Apollo vs Cruisin Motorhomes

Both rent automatic vans and motorhomes with a fitted kitchen, both include bedding on every booking, and both hire from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Cairns and Perth — every city Cruisin sells from on this site is one Apollo sells from too. Both set the minimum driver age at 21 and want a full rather than a provisional licence from every nominated driver, Apollo adding a two-year holding period and a ceiling of 75, Cruisin a ceiling of 79. Bathrooms sit differently inside similar fleets: Cruisin puts a shower and cassette toilet with hot and cold water in seven of its eight models, leaving only the 2 Berth Hi Top without, while Apollo confines them to its six Euro motorhomes — the Hitop and Endeavour carry neither, and the 4WD Adventure Camper has a cold external shower and no toilet at all. Heating is where the two are closest, and it flatters neither: Cruisin fits a living-area heater to every model and Apollo reverse-cycle to the Euro six, and on both fleets it runs on 240 V only, so nothing heats the living space away from a powered site. Apollo lists nine models, Cruisin eight of two to six berths, and neither publishes a vehicle count.

The calendar decides more of this pairing than the fleet does. Cruisin’s shortest hire is five days everywhere except Perth, which takes seven, rising to ten at every branch between 26 December and 6 January and in event weeks such as the Bathurst 1000 and the Melbourne MotoGP. Its mainland branches run 08:00 to 16:30 on weekdays and 08:00 to 13:00 on Saturdays, close on Sundays, and offer no after-hours pickup; an unauthorised late return costs A$150 a day on top of the rate. Apollo’s branches operate daily to roughly 3:00pm to 3:30pm, and its published terms set no comparable floor. Reach runs the same way: Apollo is searchable from all seven of this site’s Australian cities, Adelaide and Darwin included, while Cruisin’s home city of Hobart is one this site does not yet price, leaving it a five-city operator here. One-ways cost less with Cruisin, at A$165 against Apollo’s A$195 between two metro depots and A$295 on any route touching Perth or Darwin — but Cruisin attaches route minimums of ten to twenty-one days, fourteen on most routes touching Cairns and twenty-one on anything involving Perth, so the cheaper fee is only reachable on a long trip. Cancelling early is cheaper with Cruisin too: nothing until 29 days out and then 25 per cent, where Apollo’s ladder opens at a flat A$250 from 60 days.

Where each will let you drive, and what a claim costs, closes it out. Cruisin has no four-wheel-drive and no paid route around its road rule: every vehicle is confined to sealed roads bar a well-maintained access road under twelve kilometres to a recognised campground, so an unsealed leg means a different company. Apollo’s 4WD Adventure Camper is the one model across these two fleets cleared for the market’s restricted unsealed roads, and it is also the least equipped vehicle either of them sells — cold external shower, no toilet, cab-only heat and a kitchen below Euro-range standard — with the Gibb River Road needing Apollo’s written permission arranged in advance and the Canning Stock Route excluded outright. Money at the counter diverges as sharply. Apollo tiers bond and excess by class, A$5,000 on the Hitop and Endeavour, A$7,500 on the Euro range and A$8,000 on the 4WD, sells a standard reduction at roughly A$50 to A$60 a day and a fuller package at roughly A$60 to A$80, and excludes windscreen and tyre damage from every tier on every model. Cruisin holds one figure, A$5,000, but debits it to a physical credit card at pickup rather than placing a hold, with a 2.15 to 2.18 per cent card surcharge and refunds taking up to 14 working days; A$45 a day removes bond and liability together and A$55 a day adds windscreen, tyre, single-vehicle rollover, overhead and underbody, though awning, water and salt damage sit outside every tier.