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Driving home


Boydie

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Just for comparison, Australia vs England.

I drove home from Melbourne back to Bullaburra yesterday in Julie's Kia Cerato. This is a trip we do on a fairly regular basis as her extended family live down there.

Total trip distance door to door, 964 kilometres. (578 miles)

Average speed 102 kph. (61 mph) Our freeways have a maximum posted speed limit of 110kph (66 mph)

Time taken 9 hours 52 minutes. (2 coffee / toilet stops on the way).

Average fuel consumption 6.8 litres per 100 kilometres (40 mpg)

Of the 578 kilometres, 522 are on the Hume Highway, a four / six lane freeway that goes from Melbourne to Brisbane, switch on cruise control sit back, relax and just watch the kilometers flow past.

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For comparison, I walked home last night. Used no fuel, and walked through beautiful scenery,looking at the wild garlic in flower and the bluebells.Listening to the buzzards calling and trying not to disturb the deer.

I like Australia, but for ease of living and beautiful countryside I'll stay here.

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Napoli, Italia to Trowbridge, Wiltshire in 27 hours, 2400km, several tunnels (including the 11.6km Mont Blanc tunnel), loads of tolls, a hell of a lot of rain, one ferry, loads of diesel and about 30mpg (9.4l/100km) in a Td5 110, one driver. No sleep. Some Redbull.

Chris

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Ally V8, yeah, I know, I used to live there but you can fit the UK into Australia 25 times and 6 times into NSW and we have less population than greater London.

There would be NO kids in the UK that spend up to 3 hours each way (6 hours a day traveling ) on school a bus just getting them to the nearest primary or high school, if their daily trip is over 3 hours and they are allowed to use the "school of the air" up to high school (12 years old) when they go to board at the nearest large town.

It often cracks me up traveling to see a small bomb of a car parked at the gate to a property so that the kids can drive from the homestead to the main road, meet the school bus and drive back to the homestead in the evenings - (the homestead can be anywhere up to 10 kilometers away from the road) and these "drivers" can be as young as 8 years old !

This is a BIG country and on the trip from Melbourne to Sydney you go from 50 feet above sea level to 1825 feet and back down and over that distance you can experience 24 *C down to 4* (snow and ice) and back up to 24* -- not bad all in one day and a single trip ^_^

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The roads need to be empty as it was a 300mile round trip to get a BK Whopper for me , and you need a decent bull bar to handle hitting a Roo at 65mph !! Like anywhere there are pluses and minuses :)

ps How about a 2600km vehicle recovery job!

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I dont know about 2600 kilometer recovery but the Birdsville Roadhouse charges $400 an hour for desert recoveries, there and back and you can figure it out at around 20 kph and when we were at the Ilkurlka Roadhouse some years back we heard of a guy who had his Land Cruiser towed off the Anne Beadell to Warburton to get suspension repairs carried out and didn't get any change out of an $8000 towing fee :blush:

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over that distance you can experience 24 *C down to 4* (snow and ice) and back up to 24* -- not bad all in one day and a single trip ^_^

The way the weather has been recently you can experience all that in the UK without leaving home!

Chris

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Ally V8, yeah, I know, I used to live there but you can fit the UK into Australia 25 times and 6 times into NSW and we have less population than greater London.

There would be NO kids in the UK that spend up to 3 hours each way (6 hours a day traveling ) on school a bus just getting them to the nearest primary or high school, if their daily trip is over 3 hours and they are allowed to use the "school of the air" up to high school (12 years old) when they go to board at the nearest large town.

It often cracks me up traveling to see a small bomb of a car parked at the gate to a property so that the kids can drive from the homestead to the main road, meet the school bus and drive back to the homestead in the evenings - (the homestead can be anywhere up to 10 kilometers away from the road) and these "drivers" can be as young as 8 years old !

This is a BIG country and on the trip from Melbourne to Sydney you go from 50 feet above sea level to 1825 feet and back down and over that distance you can experience 24 *C down to 4* (snow and ice) and back up to 24* -- not bad all in one day and a single trip ^_^

Very true,it is a very big country,I've had plenty of experience of it during many visits.I have family and friends all over it.My favourite area of Oz is the south west corner around Walpole where friends farm. More recent trips have left me thinking that in many ways the size of the place is a massive handicap,much time and fuel is used in moving freight and people over long distances,because so much of the country is of no use. I really appreciate the fact that about 3 hours is as much time as you need to spend here in the UK to get to anything you can imagine,2 hours flying will take you to most of the best destinations in Europe - to do what ever you want. Australia is nice to visit,but there are better places to live.

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Australia v. England?

I love the vastness of Australia, stringing together a heap of 400 mile days and just crawling across the map. All that space is fantastic!

I love the intimacy and quaintness of England, exploring slowly (even on foot) and seeing so much in such a small distance. Not to mention the drama of Scotland!

Horses for courses - I'll take one each way.

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I have to admit becoming a tad anti-social, Julie and I enjoy touring in the red centre and our top travel period to date was in 2014 driving 9 days without seeing another living soul - thats sublime peace and quiet. When we are looking for a place to camp up for the night or even for a few days and we see another 4WD we generally go another 5-10 kilometres so we have space of our own.

Yes, living in the UK has its attractions, 4 mates and I celebrated finishing uni in '68 by driving in three Cooper "S" to Israel - we had a great time but you couldn't travel for more than an hour in europe or in the UK without coming across some form of civilisation, a house, farm, village, town or city.

Here in Oz drive over the Anne Beadell and you have 850 kilometers (510 miles) between fuel points or human habitation and as I found out on one occasion,1500 kilometres (900 miles) and a good four days driving over rough corrugated tracks to get to the nearest nurse or hospital and that knowledge makes you exceedingly resourceful, and thats the outback I love.

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There would be NO kids in the UK that spend up to 3 hours each way (6 hours a day traveling ) on school a bus just getting them to the nearest primary or high school, if their daily trip is over 3 hours and they are allowed to use the "school of the air" up to high school (12 years old) when they go to board at the nearest large town.

I suspect some islanders in the Hebrides would disagree with you on that one...

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I've been up in the Kimberley for over a decade and the distances are pretty annoying in the sense that if you go anywhere, it's going to be a long way. Freight is expensive, car parts usually take two weeks to get here from the other side of the country, and food is not only expensive but is of hopeless quality as well.

I haven't been out of the Kimberley for over five years and while we're planning to drive down south this year, we may not have the sheer amount of time and money involved. The distance one way to a small town south of Perth is about the distance from Moscow to London, but with only one city and two or three big towns on the way. It makes everything difficult. Some people have been known to do the Perth-Kimberley run in one drive by swapping drivers, but that's without kids and pretty crazy anyway. Driving at night in Western Australia relies too much on luck to avoid animals/falling asleep/crazy people.

I love the emptiness of the place and the above-mentioned resourcefulness required, (though many never figure that out), but my idea of a great holiday would be a summer in Britain driving only backroads and walking everywhere else!

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  • 2 weeks later...

The part of OZ that gets the best of both "countries" is Tassie , I always thought of it as a cross between the Cotswolds and Scotland

in an area about the size of Wales but with the usual empty (non Metro ) Aussie roads .

I didnt have the brass neck to charge as much as that for recovery , but it was well worth the bother , especially when using a defender to drag in a cruiser :) and explaining that it was OK to tow in 5th with a landy !

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My drive home is usually some 1.000 kms. through 4 countries. Like you, time, energy, costs & idiots on the road play a big role.

Off to a client later this year - 2.000 kms. one way - 7 countries.

Going to be fun.

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  • 4 weeks later...

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