The missus has, much to my surprise, agreed to look into taking a full year out of the ratrace and go on a year long tour of Oz and New Zealand. We would have to wait a couple of years for our son to sit his GCSE’s, and it would mean taking our daughter out of school for a year (she will be about 8 years old).

Has anyone on here done anything similar? What were your experiences? Was it worth the obvious costs? Any regrets in doing it? Any good ideas for itineraries? The basic plan would be start at Cairns and work our way down the coast to Melbourne or Adelaide as well as take in some of the outback, ‘hop’ over to Tas and then head to NZ. What options would be best for accommodation – any recommendations or suggestions given we would have our daughter with us – do Hostels ‘do’ families?? Budget would be £35 – £40k to cover our whole year expenses.
Any constructive advice and info would be gratefully recieved

Something like this but buying on arrival and selling on leaving rather than renting? (for the Aus leg)

http://www.motorhomesworldwide.com/motorhome/australia/apollo/vehicles/4wd_outback_camper.shtml

Edit: the link is meant to show a 4-man camper though the text suggests otherwise

I have nothing particularly helpful to say, except that I’ve never met anyone who travelled (properly) and that I didn’t think they were better for it.

In my extremely limited experience, people who have seen the world are more rounded and have a great perspective.

Jealous as hell, as I’m not in a position to do it myself, but if you have the opportunity – go for it!

And good luck!

How keen on this is your son? Despite the allure of a year down under I’m pretty sure I’d have rather stayed at school with my mates than go away with just my family for a year.

I have nothing particularly helpful to say, except that I’ve never met anyone who travelled (properly) and that I didn’t think they were better for it.

Yes, but some folk then can’t settle down. Read this:

Just do it!

I did something similar in my late twenties, but without the family in tow, but I’m now living in Oz and have met many local and international families doing it, and none of them regret it one bit.

Just a bit of advice based on my camping experiences in Oz…

An integrated campervan is Ok for short holidays, but for a longer trip I’d suiggest a separate vehicle and camper, something like this…

Gives you much more flexibility to base yourself somewhere for days or weeks, and explore daily in the vehicle, rather than having to pack up your whole home and take it with you you every time you move, or just want to nip to the beach/supermarket!

Also, some may recommend a 4WD camper and/or vehicle, but there’s actually very few places you really need that going down the east coast, and its a big burden in terms of fuel efficiency, speed, and spares. For those occasional off the beaten track excursions you can always hire a 4WD or join a tour. (Note: if you’d included WA in your itinerary I would have recommended 4WD)

Distances are massive in Oz, leave enough time to transit between places, accept the days of travel will be boring for the kids and have a plan for it (catching up with schoolwork for example!), and save enough in your budget to do things when you get places – biggest mistake backpackers make! For example, there’s no point in just going to Cairns – in fact its a bit of a tourist dump – you need to have the money to do a liveaboard dive trip out on the Barrier Reef, or hire a boat to cruise the Witsundays, for example.

Finally, plan well for the seasons, as there’s some serious weather in Oz. You want to be up north in our winter when it’s dry and not too hot, down south in time to enjoy the summer, and in NZ in winter/summer depending if you want to tour or ski!

Hope that’s of some help, but I’m sure others will be along soon to add to it and/or disagree with what I’ve said 😀

If you fancy more than a year on the road, you could always keep the kid out of school longer and get a job tarmacing drives (badly)

we have a similar plan but are going to squeeze it into the summer holidays, round the world in 6-8 weeks.
kids are 7 and 6 now so we are going to save and plan for it in about 5 or 6 years time.

Yes back in 09.
Followed the Americas Cup and Volvo Ocean Race then went windsurfing. It took no planning, came about after a right old fisticuffs with me ex Business Partner. Sold up, sodded off.
You’ll get bored unless you do plan stuff to do, don’t waste it sitting on yer bottom.

HTH

There’s an ongoing tale on Crazy Guy on a Bike about a family taking their 2 kids out of school to do a tour down through South America, basically they do self teach with the kids from school via the interweb thingy. IIRC it’s called life is like a box of chocolates. Wish we’d done something with ours like that if I’m honest.Have a look here

30-40k for a family of 4 is optimistic. I travelled round Europe on my own riding for most of last year and didnt get much change from 25k.

“30-40k for a family of 4 is optimistic. I travelled round Europe on my own riding for most of last year and didnt get much change from 25k. “

What on earth were you doing? That is a shedload of money to spend riding in Eastern Europe, considering I do 6 weeks in the alps for about 200 euros in the summer.

