Excellent Adventure: Season 2 - Australia!

 To be honest, I was surprised this blog was still on the internet, what with the great deletions by Google and the like. Like a digital Indiana Jones, I blew the dust off the keyboard, grabbed the "New Post" button and ran from the falling boulders of the new layout designer.

But here we are, firing up the ol' travel blog because, for the first time in a very long time, we are going on an adventure. Not that the last 12 years between posts hasn't being adventurous - we've been very busy - but mostly with things like having 3 kids, buying and renovating a house, living life and dealing with a once in a century pandemic.

Anyway, let me recap how we got into an adventurous position. In 2018, after another expensive holiday staying in a house, we were driving back to Melbourne and Michelle got it into her head that holidays would be a lot more fun (and cheaper!) if we got a camper trailer. My family had one when I was a kid, so I was greatly experienced in the ways of the camper trailer, and we'd seen a number of them while camping at the prom and we were impressed with the Swan Outback. "Sure" I said. So after a number of trips out to Bayswater Jayco and quite a few spreadsheets analysing the 2nd hand camper trailer market, we put in an order for a new 2019 Jayco Swan Outback.

We put it through its paces at the Prom and South East Australia, with notable trips including driving over the Snowy Mountains and a hasty escape from Mallacoota as the fires bore down in December 2019. We also went through a couple of tow vehicles, with a Mitsubishi Outlander proving to not be up to the task so we upgraded to a Pajero Sport, a fine specimen of the Wagon SUV. 

There wasn't much camping when the Coronavirus hit in early 2020, but friends of ours used the first lockdown to plan a SA, WA and NT trip with a giant caravan, which they embarked upon in 2021. Inspired by their Instagram feed we bought a big map and started to plot our own trip.

Planning a transcontinental camping trip

Well strictly speaking you do, but I wouldn't do it without some preparations. As the Russian Army has discovered recently in Ukraine, simply driving into the unknown with plenty of optimism but without the correct equipment and approach can end in tears. 

There's a planning process that needs to be performed! Routes mapped out, activities researched, campers improved, kit bought and so on. There are 2 ways to do this:

1. Join facebook forums, read all the #vanlife posts on instagram, read books about the Kimberley, the NT, find all the obscure travelling websites, chat to a park ranger from the Coorong to find out the best campsites, have a friend who is a travel writer (Hi Cath!) and do a 5 hour Facetime call with maps, photos, info on the best gorges in WA and all manner other manner of priceless info that only comes from being on the ground.

Or  

2. Be married to Michelle. She's very, very good at this planning and has thought about every detail down to the details of the details. Which campsites require a portable toilet, researching and buying the best firepit. Working out the campsites where you can use the firepit. What's the best recovery gear? what's the best price for the best recovery gear? What 12v connectors might be useful? Here's the best 12v fan for a camper plus all the stuff you need to hang it outside on the annex. Amazingly useful stuff that needs to be known well before you hook up the trailer and drive off.

After all that, you now can prepare to Simply Drive around Australia. Here's how we are doing it:

Travelling clockwise, we are heading to SA to begin and from there west to WA. North along the west coast, up to Cape Range near Exmouth, in to Karajini then up to the Kimberley. From there we go to Darwin, Kakadu and work our way south to the Alice, Kings Canyon and Uluru, finally back to Melbourne, ideally in time for the kids to get to school in time for Term 3. 

What will we do, I hear you ask? Mostly drive around by the look of things, but there will be plenty of beaches, lagoons, estuaries, gorges, caves, forests, reefs, sharks, fish, squid, boat rides, flies and red dust in between.   

So there we go, the adventure awaits. Click like and subscribe! #instathingsidontunderstand! and check back in regularly and we will keep you updated with our trip.