TravelEssence UK Anmeldelser 

We came across Travel Essence at the Manchester Destinations show in '23. We knew little about them: the UK arm of a pan European company.
We gave Kieran a call to help / inspire us planning a trip to NSW and South Australia in late '24. We are so glad we gave them a call.
Kieran took time to listen and understand our aims, needs and limitations. Willing to accommodate any tweaks he built the perfect trip for us.
Accommodation was spot on, recommendations for places to visit spot on, all vouchers, car hire and contacts worked well. Head Office support was superb.
We are so glad we used Travel Essence on what was to be our last trip to Aus, so much so that we've decided to do another trip to what is a wonderful country and are in touch with them again.
Thank you Kieran, Lisette and the whole team.

TravelEssence was a joy to work with. They know the New Zealand landscape extraordinarily well. Our accommodations were always above expectation. The activities booked were great fun and well timed with the travel necessary. They were easy to contact when needed and responded quickly. Being Canadian we booked our own airfare but everything else was handled by the lovely people at TravelEssence. Cannot recommend them highly enough.

Travelled with Singapore Airlines. Gave us excellent service on four flights arranged by Travel Essence, who also arranged all our six places to stay in Singapore and New Zealand. No complaints at all, as agent Kieran listened to what we needed and the company gave us what we wanted and more. Saw beautiful scenery and met lovely people. Highly recommended.

I came across TravelEssence by chance, but soooo glad I did.
I'd wanted to visit New Zealand for as long as I could remember and their personal, listen and recommend approach to supporting potential clients worked perfectly for us.
Our wish-list for "small tours, quirky accommodation, varied activities, plus some genuine NZ culture" were all accommodated, and some additional suggestions made by our expert Kieran during our 3 preparatory calls, once he knew the things we liked doing.

Mother nature had a few surprises up her sleeve whilst we were away, which included heavy rain and a landslide, meaning our route and accommodation had to be changed at short notice. The office team had spotted this and sent an email to make sure we were aware and propose a plan B. It was very reassuring to get this message, as we'd been out of mobile signal range overnight, so were unaware of the situation. It also gave us the comfort to know that someone was keeping an eye on our progress despite being thousands of miles away.

I would genuinely recommend using this team if you plan to visit New Zealand and can only assume the same company ethos is applied to trips to Australia too.

We first met TravelEssence at the Destinations travel show in London in early 2024 when we were researching our first, and possibly only, trip to Australia. We were immediately struck by their philosophy and approach to travel and choice of unique accommodation.
Planning for our trip started straight after the show and we were impressed by the initial itinerary and the willingness and ability of our travel consultant to make changes to suit our particular needs and wishes. Within a very few weeks the itinerary was finalised and bookings made.
The flow of information from the start right through to us departing was excellent and all the arrangements for our month-long trip worked seamlessly. The accommodation, both in the cities and off the beaten track, was unique and amazing enabling us to get up close and personal to the diverse wildlife of the country and feel like we were locals. Just what we had hoped for.
We would not hesitate using the company again for future trips and can unreservedly recommend them to others, which we have already done!

Kieran and TravelEssence saved us so many hours pouring over booking websites and travel blogs and decision-making for our 3 week travel through New Zealand with 2 kids, aged 2 and 5. He understood our family travel needs (maybe even better than we did ourselves) and worked around some existing commitments in New Zealand to generate a wonderful itinerary that allowed us to see a lot in 3 weeks without burning out from too fast a pace. The accommodations were memorable and home-like--very much doubt we could have found them on our own.

Kieran and the Travel Essence team arranged a wonderful trip to New Zealand for us and our two daughters, aged 16 and 12. Kieran took the time to really understand our needs and priorities then very quickly came up with an itinerary that worked brilliantly for us. It was a fantastic trip that exceeded our expectations and we're very happy to recommend Travel Essence.

Hi all
Very happy with the services, i will use again and recommended

Thank you so much
for responsive . We had a great experienced about south Australia,,
It was no hassle booking, and was excellent services .
I can highly recommend!