Some friends sold their business for £££’s, took their kids out of school and disappeared off around the world for several months.

No idea what their budget was but seeing they’d just sold up for a couple of million and income from numerous rental properties they’d bought over the previous decade I would imagine it was a scary amount.

I know a few families who have done it, don’t know anyone of them that have regretted it, although the pair with the 4 kids who sailed around the world for 4 or 5 years did say they quite liked waking up to find their kitchen where they left it, now they are back home on solid ground 🙂

Friends of ours did it, their 4 kids were all around 8-12, they were away for a year. The kids went back to school and fitted back into their original classes. As an educational experience, done correctly, the gap year is worth far more than time in the classroom.

Personally I would suggest focusing on less developed countries in Asia, more interesting and much cheaper.

The friends mentioned did not have any budget constraints !

@Joe – where did @ianv mentioned “Eastern”, for a year in France and Switzerland you can get through £25k quite easily. 200 euros for 6 weeks ? You’d struggle to keep the food bill down to that never mind the other expenses

200 euros for 6 weeks

❓

200 euros is a week and a half/ two weeks of lift passes.

Don’t underestimate the cost 🙂

We took six months out five years back, when the pound was pretty strong, to visit the US, Oz and NZ with our two wee kids. Cost us a bit over 20k. Towards the end we talked about heading off again straight away but we needed a bit of discipline back in our lives.

Some advice- don’t move around continuously- we took month long apartment leases in Hawaii, Manly and Christchurch, and tried to stay for a week in other places that we really wanted to visit. Don’t underestimate a bit of stability to try and get the most out of places. It’s easy to overdo things, and to be honest if you’re doing lots of driving then a lot of places start to look the same.
Keeping the kids entertained may be an issue.

When i travelled through Aus an NZ about 12 years ago 😥 I met a few people doing exactly what the OP is asking. Although they were all aussies. I reckon you’re 8 year old would really learn from it.
It’s got me thinking about doing some more travelling with our kids in a couple of years time as well now!!

Not sure how true this now but when i was in Aus shed loads of people were selling cars/campers in Cairns because most people flew into Sydney and out of Cairns. So it could ba good idea flying into Cairns if you fancy buying a cheap motor.

The exchange rate for the pound is so low at the moment it’s practically in Australia already, and just got lower because of the AAA/AA thing.

It was pretty close to $2 = £1 when I was out in NZ at Christmas, which means everything seems really expensive. For example, I was paying about £5 for a pint of lager in a mid-range pub. So you might need more money than you think….

I have seem the rate go as high at $3.50 = £1. That was an awesome trip, ate out in nice restaurants every day, because it seemed so cheap !!

Sounds like a great idea, so long as your son is up for it and you’re OK with taking your daughter out for year. Technology should help a lot with your daughter if you’re going to home school as mentioned above.

I’d agree that moving around too much can demean the experience. I spent a while in NZ some years ago and before we left we did a whirlwind tour – the whole place in 6-7 weeks. Needless to say we didn’t see it all and we found ourselves underwhelmed by the scenery after a while – “Oh look, another glacier. Is it time for lunch yet? Oh yes, a pool of water so full of cyanide it’s entirely green, lets get back and find a pub” etc etc.

You’ve got me thinking now 🙂

Just another thought….

If you’re coming all that way, and have a year at your disposal, you may want to consider something more than just the normal backpackers route down the east coast.

When I did my trip around Oz (many years ago I admit) I soon started to get bored of the endless procession of beautiful unspoilt beaches down the east coast 😀 , and really enjoyed the contrast that some of the more out-of-the-way places offered. Cape York in the tropical far north of Queensland is a great experience, as is driving through the dry centre to see Ayres Rock (or Uluru as we’re supposed to call it now). But, the highlight for me was definitely the Northern Territories – Kakadu (where Crocodile Dundee was filmed), Litchfield, and Katherine Gorge.

The east coast is nice n all, but it’d be a shame to miss out on some of those iconic Australian outback experiences, although it will probably triple the amount of miles you clock up by just adding those three in!

As mentioned , the exchange rate between the GBP and the NZ/Oz currencies is a bit crippling at the moment. The ecomonies of these two countries seem to have survived the recession – and for some reason the Oz Dollar is performing as well as the swiss franc.

I’ve been to Oz 3 times ( sister lives there) – first time it was 2.6 dollar to the pound, last time it was 1.5 dollars to the pound. It made a huge diffence to the “feel” of the holiday.

