellow travellers were exceptionally friendly. NT is one place you must see. We went from 16 deg to 35 deg. Tour director and bus driver kept everyone upbeat with funny ditties and ...read more jokes. Yes - I would recommend AAT Kings.
Itinerary was good. Accommodations and included meals were good. We had a knowledgeable tour director and a safe driver. This trip covered two UNESCO sites namely Kakadu National Park and Uluru National Park. I enjoyed the Field of Lights and the natural wonder of sunrise over Uluru.
Fabulous trip only 1 hotel was issue at Tenant Creek, but trip was amazing, our tour guide Dave was amazing, his knowledge and nothing ever to much trouble for him, Fabulous guy, and our bus driver Mac, kept us safe with his skill of driving, and his jokes. One of our best trips,
I had a wonderful time travelling with a lovely bunch of people on this AAT Kings tour of the South Island of New Zealand. Most of the accommodation was wonderful and the included dinners were great. Our tour director and driver were fantastic. The only drawbacks were that the front page showing the itinerary with scenic stops was misleading as it ...read more was showing that Mt Cook was a sightseeing stop which never happened as whoever drew the route to Mt Cook was incorrect and would have had to get there from Omarama. Also we were only given 30 minutes to walk there and back to see Franz Joseph Glacier. I did not enjoy the train journey and when embarking we did not get time to look at the station. Overall it was a great tour but more time for the essential sightseeing stops would have been great. I also enjoyed the extra optional tours on offer such as The Glenorchy Lord of the rings tour and the Kiwi Bird Park.
My Tasmania Icons bus trip was just excellent. Visited places on my bucket list, plus more. Guide Carolyn Tipper has so much local knowledge as she lives in the state! Met some very nice travelling friends and plan to catch up in the future. Climate was great, humans can' t control that, Carolyn said March was a good time to visit, agree. Accommodation ...read more was beautiful, clean & well presented. Staff working at reception, restaurants very helpful & friendly.
4.6
It was a wonderful trip with friendly fun people. Tour guide and driver were top of the ladder. The only down side was having to sit on a bus for so long because the first part of the trip was so far from anywhere and each other. Motels were very good, food was excellent. Tracey Standing was very easy to work with.
What a fabulous trip with a great bunch of fellow travellers. The itinerary was packed but there is so much to see. I would definitely travel with Travelmarvel again and the booking through Global Journeys was so simple and easy and all done online. I will book again for another trip.
We enjoyed the cruise and the itinerary very much. The staff were very helpful, polite and attentive. The food was good. The boat was nice and modern and the cleaning was of a high standard. It is certainly a nice way to discover a little bit of Europe. The laundry service was reasonably priced, as no irons allowed in the rooms.
You could do as ...read more much or as little as you wanted in regards to tours and exploring on your own. We made some nice friends - tour was predominantly Australian, with a few Kiwis and Americans thrown in.
My only big disappointment was that we paid for a room with a french balcony, so that we could enjoy the views and fresh air. We spent the majority of the days, when the boat wasn't sailing (which was a lot), in darkness, because another boat was nearly always tethered to our side of the boat. And apart from a 1/2 day, it was always on our side of the boat. I don't recall this being mentioned when we booked. This got worse as the cruise went on, as many days were spent in port while the sailing was done later in the evening. Yes, you can go on deck, but we wanted to be able to chill out in our rooms by ourselves occasionally, and enjoy the view. I'm not sure that I would do another cruise because of this.
We also missed out on the Amsterdam canal cruise, due to Mardi Gras, which couldn't be helped, but still disappointing. A highlight was the boat sailing up and down the Danube River at night, so that we could see the very pretty lights of Budapest. Overall, we had a lovely time and experienced lots of lovely and interesting places! I also couldn't fault the staff - they all did a great job.
You could do as ...read more much or as little as you wanted in regards to tours and exploring on your own. We made some nice friends - tour was predominantly Australian, with a few Kiwis and Americans thrown in.
My only big disappointment was that we paid for a room with a french balcony, so that we could enjoy the views and fresh air. We spent the majority of the days, when the boat wasn't sailing (which was a lot), in darkness, because another boat was nearly always tethered to our side of the boat. And apart from a 1/2 day, it was always on our side of the boat. I don't recall this being mentioned when we booked. This got worse as the cruise went on, as many days were spent in port while the sailing was done later in the evening. Yes, you can go on deck, but we wanted to be able to chill out in our rooms by ourselves occasionally, and enjoy the view. I'm not sure that I would do another cruise because of this.
