Where to? Mystery tours are back in fashion.Credit: Tom Williams
All you're told is the departure date, how long you will be away and what you need to pack. You could be going to your dream destination ... or you could be going somewhere you would never have considered. Would you hand over your holiday dollars for a journey into the unknown?
The mystery tour concept was once limited to day trips and overnight escapes but next month a group of adventurous travellers will set off on a 15-day international mystery tour with tour operator Imaginative Traveller (www.imaginative-traveller.com.au).
Two Australians are among the group that will depart from London's Heathrow Airport to a destination unknown, at a cost of nearly $5000 a head for 15 days.
It might sound like a lot of money for a trip where you don't get to choose the itinerary but the tour sold out within weeks of being announced. Imaginative Traveller's Warren Smith says it is the first time the company has offered a mystery tour and the level of demand was unexpected.
"We were surprised; it wasn't a particularly cheap trip, either," Smith says.
"But they're getting something really unique and I think that's what turned people on."
Smith says a lot of effort went into finding a "new" destination for the mystery tour, especially important as all of the participants have travelled with the company before. "We're pretty sure none of them will have been there before," he says.
"It's a new area, it's quite different ... I think they're in for quite an adventure."
Smith says there are no vaccinations or visas required and travellers will be given advice on what to pack.
The concept will almost certainly be repeated in coming years, although Smith concedes it will be hard to keep coming up with new destinations.
He says the company is also unlikely to operate more than one mystery trip a year, in order to retain the uniqueness of the product.
Smith says he is not aware of any other company operating international mystery trips.
"I know of one company in Holland that did it a couple of years ago that's where we got the idea from but that's it," he says.
Mystery tours have been largely out of favour this decade, after being popular during the 1980s and '90s.
A big part of this was the 2001 collapse of Ansett, which operated many of the mystery tours on offer in Australia.
The concept has been revived by Sydney company Mystery Flights and a handful of small operators putting together weekend coach tours and other short breaks.
Online booking agency lastminute.com.au has found a niche in mystery hotel bookings.
The site offers "secret hotels", where you are only told the general location, star rating and facilities of the hotel at the time of booking.
Lastminute.com.au claims the anonymity gives hotels the ability to put super-cheap rates into the marketplace without alerting their competitors and leads to savings of up to 75 per cent on full rates.
For example, the company is offering a four-star secret hotel in Melbourne from $89 a night.
Spokeswoman Mia Carter says the secret hotels program was launched in Australia three years ago and has become one of the most popular products on the site.
"A secret hotel sells every four minutes," she says. "It gives people luxury at a fraction of the price."
While the risk in booking a mystery hotel is limited, the potential cons of booking a mystery tour are certainly there: you could end up somewhere you have been before, have little interest in or really dislike.
The main appeal of mystery tours is the excitement of setting off into the unknown, although there is also a lot of value to some in not having to (or being able to) spend time planning the trip.
The other big selling point is that some of the best travel experiences come out of unplanned visits you might see things you would never have otherwise seen.
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