Gordon River Cruises or World Heritage Cruises?

Two companies run the Gordon River cruise from Strahan, and they are close rivals: both sail every morning from The Esplanade, both go to Hells Gates, the fish farms, Heritage Landing and Sarah Island, both include lunch, and both start at A$165 an adult (November 2026). Gordon River Cruises, owned by NRMA Tasmania, sails at 8:30 am on the hybrid Spirit of the Wild and visits the river before Sarah Island. World Heritage Cruises, run by the Grining family, sails at 9 am on the Harbour Master II and visits Sarah Island first, for an hour. The 8:30 am cruise is Strahan: Gordon River Cruise with Lunch & Sarah Island Walk, from US$116 (checked November 2026).

The calendar above is Gordon River Cruises’ morning cruise, with 469 reviews (checked November 2026).

The short answer

There is no bad choice; the differences are in the details. Pick Gordon River Cruises for the earlier start, the quiet electric running on the river, a buffet lunch, and a Premier Upper Deck with an open bar if you want to spend more. Pick World Heritage Cruises for a longer, earlier stop on Sarah Island (a 1-hour guided tour), lunch served to your seat, a family business that has run boats from Strahan for generations, and the Huon pine sawmill demonstration at the end. With children, World Heritage Cruises' main-deck child fare is the lower one (A$75 against A$80); in a window seat, Gordon River Cruises’ child fare is lower (A$90 against A$99).

Side by side

Operator facts and A$ fares from each operator’s own pages, November 2026. Child fares are for ages 3 to 16; under-2s travel free on both. The upper-deck fares are the same for any age.

The boats

The Spirit of the Wild has a hybrid drive: it crosses Macquarie Harbour on its engines and switches to electric motors on the Gordon River, which Gordon River Cruises calls Whisper Mode. The Harbour Master II is the newer of the two boats, a catamaran of almost 35 m built in Tasmania by Richardson Devine Marine and launched in October 2020. Both have enclosed decks with outside deck space and a bar on board, and both are wheelchair accessible on the main deck.

The order of the stops

This is the real difference in the day. Gordon River Cruises goes up the river first, while the morning is still young, and visits Sarah Island on the way home after lunch. World Heritage Cruises lands you on Sarah Island first, for a 1-hour guided tour, then cruises the river for about two hours with lunch and the Heritage Landing walk, and finishes with a demonstration at a Huon pine sawmill in Strahan. If Sarah Island and its convict history are the part you care about most, the hour there is the reason to pick World Heritage Cruises; Sarah Island has more.

The seats, and what more money buys

On both boats the cheapest seat is in the middle of the main deck, and the window seats cost more. On Gordon River Cruises the step up is the Premier Upper Deck at A$355, with a gourmet lunch, an open bar, morning and afternoon tea with canapes, and a private viewing deck; there is no child fare on that deck. On World Heritage Cruises the upper deck costs A$215 in the centre or A$230 at the window and adds morning tea and a drink; the upper-deck window seats are recliners. On either boat you are free to move about and go out on deck, so the seat matters most for lunch and on a wet day.

Booking through GetYourGuide or Viator

Both morning cruises are on GetYourGuide from US$116 (checked November 2026): Gordon River Cruises with 469 reviews and World Heritage Cruises with 1,267. On Viator, Gordon River Cruises is from US$118 with 4.8 from 1,643 reviews and World Heritage Cruises from US$118 with 4.8 from 1,262 reviews (checked November 2026). The listings let you cancel free of charge up to 3 days before on Gordon River Cruises and up to 2 days before on World Heritage Cruises on GetYourGuide.

Prices, ratings and review counts from the listings (GetYourGuide checked November 2026; Viator checked November 2026). Operators price by date and season, so treat the figures as the shape of the market, not a quote.