Yvette Brown For many people, exploring Australia is a dream. A thorough understanding of a country can take years.
You can drive around Australia along National Highway 1 in less than a week if you get in your car and drive day and night, only stopping to refuel.
Can You Drive All The Way Around Australia
Australia’s continent can be driven around in a vehicle. The Big Lap is well-known throughout the nation. Except for Tasmania, Highway 1 travels through all of Australia’s states and takes about 15 hours.000 km long.
How Long Does It Take To Drive Around Australia
3 Months – The Long Service Leave Trip
Ideally, you’ll need three months to drive across Australia.
I refer to this trip as the “Long Service Leave” trip because it is frequently the best choice for people who want to complete the Big Lap but do not want to resign from their jobs.
It’s not the best option, and you’ll spend a lot of your trip driving, but people do it, and, to be honest, if it’s your only choice, go for it.
If you mostly stay on Highway 1, you’ll need to travel more than 240 km per day on average, assuming a total distance of 20,000 km.
If you find this challenging, you might want to do a half lap instead, in which you drive around the west or east coast and up or down through the middle.
What you are most interested in seeing will largely determine where and how far you travel.
6 Months – The Quick Lap
The minimum amount of time you’d need to complete the lap at a manageable speed is probably six months, but even then, this won’t leave much time for side trips off the main circuit, so you’ll need to concentrate on your list of highlights as you go.
An alternative way to view a six-month journey is as a collection of 26 x one-week segments where you travel for two or three days and make brief overnight stops along the way.
Then set up a base camp somewhere for about four or five days and go on day trips to explore the surrounding area.
12 Months Or More – The Ultimate Big Lap
A year is the ideal amount of time to drive around Australia unless you’re a Grey Nomad with no compelling reason to stop traveling (in which case, I envy you).
It will give you plenty of time to explore side roads and off-the-beaten-path locations along the way and is long enough for you to see everything you want at a leisurely pace without rushing.
What Is The Distance To Drive Around Australia
Australia has a highway called National Highway 1 that runs right around Most of the way, Australia follows the coast.
With a total length of roughly 14,750 km, Highway 1 is the world’s longest national highway.
With the exception of Canberra, all of the state capitals are connected by a network of highways known as Highway 1, which circumnavigates the nation rather than being a single road.
Even further, Highway 1 reaches Hobart, the state capital of Tasmania, on our southernmost island.
If you stay on Highway 1 and avoid the unsealed section of the road between the Northern Territory and Queensland, you can drive around Australia in about 14,750 km.
If you’re planning a Big Lap road trip around Australia, you’ll actually drive a lot farther than that.
When detours, side trips, backtracking, and general zigzagging around to reach the destinations they want to see are taken into account, the majority of Big Lappers travel at least 30,000km or more.
What Is The Best Route To Drive Around Australia
Australia really only has one route around the continent, which is Highway 1, unlike Europe or the USA, which are crisscrossed with a network of highways running in every direction.
The majority of Big Lappers use Highway 1 as their primary “artery” as they travel throughout Australia, taking side trips to the locations they want to see.
Put an Australian map on the wall of your home and mark all the locations you want to visit using pins or stickers as a good place to start when planning your route.
As you come across new locations, occasions, roads, and tracks that you want to include, there’s no doubt that you’ll keep returning and adding to them over time.
As you essentially connect the dots, this will then serve as the starting point for planning your route.
What Is The Best Direction To Travel Around Australia
Whether you choose to travel around Australia in a clockwise or anti-clockwise direction will largely depend on where you begin and the season you depart. To enjoy the dry season in the North, try to travel there between April and September.
Australia has five distinct climate zones, ranging from tropical to arid and from temperate to alpine. It is best to avoid certain areas during the summer because they can get very hot. Being stuck in the tropical zone during the rainy season entails not only a lot of rain but also very hot days and nights and frequent road closures.
Try to schedule your trip so that it avoids these extremes, but in my experience, it’s impossible to be everywhere at once on a trip of this kind.
Can You Drive Through The Middle Of Australia
Following the Stuart Highway, which travels from North to South for two hours, will take you through the center of Australia.834 km (1,761 mi). Any type of car can travel on a fully sealed road.
Following the Outback Highway from East to West is possible, but this road trip requires a 4WD vehicle.
Due to the fact that you can save the other half of your trip for another time, or perhaps because you live on one of the sides and it would be simpler to take shorter trips to see that half of the country.
Driving through the middle offers a great opportunity to cut your trip in half.
It also means that you won’t have to miss Uluru because it is a significant detour on the Big Lap and many people choose to bypass it.
The Stuart Highway or the Outback Highway can be taken, depending on where you live and the kind of vehicle you drive.
Can You Drive Around Australia On Sealed Roads
The majority of Australia’s Highway 1 is a sealed road that can accommodate any type of vehicle.
Long stretches of Highway 1 between Daly Waters in the Northern Territory and Normanton in Queensland are unsealed and typically quite rough.
The Savannah Way between Broome and Cairns includes a section of this road known as the Carpentaria Highway.
You can easily take a detour around this section of Highway 1 by traveling south from Normanton and then west along Highway 66 into the Northern Territory to the Stuart Highway at the Threeways Roadhouse, which is located just north of Tennant Creek.
The largest town in the region and a great place to stay for a few days in Mt Isa, where you should stop if you decide to travel a little further south.
Many people take awesome road trips across Australia in 2WD cars and vans.
To reach many of the more stunning and remote locations, you will need a 4WD if you decide to divert from the main route.
