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Short on time? Experience an epic few days with Journey Beyond Rail

Screaming at the computer and snapping at the kids? Need a break but don’t think a long weekend will cut it? What if we told you you could go on a trip that uses only a few of your vacay days but actually feels like a month’s worth of tranquillity? Enter Journey Beyond’s Epic Few Days.

Screaming at the computer and snapping at the kids? Need a break but don’t think a long weekend will cut it? What if we told you you could go on a trip that uses only a few of your vacay days but actually feels like a month’s worth of tranquillity? Enter Journey Beyond’s Epic Few Days.

Yes, we mean Journey Beyond, travel legends and lovers of the trail less travelled. And yes, we mean Australia. Travellers will say that to see the best of the Australian outback you have to sacrifice comfort and time. Those travellers haven’t been on a Journey Beyond Rail experience.

The amount Journey Beyond packs into their 3- or 4-day rail journeys is almost like they created a time machine, stretching, bending, and warping time so that you come away as rested as if you’d been on an extended holiday.

A long, long weekend

Leave the everyday world behind you as you step onboard The Ghan.
Leave the everyday world behind you as you step onboard The Ghan.

Journey Beyond’s classic rail journeys – aboard The Ghan, the Indian Pacific, the Great Southern – take the hard work out of exploring vast Australia. They neatly package each journey into one of convenience, style, and mind-blowing wonder.

The luxury and comfort of these iconic locomotives take a perceived long journey and make it fit into a long weekend! How? It’s like every train alters the fabric of time and space so you, their honoured guest, don’t miss out on experiencing the best of Australia no matter your holiday timeframe.

Train time vs real time

Time aboard a train is different from ‘real’ time, have you noticed? It’s stretchy and unhurried and slows to match the train’s rhythm as it clickety-clacks its way across the Australian plains.

The joy of train travel is never the destination but the journey, and, for that, you’re rewarded with experiences that are neither too fast nor too slow. This is especially true about Australia’s iconic rail journeys. Not only because of the lands they cross or the distance they travel, but because Journey Beyond’s trains invoke memories of times past when things were simpler and days felt richer.

Think about The Ghan, one of the world’s most iconic rail journeys. When The Ghan first traversed from Adelaide to Darwin some 90+ years ago, the pressures of the day were less. Less jam-packed schedules, less juggling, less stress. To board The Ghan today is to invoke those times, to take part in its celebrated history in a perfect blend of comfort and adventure.

Time expands when you’re having fun

The stretchiness of time with Journey Beyond Rail begins the moment the train departs the station. As landscapes change and endless plains roll into hills, lakes, and plateaus, everything slows.

Aboard one of Journey Beyond’s rail adventures, you also engage in the luxury of time. Time to savour the best of Australia’s food and wine served in the company of like-minded travellers. Time to hear good stories alongside the new ones you’re creating.

Whether you’re aboard the Great Southern, the Indian Pacific, or The Ghan, it may only be an Epic Few Days of your busy life, but it’s creating the memories of a lifetime.

A journey back in time

Off Train Experiences are also provided including a Nitmiluk First Gorge Art Cruise in Katherine, when travelling on The Ghan.
Off Train Experiences are also provided including a Nitmiluk First Gorge Art Cruise in Katherine, when travelling on The Ghan.

One of The Ghan’s most popular Off Train Experiences is a trip back in time at Nitmiluk Gorge, in Katherine, NT. The everyday pressures of jobs and bills and missing socks simply vanish as you cruise through the sandstone cliffs of the ancient First Gorge.

Learning Dreamtime stories about the significance of the Gorge for the Jawoyn people only amplifies that sense of journeying back in time. This is heightened as you walk to the top of First Gorge to see the Indigenous rock art that connects the Jawoyn people to the last Ice Age.

Savour your time

While in our day-to-day life, we may proclaim that time is moving at a rapid pace (is 2022 the faster year ever?), when you’re introduced to something new, in a way that allows you to savour the moments for posterity, time adjusts dramatically. Life aboard the Great Southern offers this in so many ways (remember we told you how great it is recently?).

Take the Hunter Valley Off Train Experience, for example. Where most of us have a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it 7-hour work day, this 7-hour tour stretches luxuriously in front. The pleasure of sipping wines amid the cosy cellar doors in Australia’s oldest wine region seems to elongate the day in the best possible way. As you savour the generous wine tastings and leisurely, unhurried lunch, you’ll also savour the moments of taking time out for you.

Slow travel at its finest

Off Train Experiences are also provided, including dinner under the stars at Rawlinna (the world’s largest sheep station), when travelling on the Indian Pacific.
Off Train Experiences are also provided, including dinner under the stars at Rawlinna (the world’s largest sheep station), when travelling on the Indian Pacific.

The Indian Pacific offers slow travel at its finest! Journey from Perth to Sydney (or vice versus) over 4-days, 3-nights, passing Western Australia’s, South Australia’s, and New South Wales’ idyllic scenery.

Expect a shift in your perspective about time when you hop off the Indian Pacific at the remote town of Rawlinna. Time is different for the locals here; it has to be – it’s five hours from the nearest big town! Plus, when you have 80,000 sheep for company your perception of a day is vastly different.

You’ll experience this mind-altering shift when you alight for the Rawlinna Off Train Experience. Witness the outback come to life at dawn while enjoying morning refreshments, it’s another way this adventure changes you.

Agent deets

Ready to expand time and experience an Epic Few Days? Journey Beyond’s 2023 epic rail journeys are on sale now, and the irony? The journeys slow time right down, yet their 2023 sales are already booking up fast: no time to wait on these! Contact Journey Beyond’s res team on 1800 703 357 or email tradesales@journeybeyond.com.

To encourage your clients to enjoy a short break (with a long break feel), download the campaign assets for these fabulous rail journeys. Marketing materials include social media tiles and flyers which can be found at the Journey Beyond Experience Hub on the Tools and Assets page.

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