Advice - heading off with bub, wife and dog around Australia

The only advice I can give Simon is enjoy yourself.

Mrs S
( and congratulations)

Hi Simon,

There have been many threads on this forum re travelling for extended periods, working your way around, travelling with children and with dogs. If you do some searches of the forum using those terms or something similar you should get a lot of info. Do a similar search of the blogs section.

Have a great trip.

Cheers

DO IT DO IT DO IT

we have been on the road for 13months and have never regreted the day we quit our jobs and drove away.
Its not all smooth sailing but neither was it living at home either.
There is so much work out here, but we just work enough to top up the bank for a while then its a great long holiday till the next time we want work.
You can get a tax deduction on ALL your on road expenses if you go from one job to the next(and yes you can take months between jobs) its ATO approved does require a bit of a paper trail and a home base somewhere (can rent a room from kids,tenants,parents,friends etc ) but better in my pocket....
We have just spent 5 months in tassie worked a bit had a good holiday can even claim the cost of the Spirit of Tassie ferry

As a guide you should have no probs anywhere, but just doing painting maintenance,gardening etc heaps of work all around the country.
any questions just ask

kim n doug

Hi Simon, dont exceed the bag limit leave the wife at home ha ha have a great trip twintrail

Nothing like what you're planning to do, but we moved around Aus (due to change of jobs mostly) quite frequently up until the kids hit school age.
I reckon the stage where you're at in life is an idea time to do what you're planning to do, you don't have to worry about home schooling or anything like that and still have the option to settle down once the kid / kids are of school age to provide them the stable home / friendships etc if that's what you want by then. In the mean time keep an eye out on that special place where you might not mind staying for the longer term.

From my experience it's the people that make the place, and I guess likewise when you're traveling it will be the fellow travelers that add to your experiences even if you don't stay long enough to really get to know the locals.

Wouldn't have it any other way was a bit hard in my day without internet when the kids got to scholl age but if you ask them they wouldn't have had it any other way either but a been cursed with gypsy hearts all of their lives they say it's a blessing. You can spend your whole life traveling around aussie and never see it all I don't know why people go overseas it's all here.
Good luck might be handy to take the cook though.

Your only here on this earth once . . . . make the most of it.

Like all trips half the fun is in the planning. But don't try to plan every day of the trip, sometimes the best things and most unexpected things just happen because you were there. Get out the maps and research just how much to want to see and how remote you want to get. There's nothing better than just yourselves in a remote desert sunrise.

Then get the right equipment to do the job . . . . strong fourby, strong trailer, efficient fridges and the ability to know how to look after them. They have to get you back home again one day, and then you'll probably want to start all over again.

Stay in touch, we look forward to hearing of your wildest adventures.

I'm sure you'll have a great time. We are also on a year long (maybe two) trip. I'm not being smart but do you need to take the dog? This will limit you a lot if you intend to see a lot of the Nat parks as you can not take dogs there. You will struggle to find places to stay with them, yes there are a few caravan parks that allow them if they are in the van. I suppose it depends on what you are travelling in. Camper, Caravan etc.

anyway enjoy

Of course you have to take the dog! Providing he is well behaved and you don't leave him tied up alone for lengthy periods you will have no trouble finding places to stay. (You can safely ignore Big4 Parks - they don't sound like your cup of tea anyway! Dog friendly places are always the nicest!) We always take our dog with us and have travelled for months at a time with no problems. She has always enjoyed travelling. Occasionally there are dog unfriendly places where she can't go and we want to go but we have always been able to find Puppy Day Care or a local kennel for a day or two. Local vets often look after dogs or can recommend a place. She really enjoyed her few days in a kennel in Darwin which had a shadier environment than the places we stayed!
Taking a dog encourages us to get out for walks so we see things we might otherwise miss and we have met lots of people through her - everyone in the bush seems to have a Jack Russell story to share!
Make sure you carry his vaccination certificates etc and put your mobile number on his collar. Keep up the flea treatment or you can have horrible excema from the vigorous fleas up north. Be very careful of baits. Baits are the biggest hazard in the bush and you can't let your dog roam in areas where baits are laid.
Have a wonderful time! Lynne

Earvin, Go For It. My wife and i are selling the house in June and doing the same thing.We are in our early and late fifties and have no plan on retiring at 65.As for the dog, we are definately taking ours,as mentioned earlier there are dog friendly caravan parks out there.Why not purchase the Camps 5 book, that will give you heaps of info on caravan parks and also free camping sites.Have a ball and we might catch up on the road sometime.

Hi Simon

We are selling everything and looking at being on the road for 1-2 years plus if we want too...we have 2 children 10 and 4 which will make an interesting trip! but we can't wait.....I have gypsy blood in me and are for ever moving so we thought instead of keep buying and selling bloody houses lets buy a van and do the big trip.....we too need to work and I have looked at the harvest trail and it looks as though they are always on the lookout for people (well hopefully anyway)....

We are looking at around September/October so will head south (we are in QLD) so who knows we may park next to you at one point...

Happy Travels :)

Karen

Likewise even though we're settled down (for now) if you end up coming over to WA Nannup way we don't mind if you shoot us an email...ducktape00 (at) yahoo.com.au if we're still where we are now then plenty of room to park your van too as we're on a nice rural block, this time of year is not bad as they're looking for chestnut pickers up the road.

If this wasn't such a nice town I probably would have contemplated moving up North where hubby's work is by now (having lived here for 2yrs).

I agree with a few other comments too that moving around even when the kids are older isn't a bad thing either, so if we do stay in one place we will at least get back into regular camping or longer trips.