We also missed out on the Amsterdam canal cruise, due to Mardi Gras, which couldn't be helped, but still disappointing. A highlight was the boat sailing up and down the Danube River at night, so that we could see the very pretty lights of Budapest. Overall, we had a lovely time and experienced lots of lovely and interesting places! I also couldn't fault the staff - they all did a great job.
Seven nights of relaxed cruising. Great weather. Only 25 passengers. Good tour director and boat crew. Fabulous small towns to visit each day.
This cruise was extremely well organised with experienced and friendly guides. The zodiacs were a challenge at first but after a few days and gaining confidence in the driver it wasn’t as daunting. Some days it wasn’t possible to view the scenery behind you from the zodiac. Food, crew and fellow passengers were excellent.
Much to my surprise, this "tour" by Travel Marvel was in fact 2 subcontracted tours to local African providers and appeared loosely "co-ordinated" by Travelmarvel. As such, it was more like 2 distinct tours, with 2 different companies, one for southern Africa, the other for Kenya and Tanzania. The latter part was wonderful - Albatross Tours in Kenya ...read more and Tanzania did a wonderful, fully professional job with an outstanding knowledgeable guide and drivers, well crafted plans, excellent communication and implementation. Accommodation was excellent and transport also great - although there were some VERY long days (8 hours+) in 4wd's on dreadfully rough tracks which were tough on all of us and saw many of the older, less fit members of the group having to miss sections of the trip due to fatigue. Albatross would easily gain a 5 Star revue for their share of the trip.
Unfortunately, the same could not be said about Giltedge Travel who were responsible for the first part of the trip from Capetown or Kruger to Chobe River. Our Giltedge tour leader was a poor communicator, disorganised and not a good ambassador for Africa. After introducing himself to we 3 who joined the trip in Kruger he said that everyone on the original trip was sick with vomiting and diarrhea and to stay away from them! What a welcome!! He constantly criticised everything about Africa and expressed his strong desire to leave. His true interest was in photography and he spent most of his time in game parks taking photos for his own photographic business. Itinerary plans were clumsy at best - with large amounts of time devoted to standing around and waiting, or travelling back across areas we had already travelled.
Starting the tour in Kruger was a particularly awkward (and expensive) starting point, and should have started in Johannesburg when the rest of the group flew via there to Kruger. On day 2, after joining the group in Kruger, 3 of us were told we could not travel with the group to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe and would, instead travel on our own to Zambia - NOT Zimbabwe!! Our tour leader was unable to tell us the logistics of how we would be able to get from Zambia to Zimbabwe to meet up with the rest of the group and "assumed" it would all be OK. The 3 of us were extremely stressed and anxious by the whole concept of splitting the group and us having to make our own way.
On enquiry to Travelmarvel about what was happening we were told not enough seats had been booked on the flight for the whole group - despite the fact that we had booked more than 12 months in advance. Travelmarvel argued that the itinerary is a "guide" and that they reserve the right to alter it if necessary. We would never have believed that the small print meant being split away from the group and sent to another country - where we were not even covered by our travel insurance. Travelmarvel blamed Giltedge, Giltedge blamed Travelmarvel! In the end, we were met in Zambia and assisted by 4 different locals, across 3 different immigration borders and with 3 different means of transport in a long and arduous journey. When we finally got to meet up with the tour director, he told us to hurry and catch up with the group who had already started to walk around Victoria Falls. His instructions to us were to keep on the path and meet him at the coffee shop. The "path" turned out to be 4km long and an hour walk through some difficult terrain - guess he couldn't be bothered to walk - or tell us anything about the Falls. He'd already told the other group who travelled with him and couldn't be bothered to let the "stragglers" know.
The one highlight of the southern part of the trip was the 2-night stay on the Chobe Princess - an extra well worth the $$$. The time on the boat was wonderful, fabulous accommodation and food, an outstanding crew who listened to our interests and tailored the sightseeing to our wishes. They too had nothing to do with Travelmarvel but were operated by a separate company again, fortunately a FAR superior company to Giltedge - or Travelmarvel.
Our changeover from the southern part of the trip to the East African part was also a total mess. We were picked up from the Chobe Princess at 10.30 supposedly for our flight to Nairobi. We were taken to the lobby of a hotel in Chobe township, from where our tour leader left to fly back to South Africa, leaving us to wait .... A coach finally arrived for us at 4pm (5 hours after being dropped off in the lobby and after our tour leader had left!) We arrived into Nairobi, on time, as scheduled, at 10pm. A very slow transfer to the hotel, plus briefing and necessary re-packing of bags, saw us able to go to our rooms at 1.30am before an 8am departure for our Kenyan section of the trip.
