Planning a big 4x4 trip around Oz, planning tips needed

My experience with tents is different. Our rooftop tent is far quicker to put up & pack away than any ground based tent including the very quick to erect centre pole type & ones like the OzTent. Dome tents with their threaded or clipped fibreglass poles take more time.

Any ground tent also requires being set up inside, unpackin & putting in the bedding, & packing again when leaving etc. Each little thing like this adds to set up time. Every minute added to set up time for long term travellers becomes a tiresome chore day after day. Very different to short trips.

The pop up type of rooftop tents like the Baroud are indeed very convenient when ‘out bush’, but they don’t provide shade/shelter in windy & wet weather (unless you want to lay down all day), have no shelter over the ladder - a problem in the rain, & lack any area of privacy when staying in places with others - getting dressed in a sitting position in a small RTT is a pain.

It is of course all a horses for courses thing.

6 to 12 months will go very quickly. We took 18 months to go around & thought we would look for work as we went. Before leaving we envisaged stopping in places for a month or so at a time. Reality was quite different, didn’t feel like we had enough time to do that, at least not if we wanted to travel at a pace which allwed us to savour the country we were exploring.

We now have a 2006 Nissan Patrol 4.2TDi & are looking forward to taking it around Australia.........but will take our time & maybe even work next time

Agree with cuppa. With a RTT you can camp anywhere. You do not need flat smooth ground. If your working you can camp around the backs of sheds, in driveways, just anywhere. See my blog
http://www.exploroz.com/Members/261669.250/2/2015/Roof_Top_Tents__RTT_.aspx

I also agree with Cuppa. With the annex hanging over the rear of the car we have full weather coverage with full access to the rear of the car and a kitchen bench to boot (tailgate). We also leave our bedding up in the tent. From getting out of bed it can has take 15 minutes, without rushing, to drive off including a cuppa and some corn flakes.

May I add this section as a suggestion.

As you are new and want to do some 4x4 I would suggest a bit of 4x4 training. There are some great 4x4 only drives on Cape York (OTT and Frenchmans), The Kimberley (Carson tracks) and the Vic Alpine (Billy Goat) area that come to mind. These need some 4x4 knowledge and experience before you tackle them especially solo, which is how we travel (40+ yrs off road exp).

Just hopping into the 4x4 with a few mates on the weekend is not the best way to learn how to drive, use and appreciate all the capability of the 4x4. And then you need to be able to self recover etc.

That said there is plenty to do and you should be "overloaded" without going to 4x4 only places I mentioned. Car choice is excellent and may I suggest that you add the Toyota 100 4.2TD to your list.

You may already have the training covered and that's excellent. Enjoy and ask as much as you wish but be ready to be inundated with info. We all have so much to tell. Maybe join the gatherings at the "monthly coffee" would be very beneficial. Nothing like face to face sharing.

Enjoy . . .

Simpson Desert 2012

Thanks all!

Michael, is it any different with the bike racks which mount to the spare tyre on the back? I'm just worried about adding extra weight on the roof.

I will definitely head out and get some experience first, I've exclusively been watching youtube vids for the last month on driving & recovering a vehicle under all kinds of conditions, but of course nothing beats hands on experience with an experienced person to guide you.

You are right Piet, nothing beats hands on experience. Mine is quite limited but enough to make me realise that nothing else is a substitute. I recently went out 4wd’ing with a bunch of experienced folk who ‘coached’ me up & down some quite difficult sections. It was invaluable. Although I have years of off road motorcycling under my belt driving the same terrain in a car is not comparable. Driving down a steep & deeply rutted hill where wrong wheel placement could have easily resulted in a rollover, with someone outside the car saying “keep left’, “move right” etc not only got me down without damage, it also boosted my confidence enormously. Week after next I’m doing an accredited 4wd course. The cheapest way to do this is to find a 4wd club who run their own course. In my case it is included in the cost of membership, & in fact is a prerequisite for joining in any club trips.

Before driving myself I went out several times with another 4wd’er in his car as a passenger, we stopped prior to any ‘gnarly’ section & discussed the best lines. I found this very useful as car lines are totally different to bike lines. I’m still adapting from being able to see where my front wheel is in relation to the terrain to only being able to see sky or treetops on uphill sections. A totally different approach.

But to get back to the main point - every time I go out my confidence builds. My aim is to familiarise myself with 3 things without damage.
The physical ‘space’ my vehicle needs in ‘tight’ settings, the limits & abilities of my vehicle without pushing past them & techniques that are counter intuitive, but necessary to know. The first happens quite quickly with just getting out there. the second will I think come, but will take a little longer. The last is what the course is for.

Oh & I’d agree with Peter. Probably best to leave the push bikes at home, they will get very little use.

And that sounds like great advice.

