Say what you will about the relative quality of her television show, but there’s one place Oprah can’t be topped:  her giveaways.  She gives away the best stuff to her studio audience, and now she’s managed to top herself in the show’s final season.  During her show, Oprah announced that she was sending her entire 300-person audience on a free 8 day, 7 night trip to Australia, thanks to a little help from Tourism Australia and Quantas.

“The Oprah Winfrey show has a world-wide audience across 145 countries and we are delighted to partner with Tourism Australia on this amazing opportunity to showcase the best Australia has to offer,” said Qantas CEO Alan Joyce.  The total cost of 300 round-trip tickets from Chicago to Australia is about 400,000 dollars, not including fees and various other expenses.  The audience will be traveling at the same time, but will be spread over several planes for logistics purposes, rather than simply cramming all 300 people into the same jumbo jet.

Interestingly enough, the give-away was announced by Quantas spokesman John Travolta.  That’s right, the actor.  He serves as Quantas’ ambassador at large, and his personal jumbo jet is a former Quantas jet.  No word on whether or not he’ll be the one flying Oprah to Australia, but that would be awesome if it was true.

Tags: Oprah Winfrey, Oprah sends audience to Australia, free trip to Australia, Australian trip for Oprah audience, Quantas, John Travolta, unusual giveaways, free 8-day trip to Australia for Oprah audience, television, Tourism Australia

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