Australia is a land shaped by extremes and defined by its connection to nature. It’s famous for sun-bleached beaches, a laid-back surf culture and an outdoorsy way of life, alongside extraordinary wildlife.
Australia is huge, but generally pretty easy to get around. Here’s a breakdown of the transport I used in Australia:
Domestic Flights: Flying is by far the easiest way to get from A to B in Australia, given its size. Crossing multiple time zones takes a while, even in a plane (it’s about 5 hours from east to west!). You can search using Skyscanner to find the best deals.
Trains: Trains are not particularly common in Australia (apart from commuter routes within cities like Melbourne and Sydney). There are some famous routes like The Ghan and the Indian Pacific, but these are more of a luxury experience, and the price reflects that. There are some train lines connecting major cities, for example the line between Melbourne and Sydney, which takes about 11 hours.
Buses: Intercity buses are a popular mode of transport for backpacking Australia, especially on the East coast. You can use Greyhound and FlixBus.
Car/Campervan: Hiring a car or a campervan is by far the most popular way of exploring Australia. Having your own vehicle makes it much easier to visit national parks, remote beaches and smaller towns.
It’s best to think of Australia as several countries in one when it comes to seasons. Summer for example is perfect for beaches and coastal road trips, but scorching hot in the outback. Spring and Autumn are the sweet spots, with warm days, cooler nights and perfect conditions for exploring cities and wine regions without melting. Winter is an often-overlooked secret: the Red Centre is at its best, the tropical north enjoys sunny, dry weather, or you can embrace the cold by combining swimming in frozen Tasmanian lakes with a floating sauna!
Finding accommodation in Australia is easy, with a plethora of options from luxury resorts to campgrounds to buzzing hostels, as well as airbnbs varying from city apartments to remote log cabins. I usually use either airbnb or booking.com to find places to stay, or hostelworld for backpacking hostels. Remember to always read reviews before booking. I usually set a review score filter of 7 or 8 and above in booking.com to narrow down results.
Australia has a strict immigration policy, so most visitors will need a visa of some description. Check before you travel. The official Australian immigration site has information about the various different visa types.
I always recommend to people to check the official government advice from their own country of citizenship when applying for a visa, for anywhere. For example, I’m from the UK so I use the UK Government’s Foreign travel advice website, and navigate to the “Entry requirements” section of the country I wish to visit. That will show me the correct links to use to apply for a visa officially, without being scammed. E.g. “Australia: Entry requirements”.
Be aware that if you just google “Australia visa”, you’ll find lots of 3rd party websites offering to do the application for you, which at best will charge you quite a lot of money and at worst may scam you completely.
If you would rather someone else take care of the application for you to save you time and hassle, I can recommend iVisa. iVisa offer an end-to-end visa application service where they take care of the entire application for you. You just need to sign up via their website and fill out the information they need from you for the application. Note that they charge a fee for this service, so it will be more expensive that applying directly yourself.
Here are some of the resources I’ve found particularly useful for travelling in Australia. Download the apps before you go to ensure a smooth and stress-free experience! Check out my Useful Travel Resources page for my complete go-to list of websites and apps.
Currency:
Australian Dollar (AUD)
Capital City:
Canberra (ACT)
Languages:
English; Over 100 surviving Indigenous languages
