Sydney Walking Tours

What’s included and what’s not

Included on most walks:

• A guide for the length of the walk, with a voice amplifier or headsets on some walks
• Free stops at outdoor sites: Customs House forecourt, Macquarie Place Park, The Rocks lanes, Hyde Park
• A mobile voucher, so nothing to print

Not included unless the listing says so:

• Entry to Hyde Park Barracks and St Mary’s Cathedral. Both are marked as admission not included on the Ultimate Sydney Walking Tour, so you see the outside
• Food. Only the Ultimate tour adds a snack, and only the Small-Group City Walking Tour adds a coffee or tea
• Transport back to where you started, on the walks that finish somewhere else

Where the walks differ, the difference often decides the booking. The Ultimate tour ends with one small craft beer, cider or juice at Squire’s Landing on the harbour, for over 18s. The Badass Women walk gives you a hand-drawn postcard and a reading list afterwards. The True Crime walk sends a Casefiles eBook. The Aboriginal walk includes the smoking ceremony and transport between sites, which is why it runs longer than any city walk.

One listing contradicts itself. The Secrets and Scandals page lists lunch and building entry as included in one section and excluded in another. We read that as excluded until the operator confirms otherwise.

The day, hour by hour

This is the Ultimate Sydney Walking Tour as its listing lays it out, with the time the listing gives each stop. The stops add up to about 100 minutes of a 3.5 hour walk. The rest is walking between them.

• Start, 15 minutes Customs House on Alfred Street. Meet in front, by the steps and the access ramp.
• 15 minutes The Mint on Macquarie Street, which Museums of History NSW calls the oldest surviving public building in the CBD.
• 5 minutes Hyde Park Barracks from outside, part of the Australian Convict Sites listing with UNESCO. You do not go in.
• 10 minutes The Royal Botanic Garden.
• 5 to 10 minutes each The Queen Victoria Building, St Mary’s Cathedral, the General Post Office and Martin Place. This middle stretch is mostly walking.
• 30 minutes The Rocks, the longest stop, with the Opera House and Harbour Bridge in view as you pass.
• Finish, at about 3.5 hours Squire’s Landing by the Overseas Passenger Terminal, drink in hand, facing the Opera House.

One reviewer on the listing says the guide ran behind and they left before the drink. Another found the guide hard to hear over street noise, and the operator’s reply says to stand within 3 to 4 metres. Stand near the front at the noisy stops.

The shorter themed walks keep one area. The True Crime walk spends about 30 minutes in Hyde Park and 90 minutes in Darlinghurst, then stops at the Kinselas Hotel on Taylor Square. The Secrets and Scandals walk works north from St Andrew’s Cathedral past nine buildings and ends at the Archibald Fountain. The Badass Women walk is all pass-by stops, from Hyde Park down Macquarie Street to Nurses Walk and the Orient Hotel in The Rocks.

Meeting point and getting there

Customs House, 31 Alfred Street, is where four of these walks begin. It faces Circular Quay station, so the train, the ferries and the light rail all stop a minute away. Use Transport for NSW to plan the trip to Circular Quay. Each operator stands in a slightly different spot. The Ultimate tour meets by the steps and the ramp on the right as you face the building. The Small-Group City Walking Tour meets on the steps themselves.

The Archibald Fountain sits at the north end of Hyde Park. Two walks start here, the Badass Women walk and the Sydney Walking Tour including The Rocks. St James station is the closest. One listing tells taxi passengers to ask for St James station and walk over, because the 110 Elizabeth Street pin on Google Maps lands in the wrong place. Look for a pink flag or a pink She Shapes History shirt.

The Secrets and Scandals walk starts on George Street between St Andrew’s Cathedral and Town Hall, beside a round red seat. Town Hall station is underneath. The True Crime walk meets in the courtyard of the Hydeaway Cafe behind Museum station.

Four of the walks finish away from where they started. The Ultimate tour ends at Circular Quay, the long Rocks walk ends at Campbells Cove, the Badass Women walk ends on George Street in The Rocks and the True Crime walk ends in Darlinghurst. All are within a short walk or one stop of a train.

Late is late. These walks leave on the minute. If you are running behind, ring the number on your voucher. Do not ask Viator to hold the group, because they cannot.

What to bring

• Shoes you can walk 4 km in. The Rocks is cobblestones and worn sandstone steps, and one reviewer on the long Hyde Park route called the pace brisk.
• A hat and water from November to March. A reviewer on the same walk said the guide stopped in shade on a hot day, which tells you how hot it gets on Macquarie Street.
• A layer or a small umbrella. World Wild Hearts, in a video sponsored by GetYourGuide, found late May weather in Sydney very unpredictable and packed layers.
• A contactless card or phone to tap on. Four of six traveller videos we compared said tapping a bank card on trains and ferries just works, so getting to the start and home from a different finish is easy.
• Photo ID if you are on the Ultimate tour and want the beer at the end.

Leave the big backpack at the hotel. Some stops are inside churches and arcades, and a group of 16 squeezing past shoppers is slow enough already.

How to choose

What the dearer walks add, when you compare the cards, is time and group size rather than more sights. The 3 and 3.5 hour walks cap the group at 12 and add a coffee or a drink. The 2 hour walks take up to 25 people and stick to the outside of buildings. If The Rocks is all you want, the 90 minute The Rocks walking tours cover its lanes in more depth.

About free walking tours. Sydney has tip-based free walks, run by independent guides who are paid what the group chooses to give. They are not sold on Viator, so they are not in the grid, and we have not compared them. The paid walks here cap numbers and show the price before you go. Every one also allowed free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead.

Pick a paid walk if:

• you want a group capped at 12 or 16
• you want a theme, such as crime, women’s history or Glebe, or a pub walk instead with a drink at each stop
• you need wheelchair access, which two listings offer

Skip it if:

• you are happy to tip a guide and walk with a larger group
• you would rather do the Rocks lanes alone with a map, which our guide to free things to do in Sydney covers
• Rather ride than walk? Compare city sightseeing tours by bus and van

Season and timing

Spring and autumn are the easy months for a long walk. Three of the six traveller videos we compared recommend them over summer, mainly for the heat and the crowds. Summer from December to February is hot on the treeless stretches of Macquarie Street and George Street. Book a morning start.

Winter is cooler and sometimes wet. Check the Bureau of Meteorology forecast for Sydney the day before. Yellow Productions filmed in winter and got rain, and World Wild Hearts found late May changeable. The walks still run, so pack a layer rather than moving the date.

Time of day matters too. Most walks start between 10:00 and 11:00. A cruise ship at the Overseas Passenger Terminal can block the harbour view from Campbells Cove, which the guide on the Oz and Beyond interview mentions. Weekends bring The Rocks Markets, which three videos praise and which also slow a group of 16 down.

Book a few weeks ahead for the morning slots in December and January. Two of the themed walks say they are usually booked more than a month ahead.

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