My girlfriend has gone travelling. She is absolutely desperate for me to go and spend some time in Australia with her in the Summer. It's not something I've ever been even remoetely interested in before but the more I think about it the more I think it's a fantastic opportunity and would be absolutely brilliant.
So I'm going.
The problem is, I've got absolutely no idea what I'm doing. I've only ever taken traditional holidays in the past. The plan is fly to Australia, stay for a month, and then fly home.
What sort of budget am I going to need to cover this? Flights are £600-£800 and I was wondering if I'd be able to do the whole thing with a total budget of £2k.
Accomodation wise initial googling seems to suggest that Youth Hostels across Australia offer double rooms for only a slight premium over the traditional youth hostel style accomodation. Seems to be about 125 quid per person per week. Is this a practical thing to do? Can I tour Australia staying at Hostels for a few days-week at a time whilst renting a double room?
Basically I'm just after some sort of idea as to how much I need to budget for food and accomodation, really. I'm not an exotic eater and have quite modest eating requirements so I could get away quite easily without 3 course meals at posh restaurants.
Anyone done this before? Any advice? Was looking at hiring a car for the month as well - would work out at about £300 each for the month (£600 in total) for a Ford Falcon. Whilst this would give us huge flexibility is it worth it? Or would the money be better spent on other things?
I think spending time with her is more important to me than the whole travelling 'experience' thing, so spending hours on a dusty bus to save 30p over car hire probably isn't my bag although obviously I'd like to see plenty of great things.
Any advice and/or reality checks gratefully appreciated, thanks!
I'm going to Australia for a month in the summer too, and I'm hoping to keep my budget under £3000, but I'm also going to Thailand and Singapore and I'm doing a big tour in Oz that costs just over £1000 so I think you'll be absolutely fine money wise as long as you're sensible and have a food budget each day etc.
I'd say the car thing sounds good, you can travel in your own time and spend time together, the only reason I'm doing a tour and not something like this is because I'm going alone.
Double rooms in hostels aren't usually too expensive, I'd definitely say stick to hostels rather than hotels and this is a good idea, and yes you can tour Australia staying in hostels for a few days each in double rooms. If I was you I'd book at least a few online in advance.
oh wow sounds fantastic, i'm sooooo jealous! Good on you, you should take these lil life adventures and jump full force into them! You wont regret it, I am sure!
I personally haven't done anything like this before (tho I desperately want to) however 2 of my cousins have and both didn't want to come back once out there. They travelled around on buses and stayed in youth hostels etc and said it was the best way as that's how you get to meet people. I know you are going out there to spend time with your girlfriend but you should make the most of everything you possibly can when spending that kinda money. I would say 2k is definitely the kinda money you should be thinking of saving and spending, always best if you can to save a little more and be able to come home with some instead of running out!!
Well thats the other problem - she won't know where she will be until May, which means I'm missing the tempting early booking flight deals and can't book anything until May. She's on an organised trip until May 10th, then she's free to do what she wants - but I've got to finish Uni first.
How available are double rooms in the hostels? Is it turn up and pay or do you need to book them in advance?
is it basically like a hotel room but without the fancy crap I don't care about?
I spent 6 months travelling oz last year and had the time of my life so would definitely advise you doing it.
As for the budget i would say if you are spending conservatively and staying at hostels you would just about get along on a budget of 1k for spending per month depnding on what excurtians and trips you plan on doing.
Has your girlfriend given you any sort of idea on places and things she wants to do? Obviously this will give you more idea of how much you will need to save.
One thing on staying in a double room at hostels, i would very much advise on booking as adavanced as possible as many hostels only have the odd double room available and these get snapped up pretty sharpish.
If you are planning seeing as much as you possibly can during the month then i would say hiring a car is a good choice, what many people do travelling the East Coast is hire a camper van. Wicked Campers are very popular, you see them everywhere and are very reasonably priced - www.wickedcampers.com.au. If you go for one of the larger campers this will save you on paying for a double room every night whilst on the road.
Food & drinking is very much the same amount as you would expect to pay over here. If you go out on the town expect to be paying the average amount for a night out here aswell.
If you have any other questions let us know. Have a great one!
I think there are usually fewer private rooms than dorms in hostels so I really think it would be wise to book beforehand as there often isn't space when you just turn up. I had a problem when I arrived at a hostel once and really didn't want to stay there but couldn't find any other beds in dorms available in the whole city for that night, you don't want to turn up and try loads of places and resort to an expensive hotel! Double hostel rooms are basically how you described, just a room with a double bed usually.
