The 1995 80 series and it had a hard life i had spent in repairs before i left and
also on the trip fifteen thousand dollars some people might think that this setup would take
forever to set up but honestly maximum take one person i reckon maybe five to six minutes
maximum to set up this entire trailer not that it was a new vehicle but when i bought my
last land cruiser it broke down on the way home
G'day guys welcome to another campfire yarns we are finally out of lockdown down in New South
Wales and we are actually in front of a real fire we're not having any virtual beers anymore
so thank god we're finally out here outside of Wiseman's very beautiful area here and today
at my disposal i have Brenno and i'm gonna pick his brain on a couple of questions that you guys
have asked but also a couple that i want to know about planning and executing the big
lap around Australia and to my right here i've also got my good mate Cahn who's a 12 volt guru
as you guys know so i'm going to be asking him a bunch of questions on your behalf but again
some questions that i want to ask for my own trip that i want to do one day in the future
so uh let's kick things off with Brenno right now mate i'll give all the viewers at home a little
bit of a background so probably about five or six years ago i did a trip around Australia did
the hot lap um did about 10 months on the road 42 000 kilometres in a busted old 80 series i'm
open i'm ready to answer so you fire away okay beautiful so my first question that i'm sure
everyone's curious about is how the heck do you start to even think about budgeting for a trip of
that magnitude it is the million dollar question literally yeah okay so there's this generally held
wisdom that says when you do a big trip around Australia the rough budget you should work to is
a thousand bucks a week right sounds like a lot depending on if you've got a year off 52 000 is
a lot of money that is kind of the everything all-inclusive your diesel your petrol whatever
it is your campsite fees your your tourist attractions your food all that sort of stuff
that's sort of like an upper end of the scale if you had the money and you'd saved and saved or
you've sold your house or whatever you want to do you're doing the dream trip of a lifetime
if you had a thousand bucks a week you would do everything you could do around Australia
and by that i mean you'd get up to the Kimberly and you'd be able to take those helicopter rides
out over the horizontal falls you'll be able to go up to the Cape and not just go do the Teletrack
but you know hop on a croc boat tour and go and see a croc i reckon you could do it for about
half that if money was the concern it might limit a little bit how far you can drive because out
of your budget you're going to find that fuel is your biggest cost one way or another if you want
to drive you've got to put fuel in your car you can save money in other ways free camping you can
free camp right around Australia or national park camp or anything like that you could you could
cut your accommodation bill down by hundreds of dollars a week if you feel free camped as much
as possible and that's probably where your advice comes income because part of free camping as much
as possible is setting up a vehicle and a 12-volt system to allow you to free camp yeah that's
correct and i get a lot of questions about this all the time what setup do i specifically need
and that's a really hard question to answer if i'm helping someone one-on-one which i've done a fair
bit of it's a lot simpler because you can actually talk to them about the vehicle they have the type
of camping they want to do and realistically how much driving they expect to do because these days
with dc-dc chargers you're charging your battery while you're driving so if you can bank on the
fact that you're going to be driving a couple of hours every couple of days you can pretty reliably
know that your batteries are going to be charged up if you're the sort of person who's going to
stay somewhere for a week or two at a time that's when you really need to start thinking about solar
power and these days it's not hard you know you can get permanent solar on your roof and portable
solar which covers you if you want to camp in the shade and you don't have any sun on your solar on
your roof you can actually set up your portable blanket out in the sun take advantage of that
alternatively if you don't have any shade and your vehicle's set up there it's always
charging you've always got sun so there's so many options these days really you've got to calculate
how many things are going to be drawing power these days with 12 volt fridges and all this sort
of stuff they don't use as much power as you'd expect so it's worth looking at the specs of the
products and being realistic a lot of the time you get an average figure say a fridge might be
tested at a certain temperature some fridges are tested at like 25 degrees celsius
at ambient temperature if you're in Australia you're very rarely going to get that sort of
temperature top end it could be another 20 degrees ambient temperature exactly right so be realistic
and have a look at that because some brands are a bit sneaky with their marketing okay the setup
that i had i had an old 80 series cruiser and a camper trailer i had two batteries in the back of
the 80 series and two batteries in the camper trailer solar panel up on the roof rack and
i'll tell you the one thing that i found the most useful of anything was a 240 volt battery charger
if your batteries get super super flat there's nothing as good as being able to pull into
a bush caravan park somewhere paying for a powered site for the night you plug them in and the next
morning you back up to it's like a get out of jail free card you back up to 100 again and just while
i think about it if you guys out there do want a bit of help with your 12 volt setup and you are