40K sound be enough – but wait to see what happens to exchange rates before finally setting the dates …

Oz, South America, you lightweights

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21603490

Hate to say it, but that may be an optimistic budget. As said, exchange rates are painful now and probably won’t change much any time soon.

Wouldn’t expect much change from £5k for flights for a family of 4 for UK-Aus-Tas-NZ-UK.

Fuel isn’t cheap and the distances are big (4500km from Cairns to Adelaide down the coast). Food is expensive, even if you stop at the supermarket and DIY every meal. Even if you’re in a camper, your nightly accommodation costs will be $20+ a night (there are some free ones but they tend to be out of the way and with very basic facilities). You’ll want to see and do things which all cost money.

I was staggered at how much a month a Australia cost for just 2 people, and we were in the cheapest camper possible and cooking most of our own food. And that was already being used to the cost of things in NZ.

Also, while I don’t know your son, the last holiday I took with my parents and brother was when I was 16. The idea of touring around for a year with my family at that age would have horrified me.

I’ll agree that the budget is pretty optimistic. Probably can be done with wild camping and spag bol every night.

The east coast of oz is the most civilised. That trip will be the easiest especially with kids in tow but I’d suggest getting a bit more out the way. The old mining towns of WA are quite a site and a good history lesson. We did a loop, up the West coast then back in land via the outback gold fields. It was amazing from a wildlife, scenery and social history point of view.

If the budget allows ,do it.

Do you really need to go as far as Australia as there’s loads to do and see around Europe.
Me and the wife decided to take a year off and it rolled on to 11 years away.Back in the UK now for 18 months and it seems a bit stifling so we’re off again at the back end of the year with a one way ferry ticket.No kids though so that makes it a bit easier.

Someone above mentioned finding some places to stay for a while – this is a good idea. We did a bit of a world tour and to be honest we got very meh about places and sights by the end – spoilt I know. “amazing temple-seen one of those”, “large palace, ticked already”! Work out what sort of people you are and don’t feel you have to do something/see something just because it weighs heavy on the tourist top 5 of that area. We worked out we were doers not lookers and started to focus on places we could do memorable stuff rather than ticking off man made marvels. We also realised cities held little draw for us.

We have and we are currently in Argentina with our three kids aged 9,7 and 5….we’ve tracked down and met a couple of other families too. I wonder about Aus and NZ for a whole year? I’ve a feeling you could regret not seeing more of the world? You could easily be more adventurous and see some of SE Asia too, for example – giving your kids a much more diverse experience, or India, or China……etc If you choose somewhere less first world you can easily make your budget go further. Thats been our plan and one of the reasons we decided to start in S America. 8 years old is a good age – though depending on her, you might find she has spells of being very homesick. Our 9 and 5 yr olds have been more adaptable than our 7 year old daughter who has really learned the value of home and looks forward to returning although at the same time she is learning lots else and enjoying many of the experiences! Your teenager maybe is old enough to join you and head off for stretches on his own or may be happy to be part of the family. I must say, the biggest challenge is all living together 24×7 – needs lots of patience. The children have grown closer in many ways (fabulous to see) and other times just fight like hell and drive us crazy! I agree with the comments to spend longer in places – you can’t rush like you might as a single or couple travelling. Sometimes its a real treat to get a cheap apartment and stay for 1-2 weeks. We have been in S America for 8 months and enjoyed staying one one place or a month or so to learn english or volunteer whilst arranging for the kids to go to a local spanish school for example. That said, one of the best ways to manage accomodation wise with family in Australia and NZ is camp sites, either with your own tent – the cheapest, or renting a fixed site caravan – quite cheap and excellent for good living accomodation and self catering which is also very much the cheaper way to go. I did this 20 years ago with my mum and aunt in tow! Hostels do allow for families without doubt and makes a nice change – not so much security for your stuff tho and you need to avoid those that are just full of party animals! I found many hostels have double or quad private rooms, often en suite as well as dorms which is a nice compromise and great for meeting others. B&Bs also good though harder to find for families. Trip advisor great, you can select hotels then look at the B&B and ‘Other’ options for many different possibilities. everywhere has wifi these days so as long as you have a smart phone , everything can be booked along the way! SE Asia, in contrast would allow cheap eating out for delicious street food or cheap restaurants and cheaper accomodation!
It might sound silly but it really helped to try and work out your goals for the family gap year and make sure you use them to make your overall plan. I read this advice in a book about a family who spent a year in S America and it helped us plan whilst getting our goals aligned! Good luck and do stop by our family gap year blog at mmbzl.com to read more and feel free to get in touch. best wishes, Mo