Could you not just book cheap flights to, say, Sydney now and then nearer the time if she's somewhere else you could stop a night in Sydney and have an internal flight booked. I had a look at some internal flights and found flights to Cairns for about £40 and flights to Darwin for about £60 etc. It may be much cheaper to book a £700 flight now and then an internal flight later than risk waiting til then and end up with a flight directly to where she is for £1500 or something!
Well thats the other problem - she won't know where she will be until May, which means I'm missing the tempting early booking flight deals and can't book anything until May. She's on an organised trip until May 10th, then she's free to do what she wants - but I've got to finish Uni first.
How available are double rooms in the hostels? Is it turn up and pay or do you need to book them in advance?
is it basically like a hotel room but without the fancy crap I don't care about?
Thanks for the quick replies guys!
my brother went to Ozzy for an year.
all be booked in advanced was flights and a week at a hostel, he then worked around, travelling from one hostel to the other with out booking in adavnce.
He went sky diving, snorkled the Great Barrier Reef, and visited the top cities [and more but I cant remeber].
This will be one of your best month ever!!!
hostels are usually very nice, and suitable for young travellers, and there willb e loads of backpackers sharing with you.
I've decided to go to america instead!!! (Don't want to do exactly the same as my big bro do I??" lol
I would def try talk to her about making a few plans at least of the sort of area she thinks she will be in!! Flights will go up and up in price and your budget will be blown! She must know where her tour ends??
I'm really not sure how the flight thing will work. As a test, I've just got a quote for a flight leaving in 1 month time (Ie, the minimum amount of time I'd leave it) and the prices are coming as no more expensive, if anything, even cheaper (Just came up with a flight @ £610 which is cheaper than any I've found leaving on 30th June). I even managed to find a flight for tommorrow at £608, lol
I'm not sure whether June/July is 'peak time' or not. It's Australian winter, not Summer?
Obviously the easy thing to do is get her to commit to some sort of area, but thats easier said than done as my only real contact with her at the moment is via text plus she's only 3 weeks into a 3 month trip to Aus and going through all the usual 'Do i like this? I want to go home, no i dont, I hate my travelling friend, no I dont' sort of thing. Last thing I'd want is to book a flight to find once she gets there she can't wait to get back to England.
You can't base the cost on the price of a flight for tomorrow, it doesn't work like that!
July-ish is the most expensive time to go despite the fact it's their winter.
I'm going back to Aus on June 15th as apparently after that is when the prices start going up.
If you seriously wanna hire a car I'd probably avoid a Falcon/Commodore as they are typically 3-4L gas guzzers which can be expensive to run. Unless they are running on LPG which is pretty cheap in comparison.
You can't base the cost on the price of a flight for tomorrow, it doesn't work like that!
July-ish is the most expensive time to go despite the fact it's their winter.
I'm going back to Aus on June 15th as apparently after that is when the prices start going up.
If you seriously wanna hire a car I'd probably avoid a Falcon/Commodore as they are typically 3-4L gas guzzers which can be expensive to run. Unless they are running on LPG which is pretty cheap in comparison.
I'm going on the 15th too, and I was told the same thing!
Yeh definitely book flights well in advance because if you're looking for tomorrow now it's out of season here and sometimes prices drop just before the departure date... a much safer bet is to focus on buying flights to whichever vague area she will be in now and then looking at domestic flights later if needs be.
I'm going on the 15th too, and I was told the same thing!
Yeh definitely book flights well in advance because if you're looking for tomorrow now it's out of season here and sometimes prices drop just before the departure date... a much safer bet is to focus on buying flights to whichever vague area she will be in now and then looking at domestic flights later if needs be.
Time to resurrect this thread. She's assured me she's definitely going to be there so I'll be booking the flight in the next week or so, to Melbourne.
Budget is £2000 excluding flight for 5 weeks which sounds like it will be enough.
I can't help worrying about accomodation though. Hostels are plentiful and very good value and we'd like to use them almost exclusively but I'm concerned about availability. I'm taking my laptop so I can book in advance but I like the idea of 'Where shall we go this week?' so I don't want to have the entire 5 weeks booked months in advance.
However...
Whilst I appreciate the appeal of many for hostels is getting to know people and a big part of this is staying in a big dorm, it's quite important to me that we are able to take advantage of the double rooms. Most of the reason I'm going is to be with her, not with random people in a big room whilst she's in another.
Am I worrying un-neccesarily? Do the double rooms get booked it up pretty quick? Do most people evee bother with them or what?
Dont mind shared bathrooms, kitchens, showers, whatever, but a private room is important.
Going on holiday, interrailing, broadening one's horizons and weekends in Skegness
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I'm thinking £2,000 will be enough but I'll go there with slightly more money just to be on the safe side. 
