The studio behind your best stories
Joyful Sunrise started with one field guide, a battered LandCruiser and a strong opinion about how Australia should be travelled. Ten years on we're eleven people — same opinion.
Built one sunset at a time
We never set out to be big. We set out to be the agency that answers honestly — and we're stubborn enough to have stayed that way.
"I kept meeting travellers who'd 'done Australia' in eleven days and remembered none of it. So I started planning the opposite."
— Jack Merritt, founderThe LandCruiser years
Jack runs private Red Centre trips out of Alice Springs — three guests, one esky, every sunset watched properly. Word spreads mostly by campfire.
A desk in Deakin
We open the Canberra studio and add our first coastal routes. The rule is set: nobody sells a region they haven't walked.
The quiet season
Border closures nearly end us. We survive on domestic bookings and learn to build trips that flex with weather, closures and life.
Beyond the bush
City weekends join the map — chef-table Melbourne, harbour Sydney, and the casino hotels that actually earn their stars.
Where we are now
214 journeys designed, 46 regions covered, and a waiting list for the Kimberley season that still makes us slightly nervous.
A holiday is the only thing you buy hoping to be changed by it. So we plan for the memory, not the itinerary.
Four of the eleven you'll meet
Small team, overlapping obsessions. Whoever picks up the phone has personally done the trip you're asking about.
Founder · Routes
Jack Merritt
Ex-field guide, 11 seasons in the Centre. Still insists on watching one sunset per scout trip "for quality control".
Desert & North
Travel architect
Sarah Okafor
Former marine guide out of Cairns. Designs every reef itinerary and personally knows which moorings stay empty.
Reef & Islands
Travel architect
Tom Reilly
Rail tragic and outback mechanic in a former life. If a route involves a dirt road, Tom has probably driven it twice.
Outback & Rail
City & events desk
Priya Chandran
Books the tables and suites nobody else can. Runs our casino events calendar and the NYE seat list.
Cities & EventsWhat we do between bookings
The research and side-projects that keep our routes honest — most of it ends up folded into your itinerary.
The Empty Lookout Index
Our private database of 340+ viewpoints and their crowd patterns — updated after every scout run.
Reef Health Log
Five years of visibility and bleaching notes from our Cairns departures, shared with marine partners.
2% Promise
A slice of every fare funds land-care and reef projects in the regions our travellers visit.
The Almanac
Our annual print journal — 64 pages of routes, honest reviews and photographs from the road.
Registered, insured, accountable
"The rare agency that talks you out of the expensive option when it's the wrong one."
— Traveller's Notebook, on our 2025 season review
Come plan something with us
Fifteen minutes, one honest conversation. If we're not the right fit for your trip, we'll say so and point you somewhere good.