Australian Families Vote their Top 10 Resorts

Queensland and Fiji have scooped the pool as homes to the favourite Australian and overseas resorts for families, according to the country’s leading family travel and lifestyle magazine, Holidays with Kids.

All of the top 10 Australian resorts for families are in Queensland while five of the 10 best overseas family resorts are in Fiji, according to Holidays with Kids’ annual survey of readers.

The new 2007/08 summer edition of Holidays with Kids, out this week, lists Paradise Resort on the Gold Coast as the number one family resort in Australia while Shangri-La’s Fijian Resort on Yanuca Island in Fiji was nominated as the leading overseas resort for families. The Treasure Island Holiday Park on the Gold Coast was also voted as the favourite holiday park for Australian families.

“Our latest Top 10 survey shows beach resorts are still the number one holiday experience for Australian families, with parents and kids seeking sun, sand and surf to spend quality time together,” said Holidays with Kids editor Cathy Wagstaff.

“There is no more reliable inspector of a family-friendly resort than a parent and of course the harshest critics of all are children themselves who are very fussy when it comes to living it up away from home,” Ms Wagstaff said. “The results of our annual survey, therefore, should come in handy to other families seeking an ideal holiday destination.”

The latest 200-page edition of Holidays with Kids features stories on beach holidays, Mauritius, the Whitsundays, Northern Territory, cool camping spots and a trip to Tasmania by the magazine’s new ambassadors Kieren and Symantha Perkins and their children. A $10,000 family holiday prize to Thailand is also up for grabs.

The magazine’s popular website – www.holidayswithkids.com.au, which features information on all the top 10 properties – also boasts a new digital version of the magazine with a page-turning function creating a virtual magazine. The site also offers the latest family holiday deals and tips on travelling with kids.

Top 10 Australian Resorts as voted by Holidays with Kids readers:

1. Paradise resort, Gold Coast, QLD
2. Sea World Resort, Gold Coast, QLD
3. Club Med Lindeman Island, QLD
4. Novotel Twin Waters Resort, Sunshine Coast, QLD
5. Hyatt Regency Coolum, Sunshine Coast, QLD
6. Couran Cove Island Resort, Stradbroke Island, QLD
7. Reef View Hotel, Hamilton Island, Whitsundays, QLD
8. Rydges Capricorn Resort, Yepoon, QLD
9. Turtle Beach Resort, Gold Coast, QLD
10. Great Keppel Island Resort, QLD

Top 10 Overseas Resorts:

1. Shangri-La’s Fijian Resort, Yanuca Island, Fiji
2. Bali Dynasty Resort, Bali
3. The Naviti Resort, Fiji
4. Le Lagon Resort, Vanuatu
5. Disneyland Resort, California, USA
6. Plantation Island Resort, Fiji
7. Aggie Greys Lagoon Beach Resort and Spa, Samoa
8. Outrigger Resort, Fiji
9. Treasure Island Resort, Fiji
10. Westin Resort, Nusa Dua, Bali

Top 10 Holiday Parks:

1. Treasure Island Holiday Park, Gold Coast, QLD
2. Ashmore Palms Holiday Village, Gold Coast, QLD
3. Blue Dolphin Holiday Resort, Yamba, NSW
4. Cairns Coconut Caravan Resort, Cairns, QLD
5. Happy Hallidays Holiday Park, Forster, NSW
6. One Mile Beach Holiday Park, Port Stephens, NSW
7. Adelaide Shore Caravan Resort, SA
8. Murramurang Resort, Batemans Bay, NSW
9. Adventure Whitsunday Resort, Airlie Beach, QLD
10. North Star Holiday Resort, Hastings Point, NSW

Holidays with Kids is Australia’s largest and most widely distributed travel magazine*, with a circulation of 60,000 copies and more than 600,000 readers, making it the country’s leading authority on family travel. The Holidays with Kids website (www.holidayswithkids.com.au) receives almost four million hits and 740,000 page views per month and has more than 33,000 online members.

* Holidays with Kids is the highest circulating travel magazine in Australia that serves both consumers and travel agents as audited by CAB. Total number of readers includes in-flight readership on Australia’s leading airline.

A Report by The Mole