How much it costs

A road trip of 1690kms in Australia

Adaptation; generally speaking, adaptation means adjusting to environmental conditions or, better, changing something to make it more functional in a different setting.
Let’s admit that 4 people sleeping 9 nights in a Toyota Estima, without the certainty of a daily shower, surely are the result of adaptation. 😀

Once upon this world, 4 pretty random friends were renting a van for 9 nights through the Australian Backpackers website, to drive 1690kms – from Sydney to Noosa, New South Wales to Queensland, the well known Australian East coast (or part of it).
Let’s dive into their journey along the Pacific Highway!
Costs so far: 440.7aud as deposit for the van.

Day 0. Pick up of the van.
First thing, check the whole van: lights, doors, seats, rooftop… once made sure everything works fine, our characters are ready to leave Sydney behind. Direction Port Macquaire (4 hours and 16 minutes drive north from Sydney), decided to find a free campground on the way thanks to the Campsite app.
First night: free campsite in the outskirts of Kew – it was more like a parking lot with toilets rather than a camping.
Costs: other 1475,50aud to cover the full van for 9 nights; 0aud for the night.

Day 1. Koala Hospital.
The first night went pretty well and we woke up excited to use our brand new gas stove to make coffee before getting dressed and drive 30 minutes to the Koala Hospital in Port Macquaire.
This hospital is a wildlife rehabilitation facility where you have the chance to see rescued koalas, but not holding nor touching them.
The entrance is free so if you’ve never seen a koala in real life, a quick stop may be worth it.
What else we saw in Port Macquaire? Town Beach and the painted rocks on the seaside breakwall.

Do you know something amazing about Australia?
You will always find public toilets next to the beach and, most of the times, showers too 🙂
(The morning shower that we couldn’t take in Kew, was then taken in Town Beach – although freezing).

Sunset time: one cider sip, one phone call to a camping; another sip, another camping until we found Waves Campground in Kempsey: 1h15 drive for a proper camping with guests’ kitchen, bathrooms with hot water, even a café but no phone reception: “walk to the tree on the beach to get 3 lines or till the rocks to get 4 lines” said Jeff the receptionist – well who needs phones, when you have a bottle of champagne? 😉
Costs: 61aud for the night in Waves Campground.

Day 2. The Big Banana.
Fun thing about adventures is that you go with the flow or, in our case, with the weather: we were expecting rain for the following day so we decided to postpone the seaside destination we had in mind and detour to Nimbin, more than 4 hours drive from the campground but having no rush, on the way we stopped for some photos in Nambucca Heads and the famous Big Banana in Coffs Harbour – yes, it really is famous as much as the Big Pineapple or the Big Mango etc.

Day 3. The Hemp city.
We woke up in Nimbin, the hippie town ruled by the hemp.
Since we could not see anything in the blackest dark of the night before, we were amazed to have breakfast surrounded by a full range of mountains… Mother Nature always surprising.
Nimbin is known around Australia for the Aquarius Festival, which aims to celebrate alternative thinking and a sustainable lifestyle – it’s basically the Woodstock of Australia, with weed and everything.
It happens every year in May, in case you are interested…
Costs: 40aud because the campsite caretaker saw only 3 of us, instead of 4 (I was at the toilet in that moment).

Day 4. Byron Bay.
We left Nimbin in the afternoon of day 3 to drive a little bit longer than an hour towards the fancier, but still bit hippie, Byron Bay.
Campings were expensive, minimum 110aud per night, but we wanted to stay in the city so we decided to spend the night in an isolated parking lot in front of the beach, careless of the “no camping at any time” notice.
Surfers woke us up at 5am – life in Australia starts early – but for the rest of the day we took it easy: beach, lunch in the park, Lighthouse at sunset.
Costs: 0aud.

Day 5. “Wakie wakie? Ranger at the door!“
This is how we started day 5. Yeah, second night in that parking lot did not see us as lucky as the first one – we are still waiting for the 150aud fine he promised.
Time to cross the border! Next stop: Gold Coast, Queensland.
Costs: well.. 150aud – maybe.

Day 6. The maledition of the ranger.
Since he woke us up, everything went wrong: one of the girls forgot her bag on top of the car and it flew away while we were driving, we tried to go to Springbrook National Park but the road was closed…
We thought the best idea to put an end to this day was a bottle of wine in Burleigh Heads National Park to watch the sunset over the famous Gold Coast skyline before heading to Surfer Paradise.

Day 7. The Spit dog beach.
We spent 2 nights for free in this parking without any ranger alarm and we even made it to Springbrook and its twin falls.
Costs: 0aud.

Day 8. Sunshine coast.
Here we booked a camping to finally take a full hot shower and we felt that the maledition of the ranger was absolutely over because by phone the camping staff told us 1 night would cost 76aud, but at check-in we were asked for only 48aud.
Costs: 48aud for the camping.

Day 9. Noosa or Brisbane?
We woke up under the rain in… Sunshine coast.
We drove to Noosa and started with the simple coastal walk in the Noosa National Park before trying our luck with the sun on the Little Cove Beach.
Weather did not turn great, bit of sun here and there but not enough to convince us to stay: back in the car for a 2 hours drive south to spend the night in Brisbane, our last stop.

Day 10. 1st cancellation.
We woke up in a very sunny and warm Brisbane – well we were actually in the Wellington Point Recreation Reserve (outskirts of the city) where we could spend the night for free.
We spent the after-breakfast cleaning the van because we were close to the end – or that’s what we thought: in the evening Jetstar canceled our flight for the morning after; we had to reschedule it for the afternoon of the same day and search for a room to spend the night because the original plan was to sleep at the airport, since the flight was early.
Costs: 426aud for a room; expected refund by Jetstar, 400aud; actual cost: 26aud.

Day 11. Endless trip.
We woke up, went for breakfast and headed to the airport having the most amazing airport lunch possible because Jetstar was gonna pay (they would refund 50aud per day per person), when another email:
“your flight has been canceled“, AGAIN!
We went to the assistance desk and this time they had booked a 4-star hotel, 1 room each passenger…
From a van in 4 to a private room in a 4-star hotel, sounds like a nice adaptation upgrade 😀

Other costs:
Tolls: 21 + 14.43 + 11.64
(note: by following the rental company instructions, we had to register the car plate on the provided website in order to be charged for the tolls).
Fuel: 103,51 + 92 + 90 + 50.

Total cost of the trip (not including expenses for food and drinks):

2473.78aud
(plus 150aud – maybe 😛 )

The long and the short of this post is:

if you want to organize a road trip,
find some partners in crime to share memories
and split the costs!