planning a big trip throw a comment down below and i'll get back to you and do my best to help
you out for your exact situation that's a good offer yeah i'm going to be the first to be busy
i'm going to be the first all right so that's budgeting what else am i in so the next thing i
wanted to ask you is uh vehicle setups now i know you've already touched on your 80 series but can
you talk us through your specific vehicle setup how you had it set up and if you could change
anything about that setup after you got back uh from your big trip what would it be everything
so this is a little still painful to talk about if i could have changed anything i would have gone
around Australia in a more modern vehicle i'm not saying something brand new but when i left
it was a 1995 80 series and it had just shy of 400 000 kilometres on the clock and they weren't
easy kilometres it had a hard life i was towing a camper trailer as well and i worked it out when
i came back i had spent in not accessories not modifications repairs before i left and also on
the trip fifteen thousand dollars fifteen degrees it literally broke me ended up coming back from
the trip probably about two months early because i just ran out of money and the reason i went around
in that car was because it was the one that i had and i really didn't want the expense of buying
something new and having a vehicle repayment whilst on the road but wisdom in hindsight i
would do it definitely in a four-wheel drive if i had the choice again but that said if there's
anyone out there watching if you've got an suv if you've got a van and that's what you've got
then don't put it off just do it do it in whatever you've got as long as it's mechanically reliable
that was the biggest thing that i learned i wanted to say something as well just to consider and that
is if you're buying a secondhand vehicle even if it's relatively new and appears to be looked after
buy it with enough time that you can drive it and get to know the vehicle a little bit before you
take it not that it was a new vehicle but when i bought my last land cruiser it broke down on
the way home you know what i mean like mate this isn't our most unreliable four-wheel drive story
we already did that one had that conversation i know but it's something to consider give it a
good once-over take it to a mechanic and that sort of thing make sure it's in good nick before you
track off on this giant trip right right oh let's talk camping setup yeah look in terms of camping
setups and uh what sort of camping gear to take i think the biggest thing is it needs to be easy um
again if i was doing it um tomorrow i'd take this thing right here to be honest put a rooftop tent
on this and i would tow this you've towed that thing in some gnarly terrain it goes anywhere
you pretty much want to tow it and i've heard that from multiple people too like some people
might think that this setup would take forever to set up but honestly when we pulled up today if we
had a rooftop tent on it it would maximum take one person i reckon maybe five to six minutes
maximum to set up this entire trailer and you've got a full kitchen here you've got the fridge
pantry plus all the storage and a storage drawer in the back and unfortunately i didn't have this
available when i did the trip around Australia uh had i would have taken it every single day of the
week but it is what it is um vehicle modifications uh so let's talk that um we touched on it a moment
ago but look nothing more than it's more about it being reliable than it being tough and by that i
mean a set of good all-terrain tyres at a minimum proper light truck construction probably ties in a
little bit with being realistic about what you're intending to do as well particularly about tyres
of the 42 000 k's you did a fair whack of them would have had to have been on time oh yeah i'd
honestly i would say 85 percent would have been and that's exactly what you've got to think about
too is if you go out and buy the most aggressive muddy as you can it's not going to handle well
it's not going to give you the confidence on road and it's a big trip a lot of little things could
happen so get tires that are going to suit the actual full driving or driving that you're doing
yep and if you guys can hear something in the background we've got the locals hanging around i
kid you not a good one okay so that uh almost rounds it out for the questions that i wanted
to ask i do have a big long list but we're on a limited time frame here so i'm gonna jump over to
some viewers questions here okay so first on the list is a bloke called Sean Matthews and uh his
question is we've already covered it but how much would you budget for say 12 months for one person
and for two people obviously not including any work you pick up around the country are no fuel
varies but an average figure yeah so we obviously already talked about that i think Sean thousand
bucks at the upper limit um 500 bucks if you're doing it tight okay and you went with two people
brother yes so that 500 bucks would cover two yeah yeah yeah absolutely but i think the biggest
expense is your diesel or your petrol whatever it is as much as anything you'll save a bit of money
if you're only one person's food but it won't be a huge amount okay cool next uh question i think
bore me bore me461 any tips for beating the crowds and grey nomads apart from getting further
out bush insert a whole bunch of emojis okay so yes the short answer is try and be at the places
that they aren't and that sounds obvious but it means avoiding all the most popular places in
peak holiday season school holidays and that sort of stuff if you try and go up to the cape
i know you said i know you said grey nomads but this is talking about tourists in general
if you try and go up and do the cape in the winter school holidays you're going to have