It was a long, and expensive, tour to Africa. Africa never failed to disappoint, Wonderful, warm, helpful people, magnificent scenery, and amazing encounters with animals - especially in the East African section of the trip. Would I return to Africa - YES- definitely! Would I travel with Travelmarvel - NO - definitely not. Africa is a difficult area to travel in and the need for well planned, communicated and implemented plans is a must. Travelmarvel didn't demonstrate any of these qualities. Even their briefing notes attached to the final itinerary provided misleading, inaccurate and contradictory information - about luggage, currencies, health requirements, items to pack. Fortunately, there are many other companies that travel to Africa and they would certainly be where I would look again in the future. Many thanks to Georgie of Global Journeys who tried to help us with Travelmarvel. It was much appreciated - even though Travelmarvel's response was not!!
Unfortunately, the same could not be said about Giltedge Travel who were responsible for the first part of the trip from Capetown or Kruger to Chobe River. Our Giltedge tour leader was a poor communicator, disorganised and not a good ambassador for Africa. After introducing himself to we 3 who joined the trip in Kruger he said that everyone on the original trip was sick with vomiting and diarrhea and to stay away from them! What a welcome!! He constantly criticised everything about Africa and expressed his strong desire to leave. His true interest was in photography and he spent most of his time in game parks taking photos for his own photographic business. Itinerary plans were clumsy at best - with large amounts of time devoted to standing around and waiting, or travelling back across areas we had already travelled.
Starting the tour in Kruger was a particularly awkward (and expensive) starting point, and should have started in Johannesburg when the rest of the group flew via there to Kruger. On day 2, after joining the group in Kruger, 3 of us were told we could not travel with the group to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe and would, instead travel on our own to Zambia - NOT Zimbabwe!! Our tour leader was unable to tell us the logistics of how we would be able to get from Zambia to Zimbabwe to meet up with the rest of the group and "assumed" it would all be OK. The 3 of us were extremely stressed and anxious by the whole concept of splitting the group and us having to make our own way.
On enquiry to Travelmarvel about what was happening we were told not enough seats had been booked on the flight for the whole group - despite the fact that we had booked more than 12 months in advance. Travelmarvel argued that the itinerary is a "guide" and that they reserve the right to alter it if necessary. We would never have believed that the small print meant being split away from the group and sent to another country - where we were not even covered by our travel insurance. Travelmarvel blamed Giltedge, Giltedge blamed Travelmarvel! In the end, we were met in Zambia and assisted by 4 different locals, across 3 different immigration borders and with 3 different means of transport in a long and arduous journey. When we finally got to meet up with the tour director, he told us to hurry and catch up with the group who had already started to walk around Victoria Falls. His instructions to us were to keep on the path and meet him at the coffee shop. The "path" turned out to be 4km long and an hour walk through some difficult terrain - guess he couldn't be bothered to walk - or tell us anything about the Falls. He'd already told the other group who travelled with him and couldn't be bothered to let the "stragglers" know.
The one highlight of the southern part of the trip was the 2-night stay on the Chobe Princess - an extra well worth the $$$. The time on the boat was wonderful, fabulous accommodation and food, an outstanding crew who listened to our interests and tailored the sightseeing to our wishes. They too had nothing to do with Travelmarvel but were operated by a separate company again, fortunately a FAR superior company to Giltedge - or Travelmarvel.
Our changeover from the southern part of the trip to the East African part was also a total mess. We were picked up from the Chobe Princess at 10.30 supposedly for our flight to Nairobi. We were taken to the lobby of a hotel in Chobe township, from where our tour leader left to fly back to South Africa, leaving us to wait .... A coach finally arrived for us at 4pm (5 hours after being dropped off in the lobby and after our tour leader had left!) We arrived into Nairobi, on time, as scheduled, at 10pm. A very slow transfer to the hotel, plus briefing and necessary re-packing of bags, saw us able to go to our rooms at 1.30am before an 8am departure for our Kenyan section of the trip.
It was a long, and expensive, tour to Africa. Africa never failed to disappoint, Wonderful, warm, helpful people, magnificent scenery, and amazing encounters with animals - especially in the East African section of the trip. Would I return to Africa - YES- definitely! Would I travel with Travelmarvel - NO - definitely not. Africa is a difficult area to travel in and the need for well planned, communicated and implemented plans is a must. Travelmarvel didn't demonstrate any of these qualities. Even their briefing notes attached to the final itinerary provided misleading, inaccurate and contradictory information - about luggage, currencies, health requirements, items to pack. Fortunately, there are many other companies that travel to Africa and they would certainly be where I would look again in the future. Many thanks to Georgie of Global Journeys who tried to help us with Travelmarvel. It was much appreciated - even though Travelmarvel's response was not!!
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