ITINERARY FOR: EM14 Kokoda battlefields tour
6 nights Port Moresby, Popondetta, Kokoda
Tour includes land content only: purchase air tickets separately.
Tour package is available on demand any date for minimum 1 person

TOUR COST: (per person, rack rates)

Group of 1

Group of 2

Group of 3

Group of 4+

AUD$

AUD$ 2,910

AUD$

AUD$

TOUR INCLUSIONS
 Meet and greet on arrival at Port Moresby airport including familiarisation drive around city if time allows

  • Welcome kit including destination maps, background information, public phone calling card for emergencies and Ecotourism Melanesia polo shirt
  • Two nights premier twin-share room at Gateway Hotel including cooked breakfast
  • Full day Port Moresby war history tour as described, with English speaking driver/guide and detailed tour notes. Includes Bomana War Cemetery and Owers Corner (if weather and road conditions allow). Includes packed lunch.
  • Half day visit to national museum and botanical gardens. Includes packed lunch. (Museum not open on weekends.)
  • Meet and greet on arrival at Popondetta airport
  • 2-hour tour of Girua airfield complex, Oro Bay and Popondetta town
  • Two nights standard twin-share room at Lamington Lodge Hotel including cooked breakfast
  • Full day tour of Gona and Sanananda beach-head battlefields including sites fees, village gratuities, entry to village museums, local-style lunch, village dance group, dinghy transfers, guide
  • Return road transfers from Popondetta to Kokoda with enroute sightseeing stops
  • Two nights basic twin-share room with common bathroom at Kokoda mountain View Lodge including all meals
  • 2-hour walkaround tour of Kokoda battle sites including entry to Kokoda museum
  • Day 6 tour options either (1) day hike up Kokoda Track OR (2) walk to village for village experience OR (3) at leisure at Kokoda
  • Departure connection assistance and farewell at Port Moresby airport

TOUR EXCLUSIONS:

  • airfares
  • meals not specified in itinerary, or meals specified as not included
  • bar drinks, snacks, tips, souvenirs, personal items
  • bottled water (available from all shops in Port Moresby, Popondetta and Kokoda)


A view of Jackson's Air port Port Moresby

DAY 1: PORT MORESBY
Arrive Port Moresby with Air Niuigini/Qantas or Airlines PNG flight and overnight hotel. Ecotourism Melanesia will meet you on arrival at Jackson’s Airport and transfer you to the Gateway Hotel. If time allows, our driver/guide will take you for a drive around Port Moresby to show you the layout of the city.
Overnight Gateway Hotel (premier room with breakfast)

Owers Corner

DAY 2: PORT MORESBY
 Full day guided war history tour of Port Moresby area including Paga Hill fort, harbour defences, Macdhui shipwreck, Burns Peak ack-ack site, Jacksons airfield revetments and bomb craters, a visit to the modern history museum (if open) and/or a private war relics collection, then the Bomana War Cemetery and a drive up the majestic Sogeri Gorge and along a bumpy bush road to Owers Corner, the southern end of the Kokoda Track. If time and fitness allow, our guide can accompany you on a 1-hour hike down the first section of the Track to Goldie River and back. Includes packed lunch.
Overnight Gateway Hotel (premier room with breakfast)


Visiting a tree Kangaroo at National Mesium


A WW2 aircraft relics at Girua airfield

DAY 3: PORT MORESBY / POPONDETTA
Morning visit to the national museum and art gallery which has splendid displays of PNG culture, the next-door parliament house which is designed like a Sepik River Haus Tambaran (men’s spirit house) and the botanical gardens which have a magnificent range of flowering and non-flowering tropical flora including PNG’s famous orchids and gingers. Some animal enclosures with marsupials, birds of paradise and cassowaries allow visitors to see PNG fauna at close range. Includes packed lunch.

During the course of the morning your guide will help you check in early at the domestic terminal for your flight to Popondetta, and return to the airport at around noon for boarding. The flight departs at approximately 12.55pm

On arrival at Popondetta’s Girua airport you will be met by our local guide and take the scenic route into Popondetta town, stopping at Oro Bay where allied and Japanese ships unloaded supplies in 1942-43, the graves of missionaries executed by Japanese soldiers, and the Girua airfield complex with its overgrown runways, aircraft relics and numerous revetments. In Popondetta town, visit the Memorial Park which has excellent pictorial displays illustrating the Kokoda and Buna/Gona campaigns.

Overnight Lamington Lodge Hotel, Popondetta (standard room with breakfast)


Visit the remaining bones at Gona village war mesium

Day 4: POPONDETTA
Full day tour to Gona and Sanananda. Your guide will meet you after breakfast with a 4WD vehicle for the drive out to Gona village, the site of the first Japanese landings and the slaughter of Anglican missionaries in mid 1942. Months later, the marshes inland of Gona, Sanananda and Buna became a miry battlefield where retreating Japanese forces fought their last stand against Australian and American troops. At Gona you will visit the village war museum and be shown battle sites and rusting landing barges and other war relics lying in the tall grass. A short trip by motorised dinghy will bring you to Sanananda village where more relics and battle sites can be seen and the village guest house will put on a local-style lunch with cultural entertainment from a village dance group.

Transfer back to Popondetta and overnight Lamington Lodge Hotel (standard room with breakfast)


Kokoda war mesium
Day 5: POPONDETTA / KOKODA
After breakfast your guide will meet you once again and you will be transferred by road to Kokoda, a 3 hour trip passing through grassy plains, light forest and oil palm plantations, crossing the Kumusi River and stopping at points of interest.
At Kokoda, have lunch and a rest at the guest house before a walking tour of the small Kokoda township with stops at the tiny Kokoda museum, the cenotaph, and significant battle sites.

Overnight Kokoda Mountain View Lodge (basic single or twin room, shared bathroom, includes all meals)

Kokoda Mountain View Lodge
Day 6: KOKODA
Today you may choose from:
(1) a 6-hour guided hike up the first section of the Kokoda Track as far as Hoi village and return, (packed lunch provided),
(2) a visit to a nearby Kokoda village for a village experience (visit family homes, see how food is grown in the gardens and cooked by traditional methods, walk through the rainforest and see butterflies and orchids, swim in the crystal clear creek). There is a 1-hour walk each way to get to the village.
(3) relax at the lodge, explore the township at leisure, swim in the nearby river
Overnight Kokoda Mountain View Lodge (basic single or twin room, shared bathroom, includes all meals)

A view from freeway overlooking Port Moresby main Habour
 Day 7: KOKODA / PORT MORESBY
Morning road transfer to Popondetta airport (3.5 hour trip) to board Air Niugini flight to Port Moresby departing 1.50pm arriving 2.25pm. This flight connects with Airlines PNG’s 5.00pm flight to Cairns (Mon-Fri) or Air Niugini’s 6.25pm flight to Cairns on Fridays and Sundays only.
NB If Day 7 is a Wednesday there is also the option of a direct flight from Kokoda to Port Moresby (12.15pm/12.45pm) which also connects with afternoon flights to Cairns and Airlines PNG’s 2.00pm flight to Brisbane.
Ecotourism Melanesia will meet you on arrival from Popondetta and assist you to make your flight connection. If time allows, a trip to the PNG Art showroom for last minute souvenirs – an excellent range of carvings etc is available.