Despite our insatiable appetites for travel and burgeoning capacity to spend, Australians don’t have many immediate options for private island buyouts.
French Polynesia, the Maldives, or – if someone in the group has been reading the right magazines – Fiji, are all in the conversation. But when I went looking for the genuine best-value version of this trip, specifically for Aussies, I was surprised by what I found. And it is not where most Australians are currently looking.
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The trip we keep defaulting to has two problems, and they have both quietly got worse over the past five years.
The first is the journey. Malé and Papeete are commitments. The kind of trips that require a recovery day at each end, which means a seven-night booking is functionally a five-night holiday. This has remained largely unchanged since day dot.
The second is the maths. A top-end overwater villa at any of the marquee Maldivian properties – Soneva Jani, Cheval Blanc, the better Four Seasons – now lands somewhere between US$4,000 and US$8,000 per night for two people. Or around AU$5,600 – AU$11,200. That’s per villa, not per island. You’re still sharing the resort with dozens of other couples, several of whom will be filming sunrise yoga reels on the beach you hoped you’d have to yourself.
The “private” in private island has been doing increasingly heavy lifting of late. But again, definitely not in the Maldives, when framed in terms of value, where the Four Seasons’ Voavah private island starts at US$50,000 (~AU$70,000) per night.
So the conundrum faced by the very wealthy few (or the well-heeled dozen), is where can I actually take over an entire tropical island, with a credible operator, for a price that makes sense when split across the group I’d realistically travel with?
Fiji has Laucala, which is (apparently) genuinely excellent. But this is more of a resort takeover than a true buyout, and the rate sits north of US$150,000 (~AU$210,000) per night for the full property. Then you have to find 75 friends you want to spend time on an island with to make it work. No dice.
Vanuatu and the Cook Islands have private-island offerings, but nothing operating with the service infrastructure to be in the conversation.
The Reef has a handful of options that market the phrase “private island” with varying degrees of honesty – Pelorus might be the only true-to-category option, from around AU$25,000 per night for 11 people. But Aussies generally prefer to look outward when spending that sort of cash. Indonesia’s Nihi Sumba – once the ‘Best Hotel in the World’ – is neither private nor free of the aforementioned content-creator crowd. North Island in the Seychelles is too far to count.
What’s left, when you actually run the filter, is a property in the Anambas Islands that almost nobody in Australia is talking about.
Elang Private Residence sits within a six-island marine sanctuary in Indonesia’s Anambas Archipelago. It’s buyout-only – a completely private extension of the main resort, Bawah Reserve.
Six standalone cliffside lodges, seven bedrooms, sleeps anywhere from ten to nineteen people across adults and children. A personal butler, a private chef, a marine biologist, and a wellbeing practitioner all come standard. The island’s dedicated spa includes a daily treatment in the rate. Three meals a day, all non-alcoholic drinks, every island and water activity you can poke a stick at, and the run of Bawah’s resort facilities when you want them. It’s even hiding one of the most enviable hotel tennis courts in the world.
James Want, Editor of B.H. Magazine and someone whose benchmark for resort value runs considerably higher than most, stayed at Bawah Reserve with his wife two years ago. His take was one of incredible value for the proposition and price, even at the ‘main’ resort.
The nightly rate for Elang, according to the property’s own factsheet, starts at US$18,000 (~AU$25,200) for ten guests. At fourteen guests, it lifts to US$25,000.
Do that maths in Australian Dollars and split it across the group. Ten guests, current exchange, all-inclusive: roughly AU$2,800 per person, per night. Fourteen guests: a touch less. You’re paying the same money for an entire island that you would otherwise pay for a room in the Maldives.
The journey is the other half of the argument. You’re familiar with the ease of the eight-hour hop to Singapore already.
Then it’s an airport chauffeur drive to the 30-minute Batam ferry, another short drive to Hang Nadim airport, and an 80-minute seaplane flight out to Bawah’s lagoon on a ten-seater de Havilland Twin Otter. A short private boat across to Elang from there.
Three niggles worth noting: the seaplane runs a 15kg luggage limit (including hand carry), alcohol isn’t included in the rate (which feels like an oversight at this level, given the price of a case of Bintangs), and then there’s a US$980-per-person transport package, that resorts like Kokomo Fiji have long since learned to fold in to their top-tier villa offerings. None of them is a dealbreaker. I’m sure most of them could be negotiated.
And the journey, while shorter than the alternatives, still likely requires a Singapore overnighter at least at one end, which means you probably still need a week to make it worth your time.
All said and done, 2026 is an era of working smarter, not harder, when it comes to your travel budget. Run the numbers. Split them across a group. Then ask yourself why you’re still looking at Malé, because the answer to the maths and geography equation turns out to be in the Anambas – and it’s been there the whole time.
