Australia is a large place, About the size of Europe or mainland USA.
Australia (OZ) has a varied climate, And lots of different types of places.
So you can chose a time to see something (which will give you
the choice of various places to see) or a type of thing to see
(which will give you one or more time/s to visit).
OZ has adopted the metric system, so temperatures are in Celsius (C),
rainfall in millimetres (mm), weights in Kilograms (kg),
distances in kilometres (km), speed in kilometres per hour (km/h).
The young are not familiar with non-metric units.
The more umm mature may remember them, let see
.. 22 1/2 chains in a furlong ? Now I remember why we gave them up.
Rods, poles & perches, shillings, ounces and pounds!
Mainland OZ is divided up into states,
(or territories, a political thing that does not concern most) 7 of them ;
Western Australia taking the western 1/3,
the central 1/3 is divided into a northern half,
the Northern territory (the only bit with no speed restrictions on the open road)
and the southern half, South Australia, the eastern 1/3 northern half
is Queensland, Victoria takes a small bit of the bottom using a river
(the Murray) as its boarder with New South Wales.
A very small part of New south Wales is taken by the
Australian Capital Territory when the federal capital Canberra is located.
Keep some of the politicians and public servants away from the rest of us.
And finally Tasmania is an island state to the south of Victoria.
The OZ population is around 18 million people.
The country is roughly the same size as mainland USA or Europe.
We are sparsely populated, indeed most of us live on the eastern coast
with a smattering on the western coast at the southern corner.
Probably because this is a climate they like.
The rest is very sparsely populated.
Your choice of time to visit may be dictated by something you cannot change.
Whatever, the next basic step is to choose a type of thing to see.
Climate considerations may help in deciding an area given the time chosen.
Remember that this is the southern hemisphere, so seasons are reversed,
except in the tropics!
The tropics (the northern areas of OZ) are
hot all the time, e.g. Darwin our most northern state capital has
approximate temperatures of 25 (night time low) to 30 (day high)
[the locals put jumpers on if the daytime temperature drops below 25!].
Us whites separate the tropics into two seasons
the wet is the monsoon season
[it pours down, around December to February] and the dry.
The central parts are dry for the most part,
those 'lakes' you see on maps are salt lakes and rarely
have surface water in them. Most of the central areas are deserts,
some sandy, some stony and some are a combination.
The Alpine areas are the high country,
slightly inland around the Victoria and NSW boarder.
It can snow and blizzard at any time of year up there, but it
normally only snows over winter, from July through to August.
Tasmania is an island to the south of mainland OZ, as you would expect
it has a cooler climate than the rest of OZ, I have been there
for Xmas and had snow (this is the height of our summer).
'The bom'
has the average temperatures and rainfall
for the major centres in OZ. Use this web site to find
the typical weather you could expect
for you selected journey. Remember that exceptional weather does occur
and you may get the once in one hundred-year event,
OZ has a large selection of places.
Chose an interest/scenery and we have it.
Finding the interest/scenery may prove to be more of a problem.
For scenery visit the
National Parks web sites to see
what they look like.
For interests possible the
tourist commission
may have the answer.
Having chosen the place, use the procedure outlined in the previous
section to find the timing of the visit.
The laws regarding tourists bringing bikes and/or riding can be found on Cameron's links.
Your biggest danger is not knowing the dangers here.
Getting lost, not knowing which lane to be in ...
If you belong to a motoring organization
in your country you may have reciprocal rights with
the motoring organizations here, they have some good maps
with some detail. Check with your motoring organization.
The isolation (lack of people) of most of our roads
can be unexpected by most tourists. It can be a long wait for help
if you have trouble. It is expected that you carry tools and spares
for normally expected troubles like punctures.
Carry some water if travelling away from the population centres.
Unfenced roads with straying stock and wild animals are a problem.
Don't ride on dawn or dust, at this time the animals move between
their night positions and day positions. Most collisions occur
at these times.
Speed limits exist in all of OZ. Except in the Northern Territory,
where no limit exists away from cities/towns.
Most people sit on 120 km/h on the open road in the Northern territory
as this is the speed road trains (54 metre long semi trailers with
three trailers on the back) sit on. You do not want to be
overtaken by one and going faster means using more petrol
(petrol stations can be a long way apart). The rest of OZ has
top speed limits of 110 to 100 km/h.
When off the bike OZies make a big thing out of the dangers of our wildlife.
The truth is that not many people die from them, possibly because
we might know what to do around them. If you do come across
one of the dangerous animals/insects just leave it alone
and it will probably do the same for you.
Most OZ riders are use to riding good dirt roads.
Some of our Highways are dirt, good dirt but still dirt.
Road maintenance/repairs may have detours into dirt.
If you don't ride dirt you may not like the conditions here.
The more adventurous should realize that some of our roads
may be marked on the map, but a break down may mean a week
waiting for help, unless you make plans. Also some roads marked on maps, or that exist
may be 'private' roads. Please read
all the other pages in my
"dothis"
section, they give some
details on behavior and planing. Some overseas riders die in OZ
with petrol, oil, tools but NO WATER. Read the other "dothis"
pages please.
I recomend the book "Outback Australia" pubilished by "Lonely Planet".
It is a big book (500+ pages) but OZ is a big country. This has all of the
well known adveture routes and would be a good starting point for
overseas visitors or people new to adverture touring.
OZ is a long way from anywhere, so getting your bike here and getting it out is going to be
expensive. If the trip is short hire a motorcycle, it will be quicker
and cheaper.
Longer term visitors may be better off buying a bike here and
selling it before you leave. Take a look in
'the trading post'
for prices. Losses on the buy/sell can be compared to the shipping costs.
Not convinced? OK, try Cameron's links for details on importing.
You can e-mail me at Yahoo. Dated 4 December 2000
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