How Much Is A Camel Ride In Port Stephens?

Camel rides at Port Stephens are run by one operator, Oakfield Ranch, from the Birubi Point lower car park at the end of James Paterson Street in Anna Bay, right where the Stockton Bight dunes meet the patrolled end of the beach. The prices are the operator's own listed figures: A$50 for an adult and A$45 for a child under 15 on the 20 minute day ride, and A$140 per rider for the 60 minute sunset ride on Friday and Saturday evenings. The part that catches most visitors out is the booking side. Day rides are strictly walk-in, with no phone, email or online reservations taken, and there is no camel product on any tour booking platform at all. This page prices the camel rides exactly as the operator lists them, then prices the dune tours you can genuinely book ahead, because for most Port Stephens itineraries the two sit side by side. Since the day rides are walk-in only, planning what to wear matters just as much as planning when to arrive, and the guide to pants, shorts and footwear for camel rides at Anna Bay covers the operator's own clothing advice.

How Much Is A Camel Ride In Port Stephens?

A 20 minute camel day ride at Birubi Point is listed at A$50 per adult and A$45 per child under 15, with children aged 2 and up able to ride, two riders per camel, and a 130 kg weight limit per animal. The 60 minute sunset ride is listed at A$140 per rider and runs Friday and Saturday evenings only, with online booking essential. Day rides take no bookings at all.

Those are the operator's own published prices, and they are the only camel prices worth printing. Oakfield Ranch runs its day rides about every half hour from 10:00am, with the last departure at 3:30pm, six days a week. Wednesdays are closed outside holidays, and the rides run every day during NSW school and public holidays, which matters if you are visiting across the spring break that runs 28 September to 9 October 2026 or the summer holidays from 18 December 2026 to 27 January 2027.

The walk-in rule is the single most useful thing to know before you go. The operator's FAQ is blunt about it: no bookings are taken for day rides, you simply turn up, pay at the car park and join the next available departure. That makes the camel ride a flexible add-on if you are already at Birubi Point for the beach, the dune views or a 4WD tour, and a poor centrepiece if you are building a whole day around a guaranteed ride. On busy holiday mornings the queue forms early, and the last 3:30pm departure is a firm cut-off, not a guideline.

The sunset ride is the exception to the walk-in rule, and it is a different product. It costs A$140 per rider, runs for about an hour, departs only on Friday and Saturday evenings, and must be booked online in advance through the operator's own site. Riders must be 10 or older, and each camel carries one rider rather than the two-per-camel pairing of the day rides. If the sunset ride is the version you want, book it before you leave home; if the day ride is the version you want, no booking exists to make.

Because camels cannot be booked through this site or any tour platform, the practical play for most travellers is to pair the walk-in camel ride with a dune tour that can be reserved ahead. The three below are the bookable alternatives most often chosen by people who also want the camel experience at Birubi Point.

What Does The Sunset Camel Ride Include For A$140?

The A$140 sunset ride buys a 60 minute camel experience on Friday and Saturday evenings, one rider per camel, for ages 10 and up, booked online in advance. Day ride pricing does not apply to it, and no on-the-spot sunset bookings are taken, so the online booking is the gate to the whole experience.

The price difference between the A$50 day ride and the A$140 sunset ride is really a difference in product. The day ride is a 20 minute loop from the lower car park, two riders to a camel, running through the middle of the day alongside the steady flow of beach visitors. The sunset ride is a full hour on the dune side of Birubi Point, timed to the season so the light is right: departures shift across the year, earlier in winter and later in summer, and the operator confirms the exact time when you book.

Riders aged 10 to 15 pay the same A$140 as adults on the sunset ride, which makes it an expensive family outing compared with the day ride, where a parent and child pair would pay the adult and child prices on the same camel. For a family of four, the sunset ride costs four full A$140 places, while two day rides on two camels cost two adult and two child prices. Neither figure includes anything beyond the ride itself; there is no food, no photo package and no combined ticket with any other operator, and the operator asks that no drones be flown near the camels.

Weather governs both products. The operator runs rides in light rain if conditions still allow a pleasant experience and stops for inclement weather, and the wider Worimi Conservation Lands can close for poor weather or fire danger, which would stop the rides with them. Sunset bookings are the ones to watch here, because a Friday or Saturday storm costs you the slot rather than just delaying a walk-in. The operator's own pages carry the current conditions policy, and the NPWS local alerts page lists any active park warnings. If a storm does wash out your ride, the wet weather guide to Port Stephens covers which dune tours still run and how to fill the rest of the day indoors.

If your heart is set on the sunset ride, book it first and build the rest of the Port Stephens day around it. If you are flexible, the walk-in day ride slots easily around a booked dune tour, since both operate from the same stretch of Anna Bay coastline. The Birubi Beach 4WD tour below departs from the same neighbourhood and takes 75 minutes, which leaves plenty of time to walk over to the camel queue afterwards.

Why Can't You Book A Camel Ride Online Through A Tour Site?