a very very busy time like you were up on bribery island or double island point in the middle
of summer there's certain places that you need to be at certain times of the year such as the
Kimberley all those beautiful places like El Questro well they shut over the
wet season through summer you obviously don't want to be there then because you're not going to see
any of it if it was me i was leaving from one of the east coast major cities i'd try and leave
somewhere around March April make my way plod my way up the east coast and then be
across the top end of Australia during winter yeah okay it is um gray no med season up there
but it is what it is and then that way i guess if you are up at the top end of Australia during
winter then you got perfect weather right across there and also times really well to come down
the west coast and by summer you're down in southwest wa so that sort of works quite well
okay sweet and that actually ties into the next question i've got here from Jacobo Barcelo so i
apologize if i'm getting your name wrong there mate but uh how many weeks slash months would
you need to properly do the west coast Perth to Darwin oh how long's a piece of string
look i would say two months would cover you very nicely right depends how far you want to wander
off the beaten trail because you've got beautiful places like Karijini National Park that's you know
inland it's not necessarily on the coast i think around about two months okay so the next question
we've got uh David Cowan and his question is traveling solo is it viable and a good idea very
very good question um it can be very intimidating sitting at home having a few beers and trying to
plan out a trip around Australia and thinking it's a big old country but the funny thing is
doing a big trip is no different to do on a small trip just night after night after night if you can
do a trip that lasts for three or four nights you can do a trip around Australia because you're not
out in the middle of the Simpson desert for eight weeks at a time you're going to go through towns
you're going to be able to restock you're going to meet people on the road Australia is full of
people traveling and seeing Australia um look if you had someone to do it with absolutely if
you're doing it solo you will be able to do it no dramas in the world i wouldn't let that stop you
okay so the next one we've already touched on a little bit but it's definitely worth asking anyway
from Adrian Hardeman again sorry if i'm pronouncing that wrong my partner and
i plan on doing a coastal lap around the oz for one year going inland occasionally
we can't decide if we should get a van or a full drive we understand both have a lot of different
benefits i guess my question is what is best to do the lap in reliability and safety being some
of our biggest concerns yeah absolutely okay so look you guys are looking at buying a car look it
was me and i always had the choice of a van or a four-wheel drive to drive around Australia i would
definitely choose a four-wheel drive just opens up so many more opportunities um that said if
i already had a van then i would take the van you could drive around Australia without ever leaving
the blacktop if you wanted to do that i'd probably still put a set of good all-terrain light truck
tires on it doesn't have to be huge doesn't have to be lifted or anything like that just something
that you could then go and drive you could do the Gibb River Road in it no drummers in the world
and on that topic keep an eye out on our channel because very soon i'm going to bring you guys a
video that i'm very excited to bring you guys you guys have seen a little sneak peek of my
lockdown project i've just finished building my dream camper van and it's come up cool i can't
wait to show it to you guys so sorry i digress there but yes look the answer is um do it in
what you've got but if you have a choice i would choose a full drive every day of the week okay so
next one is from a bloke called Thomas Woodhouse water storage how much and how to access easily
okay yeah easy question to answer around about 100 litres of water storage in your vehicle at
any one time and in particular if you can spread it across a couple of different storage options
that way if you do have a leak you won't lose all your water at once um i would aim for something
like a 60 litre water bladder or a water tank something like that and it could be as simple
as then just another couple of jerry cans of water that you just have in the back of the car as well
in terms of accessing water well that's super easy just about every town out there has an rv
dump point but they also have water fill stations so just carry a food grade water hose and all the
fittings for it and you'll be able to top your water up as you travel okay so the next question
is from dan fish info regarding bringing dogs on your trip ah yes um look it's a tricky one if you
couldn't imagine doing the trip around Australia without your pup then take your pup but it's going
to limit where you go you can't take them into national parks and that's another conversation
whether it's right or wrong for another day then also the other thing that seriously needs
consideration is ticks look if it was me and i had the option to live with my folks or my brother or
my mate or something like that even for part of the trip probably do that so unfortunately that's
all we have time for i'm sure we could sit here and talk for hours about this but if you guys want
to ask any more questions go ahead and leave them in the comment section down below we'll try our
best to get back to every single one of you and if you guys are debating on petrol versus diesel
Brenno has actually done a really good video on that exact subject and he takes you through
every single aspect of it benefits downfalls of each one so go ahead and click on that and enjoy.