Welcome to our all-inclusive guide to Road Tripping Australia. Keep reading to see all of our Tips, Tricks and Hacks whilst we were on the road, exploring this huge country.
After living in a camper van for 7 months we have done our fair share of road trips around Australia. By now we feel we have acquired lots of tips,tricks and hacks to living on the road. Some are simply but important, others are what have saved us from pulling each others hair out. All we hope is that you can benefit from our experiences!
*This post might contain our affiliate links. This is at no extra cost to you, but you would be doing us a solid if you did use them. It shows us your appreciation after we have written this amazing travel guide for you 😏*
Road Tripping Australia – What Apps do you need for a road trip?
These apps were our lives on the road. They are your essentials in this modern world on any road trip around Australia.
📲 Wikki Camps
This beauty will be used more than any other app you have. By applying filters to your search you are able to find free camp spots, showers, toilets and points of interest. Not only does it not need wifi, but you can also see comments and photos by other travellers, some which can be really handy. For example we turned up at destination which was on the map as free hot showers and we read the comments and they lead us to the right door in which we needed to find for the one hot shower in the building. Using this app saved us hundreds if not thousands of dollars by free camping.
📲 MAP.ME
This is a map which you can use without wifi. All you need to do is pre download the area in which you will be driving through. Its pretty simply to use but when routing from A to B, take the eta with a pinch of salt as it is always wrong.
⛽ Fuel Map Australia
This ones for the organised person on your road trip. Simply enter your cars details and you can see all of the petrol stations with up to date prices of each fuel. We saved money by driving to the cheapest ones, especially in cities.
🌗 Lumos
This app shows you in real time where the sun and moon rises and sets. You just need to hold your phone up to the sky and move it around to see it in action. This is helpful as sometimes we would turn up to a campsite in the dark. Being able to tell where the sun would rise made it easier for us to park the van in different directions so we didn’t melt inside.
We have created Road Tripping Australia Guides for all the places we have visited. Here are some of our favourites.
South West Australia – The Best Bits
A Guide to The Great Ocean Road
Best Instagram Spots South Australia
Our Top Tips for road tripping Australia
🎧Podcasts saves lives – in particular My Dad Wrote a Porno. Sometimes you might be driving with someone who has different taste in music, which is fine but it can start to be annoying on those long drives after a few hours. We found that podcasts gave us a break from music and kept us awake, not to mention we were laughing for hours. This podcast is the funniest thing we’ve ever listened to and we highly recommend downloading it! Pots and pans will never be the same again.
🎟️ We highly recommend getting a Annual National Park Pass for which ever state you are visiting. By visiting three in the space of a year, you have already earned your money back. Every single national park has an entrance fee so it makes sense to save money when you can!
Our Top Tricks for any Road Trip
🥶 Free cold showers at the beach, don’t be ashamed to get your loofa out, because we sure as well did.
🥵 Hot showers more your thing? Most swimming centres will let you use the showers for a few dollars. If you’re anything like Milly, you will enjoy having clean hair every few days. This means we could charge electronics while we showered and could keep going on the road.
↠ Plan your weekly meals, that way you can be organised and utilise the food you have – but keep it simply. We lived off wrap toasties we cooked in a frying pan for a few weeks.
↠ Aldi over any other supermarket, tins are 1/4 of the price in Aldi. Your bank balance will thank us later.
Eating out Tricks
↠ 7/11 serve $1 Coffee
🍟 Mcdonalds serve $1 frozen coke + free wifi. Some new stores even have usb charging stations.
🌯Gomez and Golmers Mexican offer your first burrito free, if ordered on their app for collection.
Our Top Hack for road tripping Australia
The top hack for not spending any money on a road trip is so simple, it might be too obvious for most people to realise. The answer is to break things down, hear us out.
Most free camps (found on wiki camps) do not have hot showers or sometimes even toilets. Our solution was to cook dinner at a location which had toilets, often over looking the sea at the beach. When we were ready for bed we would drive to the free camp where ever it may be. In the mornings, the first thing we would do was drive to a hot shower. If it was a boiling hot day, use the free cold ones at the beach! Its pretty simple but it doesn’t come naturally to break down your simply morning tasks, but it can save you lots of money. By doing this we rarely spent money on accomodation or showers.
Things to know before you start your Road Trip around Australia
⚠️ It is illegal to park on the opposite side of the road to that in which you are driving on. So basically you can not park facing oncoming traffic.
⚠️ It is illegal to sleep in your car in any area unless in a designated campsite. We won’t tell if you don’t.
⚠️ Kangaroos are cute but they are also killers. Most car/camper van hire companies will not cover you on insurance if you drive at night. Kangaroos are a drivers worst nightmare in Australia and you will loose count of how much road kill you will see. They jump out in any direction which makes them unpredictable. Its simply, don’t drive at night.
↠ Some national parks get extremely busy over school holidays so always check a week in advance if there it availability.
Road Tripping Australia – DO’S AND DON’TS
⛽ Do plan your route and fuel stops if travelling long distances.
⚠️ Don’t ignore noises coming from the car.
💦Do check the oil, water and other bits regularly.
🚯Don’t leave any rubbish behind at camp sites.
✍️Do leave honest reviews on Wiki camps, it can really help other travellers.
🤐Don’t let issues build up. If there is something on your mind, talk about it with your fellow road tripper.
🚰Do keep at least 2 water carriers in your car. We used one 10L for washing up and one for drinking. That way we could fill the washing up container with taps on campsites.
🍬 Don’t let your self get hangry [angry+hungry]. There is nothing worse than being hungry and angry on the road. We found that we would get lost or small things would annoy us more when we were hangry and we would take it out on each other. Always have emergency snacks!
🚨 Do get break down cover. We didn’t and we broke down and it cost us $500 to be towed back to the city. We also had to buy the highest level of cover. This was because we were so far out and wanted to be towed the same day. A bonus for joining RAC is we now get discount at RAC campsites!
Most importantly, enjoy every single moment of your road trip! It was the best thing we experienced in Australia and we don’t regret a single trip. Olly enjoyed it so much he is looking at buying us a camper van for when we get home to the UK.
Buying a car in Australia was the best thing we ever did – it gave us a sense of freedom we never knew existed.
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