Oakfield Ranch sells its 20 minute day rides walk-in only, at the Birubi Point lower car park, and its 60 minute sunset rides online through its own booking system only. No camel product appears on any tour booking platform, so no tour site, this one included, can sell you a camel ride or bundle one into a dune tour package.

This is worth stating plainly because the internet is full of vague suggestions that camels can be added to a Port Stephens day trip. They cannot, at least not as a bookable line item. The operator holds a Parks Eco Pass and is listed by NSW National Parks as the licensed commercial camel operator on the Worimi lands, which is exactly why its prices and rules come straight from its own pages and nowhere else. The NPWS listing describes the ride as a 20 minute day experience or a 60 minute sunset experience, matching the operator's own breakdown.

The practical consequence is planning advice rather than a warning. Treat the camel ride as a cash-and-queue activity: arrive at the lower car park, check the departure board, pay on the spot, and ride within the half hour. The operator accepts children from age 2 on day rides, caps each camel at 130 kg, and puts two riders per camel, so a household of five might wait for two or three camels rather than one. None of that can be arranged in advance.

It also means the camel ride pairs naturally with the things you can book. Sydney day tours that include a sandboarding segment at Anna Bay, the quad bike tours out of the Murrook Culture Centre, and the 4WD tours from the Anna Bay car parks all finish within a short drive or a walk of the camel queue. Our camel rides at Port Stephens guide covers the full operating picture, including the Wednesday closure and the holiday schedule, if you want the complete detail before planning a day around it.

One more honest limit: no public statement on camel welfare or animal care standards was found on the operator's site or in official sources, so this page makes no claim either way. If that question matters to you, ask the operator directly at the car park or through its own contact channels before you ride. The price is verified; the ethics are a conversation only you can have.

What Do The Bookable Dune Tours Cost Instead?

The bookable dune alternatives on this site start from $27.76 per person for unlimited sandboarding with Sand Dune Safaris, from $29.84 with 4WD Tours R Us, from $39.55 for the 75 minute Birubi Beach 4WD tour with sandboarding, and from $82.57 for the one hour Worimi quad bike adventure. All four are reservable ahead, unlike the walk-in camel day ride.

The cheapest way onto the sand is a sandboarding session, and the two big operators both run an unlimited-time format: a short 4WD transfer onto the dunes, then as many runs as your legs will tolerate, typically one to two hours. Sand Dune Safaris is the only operator here offering both sit-down and stand-up boards, according to its own page, and its listing is rated 4.7 from 212 reviews at from $27.76 per person, with children 3 and under free. 4WD Tours R Us, a family-owned operator running since February 2015, is the most reviewed dune product on the coast at 4.5 from 574 reviews, from $29.84 per person, and NSW National Parks lists it as a licensed Worimi sandboarding operator.

The Birubi Beach 4WD tour occupies the middle of the price range and overlaps most directly with the camel ride in experience and location. It costs from $39.55 per person, runs 75 minutes, and is rated 4.8 from 127 reviews. It departs from the red 4WD and reception trailer near the Anna Bay end of the beach, includes sandboarding on the dunes, and covers the coastal drive that most visitors picture when they think of Stockton Bight. Free cancellation applies, which the camel day ride's walk-in model makes moot but which matters when you are locking in a holiday itinerary.

At the top of the dune price range sits the quad bike adventure: one hour on a quad across the Worimi lands, from $82.57 per person, rated 4.8 from 254 reviews. Drivers must be 16 or over, the operator Sand Dune Adventures is Aboriginal-owned, and the listing's transfers run on Saturdays only, so weekday and Sunday riders self-drive to the Murrook Culture Centre meeting point. It is the most physically involved of the three, and the closest in per-person cost to the A$50 camel day ride once you count the extra hour of activity.

For comparison, a camel day ride at A$50 per adult buys 20 minutes, and the A$140 sunset ride buys 60. Per minute of activity the dune tours are dramatically cheaper, but that framing is unfair to the camels: nobody rides a camel for cardio. The honest comparison is what each adds to a Port Stephens day, and the answer is usually both, a booked dune tour for the bulk of the outing and a walk-in camel ride as the memorable finish. If the animal welfare side of that finish is on your mind, this look at whether camel rides hurt the camels covers what the operator's rules and the science actually say.

The 4WD Tours R Us listing below is the value pick of the unlimited sandboarding pair and the most reviewed product on this whole site, which makes it a safe default if you simply want the cheapest bookable dune session near the camel queue.

Is A Camel Ride Or A Dune Tour Better Value For A Family?

For a family, a camel day ride means paying the A$50 adult and A$45 child prices for 20 minutes, while unlimited sandboarding starts from $27.76 per person for one to two hours of activity including the 4WD transfer. The dune tours win on value and on bookability; the camels win on novelty and on needing no plan at all.

The family maths deserves a proper look because the two experiences are priced so differently. Every rider on the camel day ride pays either the adult or the child price for a 20 minute loop, and the sunset ride charges every rider the full A$140. The same family on the Sand Dune Safaris sandboarding listing pays per-person rates from $27.76, and children 3 and under are free. The sandboarding session runs five to six times longer, includes the 4WD transfer onto the dunes, and can be cancelled for free if the weather turns.

