My Favourite Way to Travel
Without a doubt, road trippin is my favourite way to travel.
It took me a little while to figure that out, but this trip has really proven it to me.
With buses, I never enjoyed the actual travelling. It was always a chore to get on a bus by yourself even for just 2 hours, even worse when it was a 14 hour overnight journey.
But with your own vehicle, it makes the actual journey part of the fun.
Blasting our tunes, choosing how we set the mood to our trip, eating gummy snakes, and taking in the views of the country road.
Chatting shit and giggling the whole way, playing games and getting to know each other better.
Stopping anywhere we see fit, seeing new beaches everywhere we go, collecting sand in the van with every new adventure.
I've always struggled with being an over-planner, wanting to micro-manage and control every single minute of my trip. I've been working on trying to be more spontaneous and just go with the flow when travelling.
And van life is the perfect remedy for that. You are forced to be spontaneous, as sometimes you don't even know what town you will be sleeping in that night, let alone the exact campsite.
You have the go with the flow as you have no other choice.
And instead of resisting this, I absolutely thrived in it.
I found myself feeling really present, not really even thinking about where we would stay, just enjoying everything as we did it.
I loved not knowing where we would stay each night, because I knew we always had the van with all of our stuff in; we could stay wherever we wanted. That is freedom.
Moreover, Australia is really made for road trips. The big open roads with good views, not just boring highways, plenty of public toilets all the way along, petrol being pretty cheap, and free camping and rest stops. The best way we found places to stay each night was using an app called Campermate, which shows you free or cheap campsites in the area with reviews, as well as public toilets and showers and other points of interest. Using this and also Google (obviously) we found campsites each night.
We also really enjoyed cooking in the van. Since we were lucky enough to get a free upgrade to get a high top van you can stand up in, with a hob, fridge, sink and microwave, cooking in the van was so easy. We did chilli, risotto, pasta, and all kinds of other things for dinner, and most mornings we made scrambled eggs on toast. It was dreamy getting ready in the morning in a new location and making some breakfast.
Also, I had heard from a lot of people that being in a van means you don't meet as many people. We definitely did not find this to be true- we met so many wonderful people on our trip who we will keep in contact with and hopefully see again in Australia. Perhaps this was because of our Fraser Island and Whitsundays trip, or because my friends visited in Noosa and we saw Ryley's friends in Bundaberg, but this is just a testament to the beauty of road tripping! You can go wherever you want, and stay as long or as little as you want.
We spoke to more locals than you usually would travelling on buses.
And I felt a subtle but important distinction of feeling less of a tourist. Of course, we still are tourists doing touristy things, but something about the van made me feel we were 'campers' rather than 'tourists'. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something about this distinction makes me love van life way more than the usual way.
I'm now back n Brisbane with the family, and I've been working with the kids for the past week.
It took me a little while to figure that out, but this trip has really proven it to me.
With buses, I never enjoyed the actual travelling. It was always a chore to get on a bus by yourself even for just 2 hours, even worse when it was a 14 hour overnight journey.
But with your own vehicle, it makes the actual journey part of the fun.
Blasting our tunes, choosing how we set the mood to our trip, eating gummy snakes, and taking in the views of the country road.
Chatting shit and giggling the whole way, playing games and getting to know each other better.
Stopping anywhere we see fit, seeing new beaches everywhere we go, collecting sand in the van with every new adventure.
I've always struggled with being an over-planner, wanting to micro-manage and control every single minute of my trip. I've been working on trying to be more spontaneous and just go with the flow when travelling.
And van life is the perfect remedy for that. You are forced to be spontaneous, as sometimes you don't even know what town you will be sleeping in that night, let alone the exact campsite.
You have the go with the flow as you have no other choice.
And instead of resisting this, I absolutely thrived in it.
I found myself feeling really present, not really even thinking about where we would stay, just enjoying everything as we did it.
I loved not knowing where we would stay each night, because I knew we always had the van with all of our stuff in; we could stay wherever we wanted. That is freedom.
Moreover, Australia is really made for road trips. The big open roads with good views, not just boring highways, plenty of public toilets all the way along, petrol being pretty cheap, and free camping and rest stops. The best way we found places to stay each night was using an app called Campermate, which shows you free or cheap campsites in the area with reviews, as well as public toilets and showers and other points of interest. Using this and also Google (obviously) we found campsites each night.
We also really enjoyed cooking in the van. Since we were lucky enough to get a free upgrade to get a high top van you can stand up in, with a hob, fridge, sink and microwave, cooking in the van was so easy. We did chilli, risotto, pasta, and all kinds of other things for dinner, and most mornings we made scrambled eggs on toast. It was dreamy getting ready in the morning in a new location and making some breakfast.
Also, I had heard from a lot of people that being in a van means you don't meet as many people. We definitely did not find this to be true- we met so many wonderful people on our trip who we will keep in contact with and hopefully see again in Australia. Perhaps this was because of our Fraser Island and Whitsundays trip, or because my friends visited in Noosa and we saw Ryley's friends in Bundaberg, but this is just a testament to the beauty of road tripping! You can go wherever you want, and stay as long or as little as you want.
We spoke to more locals than you usually would travelling on buses.
And I felt a subtle but important distinction of feeling less of a tourist. Of course, we still are tourists doing touristy things, but something about the van made me feel we were 'campers' rather than 'tourists'. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something about this distinction makes me love van life way more than the usual way.
I'm now back n Brisbane with the family, and I've been working with the kids for the past week.
On the weekend I'm heading just outside of Brisbane to find farm work. So I'll be settling for a while, but after this I'm gonna aim to go road tripping again as soon as I can! In fact, I'd like to make road tripping my preferred way of travelling for all my future trips in Australia.
Even though it won't be for a while yet, I'm so excited for my next road trip in this stunning country.
Shepp x
Even though it won't be for a while yet, I'm so excited for my next road trip in this stunning country.
Shepp x
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