greenlady

We're going to be moving to Australia in July (me, hubby and 2yo daughter) and I'm torn between going straight there or stopping over for a week holiday somewhere like Bali. On the one hand we could do with the relaxation and time to ourselves before we start on our new life and after all the stress of preparing to go (lots of family in Sydney so there wont be much time to ourselves there). On the other hand there's the stress of organising that on top of everything else, plus the extra money, and the fact that I might spend the whole time anticipating arriving in Oz.

So clearly this is very subjective and I will need to make up my own mind. I just wondered if others had experience/opinion one way or the other.

Thanks

ianandmel

Hi greenlady,
we're moving over in June and want to stop over in Hongkong to take advantage of their Disney Land. Our kids are 7,5 and 2 and Disney mad, but we could never quite stretch the budget to go to Paris or even DisneyWorld, but when we priced up the Hongkong one, we found that we'd pay for the 2 day ticket only approx GBP 160 (for all of us!!!). We're planning to stay for 4 days in total. We (grownups) have been to hongkong before so don't feel under pressure to do much sightseeing and can just go with the kids pace, ie see how they take to such a big city and such a different culture and just see what they fancy doing.

Without the Disney option, I think we still would have tried to fit in a little short break somewhere else in Asia, to break up the flight and also because we fear that once we land in Oz, we won't be able to do any longhaul holidays (ie to anywhere with such a different culture) for a while - we're expecting the move and the settling in phase to eat up most of our savings

I'll be watching this thread for other ideas, so far nothing is booked as yet, we're open to more childfriendly travel ideas!

greenlady

Hi ianandmel

Thanks for your reply. Fortunately my little lady doesn't know what disney is yet and she will be more than happy with a pool, some space to run around and some new people to practise her talking to.

Yes my main reason for stopping over is that once we get to oz we will also be busy sorting out our life and probably wont do it again for a while. I have spent all day looking at villas and hotels in Bali, but its going to add about £800 to the cost of flights (one-way tickets from Bali to Sydney not all that cheap as it turns out), not including accommodation on top. So its a pricy 1 week holiday ...

ianandmel

Yeah, after posing it, I was thinking that my 2 year old only really knows about Disney because of his older siblings... What a shame about the Bali prices! Have you looked into a trip via Thailand? A friend of mine has just been for a holiday with her children and loved how child friendly and family orientated everyone was! Also, last year when we were first looking for flights to Australia, Emirates was having a special offer with a 4 night stopover in Dubai, I do not remember how much it was on top of the normal flight price, but it was nowhere in the region of £800. I went before we had children, but all hotels had lovely pools and I remember that I was surprised that there were tons of children around (which admittedly back then rudely disturbed my hungover midday sleep :-) )

Bermudashorts

We didn't stop off anywhere, would have liked to but did not have time before starting work.

If we had stopped over somewhere it would probably have been Hong Kong and it would have simply been about taking advantage of the opportunity. Goodnes knows when we would want to have the time and money to travel back up to one of the Asian cities.

renth

Singapore or Hong Kong would be better stopover destinations than Bali. SIA and Cathay usually offer good stopover deals.

verystormy

Your plane will stop somewhere. Where depends on the airline you use. We stopped in Singapore and Singapore airlines do a fantastic deal called the Singapore stopover. It gives a choice of 5 star hotels with transfers and tickets to various attractions for a fraction of the normal cost. We paid $20 for two days in the Ritz

Penny45

I'd plump for Singapore too - you can do 'city things' and also have a few days at Sentosa. It will be rainy season in HK and Bangkok in July. Bali is lovely but it's got really expensive over the last few years and the traffic is just as bad as Jakarta.

EvannTel

Also f you choose to fly Malaysia you stop off in KL and they also do grat packages. We had a week in langkawi.

greenlady

Thanks for your suggestions. Unfortunately my other half is a bit of a beach bum and he's after more of a 'holiday' style holiday. He's already been to Singapore and didn't like it that much. Thailand is an option but we've been there before as well, and I don't fancy Dubai personally. I'd like to go to Hong Kong but my OH isn't interested!

The price is starting to seem a bit prohibitve in fact when I think about it. There's probably cheaper options but this was based on one-way tickets to Bali via Singapore (£1600 for all of us) and then one way flights to Sydney on Jetstar (the cheapest day the flights about $500 each even for a 2-year-old). Straight to Sydney from London is only £1800. Its crazy.

greenlady

Thanks Malaysia is another option, I might look up Langkawi. Would it be rainy season in Malaysia as well?

The Crow

We flew into Langkawi and out of KL a month later. We had a week's proper holiday in Langkawi and then travelled down through Malaysia and into Singapore. Our girls were 2 & 3 and were adored by the locals - so they had a great time! We made sure we stopped at some water parks too

Bermudashorts

Would it make more sense to book London - Singapore (say) - Sydney on one ticket with a stopover in Singapore (say) and then book return flights to and from Singapore for your beach sidetrip.

If you flew through Singpaore or say KL, then you could get return flights to one of the Malaysian beach resorts for about $150.

greenlady

Sounds amazing. And hats off to you for travelling for a month with 2 toddlers!
I've got some more research to do

greenlady

Yes it would be better that way if we went to Malaysia. I guess I assumed that as Bali is so much closer to Oz it would be easy and cheap to get to Sydney from there, hence I was looking at London-Bali flights initially.