Value is not the whole story, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest reporting. A camel ride is a slow, photogenic, story-generating 20 minutes that small children talk about for years; a sandboard is a fast, sandy, repeatable thrill that teenagers prefer. Families with a wide age spread often find the camel ride is the one activity everyone from a 2 year old to a grandparent can share, since the day ride takes riders from age 2 and pairs two to a camel. The dune tours have their own age texture: the quad bike tour is 16 and over for drivers, while the sandboarding listings welcome young children with free entry for infants.

There is also the timing question. The camel queue operates 10:00am to 3:30pm, and the sandboarding operators run sessions through the day, with Sand Dune Safaris' last shuttle to the dunes at 3:30pm and its last return at 5pm. Doing both in one Anna Bay visit is realistic: book a morning or midday sandboarding session, ride the dunes for an hour or two, then walk to the lower car park for an afternoon camel departure. In school holidays, when the camels run daily and the dunes are busiest, book the sandboarding first and let the walk-in camel ride flex around it.

If the quad bike tour is the family's pick for the older half of the group, the listing below is the one to check: one hour, from $82.57 per person, with Saturday transfers and self-drive meeting on other days.

What Else Should You Budget For Around Birubi Point?

Budget beyond the rides themselves for parking and timing, since the Birubi Point area is busy in holidays, and note that walking onto the Worimi lands is free while driving on the beach needs an online permit from A$33 for three days. Food and drink are not included on any camel or dune product, and the beach inside the park is unpatrolled and not advised for swimming.

The free part first: entry to the Worimi Conservation Lands is free for walkers, cyclists and horse riders, so walking from the Birubi Point car parks up onto the dune viewpoints costs nothing at all. Gan Gan Lookout and the Birubi Point headland give open views over the Stockton Bight dunes without a ticket, which makes them the zero-dollar version of the dune experience and a sensible warm-up while you wait for a camel departure.

The paid part, if you are driving your own 4WD onto the beach rather than taking a tour, is the beach vehicle permit. Since 3 March 2026 these are sold online only, and the listed prices are A$33 for a three-day permit, A$88 annual, A$44 annual pensioner and A$88 for the annual Recreational Vehicle Area permit used by conditionally registered quads and motorbikes. Guided tours include park entry in their price, which is one quiet advantage of booking a tour over self-driving: no permit, no tide timing, no recovery worries.

Two local cautions belong in any honest budget. The NPWS alert page lists the Worimi beach as unpatrolled and unsafe for swimming, with an active alert running from 23 September 2026 to 28 April 2027, so plan the swimming part of the day at Birubi Beach, the patrolled option nearby, not off the dunes. And the lands are always open in principle but can close for poor weather or fire danger, so a closure can appear overnight; the same alert page carries the current status.

If you are pulling the whole day together, our sandboarding cost breakdown covers the session prices in more detail, and the Birubi Point and Birubi Beach guide covers the car parks, the patrolled swimming area and the walking tracks around the headland. Between those two pages and this one, the money picture for an Anna Bay day is complete: camels from A$50 walk-in, sandboarding from $27.76 booked, permits from A$33 if you drive, and free access on foot. That full picture is what Port Stephens Sand Dune Tours exists to lay out.

Before the final wrap, here again are the three bookable dune tours that pair best with a walk-in camel ride at Birubi Point.

Common Questions About Camel Ride Prices In Port Stephens

How Much Is a Camel Ride in Port Stephens?

The operator's listed prices are A$50 per adult and A$45 per child under 15 for the 20 minute walk-in day ride, and A$140 per rider for the 60 minute sunset ride on Friday and Saturday evenings, booked online. Day rides take no bookings at all.

Can You Book a Camel Ride at Port Stephens in Advance?

Only the sunset ride, which must be booked online through the operator's own site. The 20 minute day rides are strictly walk-in from 10:00am to the last 3:30pm departure, with no phone, email or online reservations taken, and no camel product exists on any tour booking platform.

When Do Camel Rides Run at Birubi Point?

Six days a week, closed Wednesdays outside holidays, and every day during NSW school and public holidays. Day rides depart about every half hour from 10:00am, with the last departure at 3:30pm, from the Birubi Point lower car park on James Paterson Street, Anna Bay.

How Long Is the Camel Ride?

The day ride is 20 minutes and the sunset ride is 60 minutes. Day rides carry two riders per camel, while sunset rides carry one rider per camel and require riders to be 10 or older.

What Is Cheaper Than a Camel Ride on the Dunes?

Unlimited sandboarding starts from $27.76 per person with Sand Dune Safaris and from $29.84 with 4WD Tours R Us, both including the 4WD transfer, board hire and instruction, and both bookable ahead with free cancellation. The Birubi Beach 4WD tour with sandboarding starts from $39.55 per person.

Is There an Age or Weight Limit for the Camel Rides?

Day rides accept children from age 2, and infants under 2 are not allowed. Sunset rides require riders to be 10 or older. The weight limit is 130 kg per camel, and no drones are permitted near the animals.