Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020 |

# Vanuatu &amp; Papua - how much time for each? Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea
daphna79 01:16 UTC 30 Jul 2007 | Hi I am travelling in about two weeks time to Papua and/or Vanuatu. My total travel time is 3 and a half weeks, so my question is: For three and a half weeks, is it worth my while to split my time between, say, Vanuatu and Papua or would it be better to use all my time to explore just one of them ? I've never been before and will probably not be again in the near future, so any advice will help! Thanks Daphna |
Laszlo 08:12 UTC 01 Aug 2007 | I would definitely prefer spending 3.5 weeks in just one of them. Even if you do that, you can only see a small part of either unless you plan to take lots of expensive flights. Also the 2 countries are very expensive to connect with each other. Of the two, PNG is much more diverse, but also more spread out thus more expensive to get around. For a novice traveller, especially a female one, Vanuatu might be the better choice. Save PNG for a later, hopefully longer trip! | 1
huitzilipoxtle 13:46 UTC 09 Aug 2007 | But even Vanuatu is quite diverse, and while it doesn't cover a huge area, there are so many different islands to go to. Considering how infrequent the plane service is to many of the outlying islands, and how difficult it is to get around most of the islands, you typically would only be able to meaningfully fit in 4 or so islands in a 3 1/2 week trip - even on such a schedule I found myself really stressed, due to the primitive infrastructure. Check with Vanair (their website is currently unavailable, however). That said, if you really want to get away from it, Vanuatu does the job. I enjoyed Pentecost a lot, and also heard that the Banks and Torres Islands are beautiful places to chill out. | 2