Travelling by road in Australia is often the longer and more time-consuming option. However, it is also the option that gives you a much greater appreciation for the countryside. The trip that I took was outlined in a short post on the day before leaving “Road Trip From Brisbane to Canberra“.
Travelling the Australian countryside by road is something that I have wanted to do for some time. To have the opportunity to see the countryside, the towns and everything else between the cities. But at the best opportunities I had, other commitments always seemed to manifest. Finally, the opportunity and the time presented itself, albeit a short condensed time frame.
Update: You can now read the whole journey in three posts. Part 1: Southbound | Canberra | Part 2: Northbound
Sharing The Journey
I am a little disappointed to say that this is the first step in sharing the journey. My original plan was to share the journey as it happened, but the impracticalities of this quickly became apparent.
The journey took place over eight days between the 6th and 13th of November 2017. Travelling with two friends, while also making stops, eating meals and sleeping all contributed to my challenge. There is something to be said for solo travel, which is how I have completed almost every other trip.
Today though I would like to start the ball rolling with a little from the trip. I have some basic stats from the drive and the walking. Also, I am going to be working hard to get the rest of the journey written up with plenty of photos to share soon.
Road Trip Quick Stats
Sharing the statistics of a journey is something that I love to do and have done in the past. While for a short eight-day drive to Canberra they may not be all that impressive, I still wanted to include them.
Over the eight-day trip, we covered a total of 2,910 km. Each day we were travelling this come in around 415 km per day. The shortest driving day was between Dubbo and Narrabri with 328 km travelled. The longest driving day was the last day from Narrabri to Brisbane with 666 km travelled.
Prior to departing Brisbane, I had worked out a rough route for each day. Based mostly on the directions provided by Google Maps with one or two adjustments. However, they did not take into account other stops and deviations that might be made. Below is the list I provided in the original post and in brackets the actual distance driven each day.
6th Nov: Brisbane to Coffs Harbour – 391 km (413 km)
7th Nov: Coffs Harbour to Taree – 227 km (329 km)
8th Nov: Taree to Gosford – 243 km (364 km)
9th Nov: Gosford to Canberra – 352 km (366 km)
10th Nov: Canberra
11th Nov: Canberra to Dubbo – 429 km (444 km)
12th Nov: Dubbo to Narrabri – 263 km (328 km)
13th Nov: Narrabri to Brisbane – 579 km (666km)
The distance travelled each day is only for the main travel. Short side trips or driving while in Canberra are not included.
Road Trip Drive Time
Travelling so many kilometres takes quite some time, especially when you start making deviations. The thought that much of the travel will be on highways can quickly see you significantly underestimating the time it will take.
In total for the above driving, there was a total of 40 hours in the car driving. With seven travel days, this worked out to about 5.6 hours driving each day. Some days did work out to be less driving time such as the day between Gosford and Canberra with around 4.5 hours. But the day from Narrabri to Brisbane was over 7 hours of driving.
For me, the time was not a great issue. Because the payoff was getting to see many new areas that I had not visited before.
Road Trip Walking
I have not made much mention of my daily walking habits and goals here, but they are something important to me. My daily goal for over two years has been to walk 15,000 steps per day. Which to date I have achieved every day with just three exceptions.
There was a concern in my mind that maybe I would face missing this goal again while on this trip. The combination of so much driving and the other day to day necessities could have tripped me up. But I am happy to say that I managed to fit 15,000 steps into every day as well. Walking a total of 134,551 steps over the eight days I was travelling, or 16,819 steps per day on average.
Updates to Come
Currently, I have some updates in mind that I want to share over the next couple of weeks. Mostly they will cover the day to day travel and attractions that we visited. However, I also have a couple of ideas to share about some of the lessons I learned on this short trip. Along with a little something about the planning aspects of the trip.
