Perth across to Wyalkatchem, a country town in the eastern wheatbelt of Western Australia slightly north of Perth (approx 194 km E NE of Perth) and an area that does not see a lot of tourists. We are using Wyalkatchem to explore the surrounding areas – This trip is current in May of 2010 and can be followed in “Trips to fill in some missed places – South Western Australia (5).

Everyone Wants to Do It!

Follow Our Last Major Trip (Note - Leaves this page) Starts at Western Australia then Northern Territory then South Australia & Home

First Thoughts of A Great Trip

It Starts at a Dinner Party

Nobody remembers who suggests it but most people aspire to the “Grey Nomad Round Australia” trip. It comes up in conversation and if you are lucky someone will want to do it with you. Then if you are very lucky they will be at a time in their life when they can do it with you.

In our case we had all been friends for at least 20 years so it was an ongoing “will do” until it became a “can do”! Strangely the majority of our other friends thought that it would be one of those never will do things.

Biggest Hurdles

There are many hurdles but the hardest to overcome are family obligations. In our case when we first started these trips we had elderly parents to consider (and I had a younger senior mother), and children that were 18 to 22 years of age to worry about. It is the realization that with modern communications at a very low cost we can talk with them on most days with mobile phones, send emails, SMS’s and even have an internet site for them to all be able to follow our progress on. The fact that with aircraft flights being so available at economical prices made it possible for us to satisfy everyone that we were never much more than a couple of days away and in most cases we would be less than a day away if need be.

Smaller Hurdles & Considerations

Getting the equipment you need to make the trip a joy for all travelers is not easy once you realize the many different standards applying to different people but if you are expecting to have a good time everyone has to be considered.

Useful Links – With links shown as actual addresses – Click on the address.

Our Caravan Supplier – See Equipment for more details on our caravan selection – No Link??

Our Caravan manufacturer – What’s new at Adria – http://www.adria-mobil.com/ or in Australia http://www.adriamobil.com.au/

Caravan Park Reports – BADGER’S http://home.vicnet.net.au/~badger04/ This site is invaluable in helping with making decisions about where to, or not to stay. From the site owner/author - “I want my site to provide meaningful reports on places to stay in Australia so people can more easily choose where to stay (shall we stay in this town or drive to the next because there is a better park there, or stop at this rest stop because there isn’t another in coo-ee) and be able to decide whether to use this park over this one.”

Fuel Watch – A great service that allows you to research today’s and tomorrows fuel prices in order to find the cheaper suppliers of fuel that may be a block away from the main highways – In Western Australia only where it is compulsory for fuel retailers to participate – http://www.fuelwatch.wa.gov.au./

Free Wireless Networks – This site lists locations where you can get free internet if you have a wireless enabled laptop computer– http://www.wififreespot.com/aus.html

Census & Statistics on WA Regional – The site page gives access to population statistics for Western Australian towns etc – http://www.omi.wa.gov.au/WAPeople2006/WA/Regional/

Bureau of Meteorology – An invaluable site where current, long distance and historical weather information is available to help whilst traveling and also in the planning of a trip – http://www.bom.gov.au/

Affordable Web Hosting – The most economical we could find – 3IX – See also General Notes and Information.

Western Australian Rest Areas – The Main Roads Department of W.A. provide maps with detailed information on rest areas provided on main roads along with information on the uses and facilities at each location http://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/UsingRoads/TouringWAMaps/Pages/RestAreas.aspx

Public Toilets Throughout Australia – This site will find you a Loo nearby no matter where you are in Australia http://www.toiletmap.gov.au/

Australian Securities & Investment Commission – Unclaimed or Lost Monies – A lot of fun and good advice on this site where we have found money that was lost to several of our friends for them http://www.fido.asic.gov.au/fido/fido.nsf/byheadline/Looking+for+lost+money%3F?openDocument

General Notes & Information on this site where you will find many more links to commercial service providers – See the main link in the Index on the left

Contact Information

E-mail address

GAyres@gmail.com

Web address

http://www.aussiewonders.com

Office phone

Please send an email if you are wishing to communicate by phone giving a brief description of your need or desire to communicate. A return email will outline the situation, answer your query or give a number that will work along with a schedule to allow communication.

Don’t Sell Your House

Everyone that has done the round Australia trip told us not to sell the house. In both of our cases we had no intention of doing so but your home does need a lot of planning to keep it in readiness for when you come back.