The other thing I might add is that if you find a place you like, don't be in a hurry to leave!

Enjoy your trip...

Baz - The Landy

Bigfish that is excellent advice. RTTs, swags or our option of sleeping in the vehicle are great if you are touring and travelling most days anyway. But if you want to stop for a while, especially if you need to work, that arrangement would be difficult. You can pick up a basic camper pretty cheaply and it would give you more flexibility, especially as some jobs may require you to have your own accommodation.

The other thing to think about is timing, especially whether you want to be in northern areas during the summer wet season.

Cheers,

Val.

I agree. Car based accommodation is only convenient if you are travelling most days. A hard floor camper trailer is easy to put up and down but tends to be more expensive and have less room to store gear. We have a soft floor (All Terrain) and have used it for years. We did a big trip from Sydney to Broome via Cairns and the gulf and back diagonally through the Tanami in 2008.

The trailer was perfect. Its robust construction meant no mechanical problems and it had enough room to set up a nice base camp to explore an area in the vehicle (100 series Landcruiser). For quick overnight stops, just opening it up without folding out the awning takes 10 - 15 minutes as I seldom bother with pegs.

I have never really understood the obsession that occurs on forums like these about speed of setting up and packing up. When I go away I am not in a hurry. An extra half an hour means little. What is more important to me is the final camp setup. Enough room for the gear I want to take, a nice shady awning, a simple functional kitchen, some walls for bad weather, good quality canvas to withstand the conditions and a good, strong trailer to carry it all over rough, corrugated roads. If you are well set up and comfortable you can relax and settle into the rhythm of your journey.

You two will have a great trip. Enjoy!

Yabbo

Thanks for the input!

There are several reasons I'm keen on the rtt. For one, the safety of being off the ground, but also it costs less, meaning we can spend more on a reliable, well-maintained car. It also gives us more flexibility in our movements (I can imagine in certain areas towing a trailer would become cumbersome).

I do see the point about it being more convenient to have a base camp, but I'm not sure how often I would want to leave it unattended anyway.

The lack of a kitchen in an rtt does not bother us much, as we would use a campfire whenever conditions and restrictions allowed for it. In populated areas, bbq facilities might also be an option. We're quite spontaneous like that. I was also planning on taking my portable gas cooker, but I'll have to revisit that option and do some more research since the ban on many models.

Wow, thanks for your advice.

So how comfortably did you travel in order to spend $30k? It seems like a lot for 4 1/2 months, what did you find were your main costs? I'm just asking because we are hoping to be pretty frugal in terms of our style of travel, kind of like a mix between backpacking and camping, so just looking to see if I have misjudged cost that much.

Dont know how you could spend that much on a 20 week trip.

We were away for over a year and did 50,000k and reckoned it cost a $ a K

That included flights into the Bungles and Horizontal Falls.

Also stayed every night in a van park.

Conventional wisdom suggest that costs come out to about $1 per km travelled. Depends on how mach free camping you do, fuel costs and also how you eat (and drink). We prepare almost all our meals so dont have dining out costs - in a RTT or other vehicle based camping where you want to be set up before dinner time, going out to eat is usually not much of an option.

Cheers,

Val

I suspect the best vehicle choice may depend upon how long you want travel in it. You are certainly correct to say that any 4wd will manage the task, but for us it was a case of for how long. One lap is quite different to a decade+ of travel on rough roads. Our decision to go with a 4.2 Patrol is because we wanted a vehicle which will last us for many years of outback travel & influenced by our experience of hiring a 4wd in Broome to travel up the Dampier Peninsular. All of the multitude of hire car companies had a wide range of 4wd’s available. However every single one of them restricted the vehicles they would allow up the peninsular to Patrols & Cruisers, mainly because they get such a hard life being driven at speed up & down the 90 odd kms of corrugations. This suggested to me that Patrols & Cruisers would be better investments for long term rough road travel.

Of course the OP in this thread is looking at a vehicle for a 12 month trip & any in reasonable condition would, as you say, manage the task well.

Piet,

You are wise taking an EPIRB, preferably one with a GPS and have it registered with AMSA.

An EPIRB is for use in a life threatening situation. It is of little use when you have a non life-threatening situation where you need to discuss your needs with someone.

Take a sat phone, for sure. There are plenty of threads on this site discussing this issue. Also check out the articles on communications here. There is a discussion on sat phones in there.

Cheers

I have this phone its great.
http://www.satphonesales.com.au/Globalstar-GSP1600-Refurbished-A-Grade
For the price its good value IMHO. I would also have a PLB.
The beauty of having these things is when you are travelling and you see or hear of something that interests you but it is remote, you can tackle it with confidence.
With a sat phone, plan for a mechanical breakdown and have your phone programmed with the numbers of a few mechanics you could ring if necessary. Also doctors etc for medical problems.