This Gibb River Road WA road trip was well organised and well thought out by the planner at TravelEssence. It gave us the opportunity to experience the best of the sights on the Gibb by combining 4 longer drives with 4 stop overs allowing a couple of full days at each place to explore.
The route guides were pre-loaded into the personal document page and was great, as it removed the stress of finding the directions and we knew in advance how to plan travel days.
The boutique style accommodation's were exactly what we wanted having had an in-depth discussion about our expectations for this trip.
The planner used his personal experience to help guide our trip.
The team were responsive to any queries and knew their stuff.
Thanks for an epic road trip

We came across Travel Essence when Googling “off the beaten track” travel in Australia and they proved to be exactly what we needed. Kieran was very knowledgeable and immediately understood the type of trip we were hoping for. We needed an itinerary that incorporated a five night snorkelling boat trip and a second thirteen night boat trip through the Kimberley that we were going to book ourselves. Kieran made many excellent suggestions for places to visit and stay in very remote parts of north Western Australia and the Top End, driving distances were just right to experience a taste of a “road trip” without taking up too much time and the proposed internal flights meant we could cover a large area. All the arrangements for accommodation, hire car and places to stay worked without fault. We were supplied with extremely comprehensive written details. Communication from the team back in London was always prompt, friendly and helpful.
Can’t recommend this company highly enough to organise an amazing, bespoke adventure in Australia.

Kieran and the team at Travel essence planned our six-week retirement adventure in New Zealand.
The experiences they recommended have created memories that will stay with us for many years. Staying in small-scale accommodations, rather than large hotels, felt so personal and our hosts passed on their tips and knowledge of their area. We saw so much more of the country than we would have done otherwise.

We came across Travel Essence at the Destinations travel show in Manchester whilst we were planning a three month trip to New Zealand and Australia.

We signed up to two of their webinars hosted by Kieran, one on New Zealand and one on Australia, with the sole purpose of getting further insights to help in our planning. We were really impressed with Kieran’s knowledge, direct experience and openness and the lack of any sales pressure so we followed up with a personal meeting with him to explore further.

Kieran was attentive, friendly, inquisitive and listened to our interests and offered some great advice and went away and planned a fantastic bespoke itinerary which we progressively tweaked and refined through a number of sessions with him. He was very flexible and keen to ensure we got quality and value for money. There were parts of our trip in Australia that we self organised and Kieran would work around that and also offer suggestions for those parts of our trip not supported by Travel Essence.

The planning was exceptional and that was borne out by our experience. We were in New Zealand for 9 weeks and the accommodation, route and pacing were all first class. We stayed in some wonderful places, in a variety of accommodation each offering something a little different and bespoke. Some of the pre organised trips built around our interests were superb. The Doubtful Sound overnight trip was particularly memorable.

Everything was really smooth even interlocking the parts we organised in Australia with those that Travel Essence organised , a testament to the back office support through Lisette which was also first rate.

I can’t recommend Travel Essence highly enough. A very friendly yet professional set up offering a bespoke quality service at a competitive price.

TravelEssence gave us sound advice, tweaked their proposals to suit our particular needs, made numerous bookings on our behalf, and enabled us to have a better, richer holiday in New Zealand than if we'd tried to do it by ourselves. Overall, it was a very rewarding experience.

We had been invited to a family wedding in Australia and decided to take the opportunity to add on a few weeks in New Zealand for a special holiday. Planning started 15 months before the wedding! I found the Travelessence website quite by chance but was impressed with the content and gave them a call. Kieran took time to understand where we would like to go the sort of accommodation we like to stay in, the activities we might like to take part in, and our budget. The online video was also useful, as it changed our decision from starting in the North Island and moving to the South, to the opposite way! Kieran was always happy to make any changes and eventually the final itinerary was decided. The documentation we received was detailed and informative and covered everything from flights to car hire, accommodation directions and contact details, information on each of the areas and emergency contact information. We had an amazing time, stayed in some fabulous places, saw fantastic scenery, met lots of fellow travellers and great hosts. The highlight for us was an overnight boat trip on the Doubtful Sound, truly awesome!