We thought our (Mary & Gary) house needed house sitters so we offered our oldest daughter and her fiancé the use of the home if they would look after it for us. They were renting elsewhere and were at first reluctant, which came as a surprise, but after several weeks worked out that they could take the opportunity to save a deposit for a home if they were paying no rent for a prolonged period. They were of course responsible for basic running costs and to keep minor items in good repair but we would be paying the rates etc.

It was not quite what we expected. During our travels we found that we needed to return a couple of times for different family events. The return was always stressful as the home is never kept to how we would keep it and the gardens were somewhat neglected. It was no good trying to blame the occupants as it is not their home and if given reasonable notice of our return, an effort would have been made to put things right but with family matters bringing us back there was never any real notice. It should be stated here that we are particularly fussy individuals and probably nobody would keep our home to how we would like it. Further when we did finally return from our trip we were a month early on what we had planned so were in a situation where we had to all fit into a home that was already overloaded with two lots of furniture (our daughter and her fiancé' were storing their furniture in the house) etc.

As with most people who do this trip, the first will turn out to be one of many so on our next trip we decided to lock our home down as unoccupied with a little help from friends and some careful forward planning.

With our new found wisdom the next time we travelled we simply left some strategic lights (low wattage) on and set the clock radio (with battery backup) to turn on and off periodically. The security system was serviced with a new back up battery etc. and smoke alarms wired in.

We made a list of what to do with appliances:

The electric boost to the hot water is turned off.

All electric appliances (TV's Microwave, washing machine etc.) are turned off at the power point.

The water taps to the washing machine are turned off at the wall.

Water taps to the dishwasher are turned off at the wall.

Fridges are emptied and turned off at the power point being careful to leave the doors just slightly ajar.

Turn the water supply at the main down to a trickle and advise anyone that is visiting the house that you have done it and want it maintained as such.

Next we visited our local post office and organised for a mail redirection whereby all of our mail was sent to our daughter who would open it and forward it to us by email after scanning it. Most people have a scanner/printer at home or work now so this is easily affected. An alternative to this is to get a friend to bundle it all together and forward it to you c/- poste restante at whatever post office you advise them to, being careful to allow an appropriate time for its arrival. It is also important to attach “No Junk Mail or Newspapers” notices on your mailbox some weeks before you leave so you can monitor for problem polluters.

Our electricity bill and our phone bills were organised to be accessible on the internet to make this easier for us.

Next we asked our now very experienced son in law to be, to check on our pool for us on a weekly basis and by heavily dosing it this worked very well. There are also pool services available to do this for you if you don't have a friend or neighbour that will do it for you.

We organised for a neighbour to be available to call if we were worried after a storm etc.

Lastly we had friends dropping around if they were going past just to check things out.

This all worked so very well that it is now what we do for and on all of our trips with it saving money on utility accounts and having our home ready for our return at any time.

This item was picked up by “http/www.caravanningnews.com”, re-written and published on their site – View the article.

Cautionary Note: It may be wise to check with your household insurer in case you need to pay an excess with a prolonged absence of occupation taking place or you may need to have a friend stay the occasional night in your home to satisfy a condition of the policy.

Departure Point and Trip Direction

Heading North in a clockwise direction from Perth, W.A.

As we live in the hills suburbs of Perth we have left from there. We have decided to depart in mid April which hopefully (and did) avoids the northern cyclone season and to travel north! This gives us 6 months on our around Australia trip to cover everything heading up to the northwest, across the top through the Northern Territory and down the northeast coast where by October we are planning to be at about the Queensland/N.S.W. border and heading south. On our northwest and central Australia trip we are planning a 4 month jaunt with again a start in mid April and heading north first as it worked so well on our previous trip.

Site Navigation

The index at left is mostly self explanatory - Put your cursor over the logo button, description or an underlined description of the page – e.g. “Equipment” and when it turns to a “hand” push the left button on your mouse and you will be taken to that page. There are a couple of other notes below that may be useful: -

The names (e.g. “Mary Ayres”) are a page about each of the “Nomads” written by the individual whereas the page “The Nomads in Brief” may be viewed differently as it is written by the site author and will include people we have traveled with.

“Place” buttons (underlined or words e.g. “Tasmania” or “Tasmania”). Should you select one of these and they take you nowhere it is because we haven’t arrived there as yet

Disclaimer

Please note that all of the information on this site is derived from personal experiences and or are personal opinions of the author and other nomads residing on this site.

You should do all of your own research to ascertain the relevance of any information gleaned from this site to your personal situation.

Last revised: Date Sunday, May 02, 2010