Our planning for a trip to New Zealand began over a year ahead of our departure date. Having met Kieran, our consultant from Travel Essence, at the Destinations travel show in Manchester, we watched an online presentation and then decided to book a personal consultation where we discussed our preferences and interests. From this, Kieran produced a personalised holiday plan for us which we were able to tweak so the itinerary fully met our requirements. Once we had confirmed the plan, Travel Essence were then able to commence the bookings. It is worth doing this early as good accommodation in New Zealand can be booked up very early.

A few weeks before our departure date Travel Essence sent us a detailed itinerary which included full details of all the accommodation, travel and activities. This proved invaluable and we never had any problems with any of the bookings throughout our 7-week trip – very impressive.

We were very pleased with the quality of the accommodation that Travel Essence had booked. We included boutique bed and breakfast, hotels, and self-catering cottages in our holiday. These were often in beautiful locations with fantastic views. Our hosts were invariably extremely helpful and gave us lots of local information on things to do and see. All the accommodation was of a very high standard and there were often little ‘extras’ provided which helped make the holiday special.

We really enjoyed the activities booked by Travel Essence. Highlights for us included an overnight cruise on Doubtful Sound, a jet boat ride on the Dart River and a day sailing on a catamaran in the Bay of Islands.

We cannot recommend Travel Essence highly enough. The personalised service and meticulous planning helped make this the holiday of a lifetime.

As we had previously travelled with…
As we had previously travelled with Travel Essence to Australia, where we had enjoyed a marvelous holiday, it made perfect sense to go with them again.
Our holiday was split between Tasmania, where we spent a week and then five weeks in New Zealand. Travel Essence arranged all our travel to Australia and then onto New Zealand via Melbourne.
They organised a total of 3 hire cars for us in Tasmania, and both the South and North islands in New Zealand and all transactions, pick ups and drop offs went smoothly.
In New Zealand the self drive tour took in every type of landscape across the islands allowing us to really discover and enjoy the country and the people and wildlife living there.
Each holiday is organised individually, with activities planned around your preferences, hence we went on boat trips, kayak trips, into towns, villages, had guides taking us around local landmarks and also enjoyed trekking across the vast open spaces up and around the mountains and the coast.
We mainly spent 3 nights at each location, where the hosts would provide a superb breakfast and provide maps and ideas about places to visit or in our case walk to.
On our travels we met several other holiday makers also touring with Travel Essence and we all agreed it was real value for money and that their careful planning made our holidays stress free, relaxing and really enjoyable. The detailed itineraries that we received allowed us to always know where we should be and what we would be doing. Great fun.

TravelEssence planned our month-long honeymoon in New Zealand in March and we cannot recommend them enough. From the first enquiry, Kieran was friendly, responsive and knowledgeable and he helped us plan the most incredible four weeks based on our interests and preferences. Lisette and the front office team were also friendly and quick to respond and sorted all the behind the scenes things - thank you so much. The trip itself was fantastic, everything went smoothly and everything was ready and waiting for us. We honestly barely had to think about anything when we were out there, it was such a treat! All the accommodation that TE work with are great and we thoroughly enjoyed all our stops. We would recommend TE to anyone wanting a personalised and fantastic trip to New Zealand planned by a fantastic company.

TravelEssence UK put together a personalised itinerary for a trip to New Zealand South Island and Australia. It was extremely varied and very interesting. The accommodation suited our needs and gave us the opportunity to stay in a wide range of places including hotels, private accommodation and also a farm. We were give lots of information before the trip. Unfortunately, due to bad weather some of our activities were canceled. TravelEssence provided very prompt refunds. They provided excellent support throughout the trip.

Kieran and the team at Travel essence put together a fantastic holiday for us, we spent 5 weeks in New Zealand, staying in some amazing places and having the best holiday we've ever had.
The whole thing was very well planned went without any problems