The essential items, camping equipment, car gear & modifications, as well as things you DON’T need!
Essential items
- Clothes: So many girls told me before I left, but I didn’t listen… You don’t need heaps of clothes, I literally rotate between 3 shirts and 3 pairs of shorts… Everything else has either sat in there the whole time, or been worn once. I always opt for my comfiest clothes, so whatever is your go to outfits, just bring those, because trust me, they are all you’ll want to wear! I brought so many clothes that I thought I would wear, but majority the time I just want to wear a baggy shirt and shorts and be comfortable. Same with the guys, Keelan rotates between 4 shirts and 3 pairs of shorts, everything else has sat in his cupboards!
- A Jumper & Trackies – EVEN if you are chasing the sun!! It gets cold at night, so I have used these items so many times. We met a couple who didn’t have trackies and I seriously felt sorry for them! Nothing better than getting into your jumper, trackies and ugg-boots on a cold night! I will note that the ugg-boots were mainly only used when we were coastal, when you get into the Kimberley of WA, it’s pretty warm at night, a jumper would be enough.
- Shoes: We wear our Birkenstocks everyday, everywhere we go. The only other shoes we use are one pair of runners/hiking shoes and thongs for the shower. That is literally it.
- Towels: 3x bath towels, you will always be somewhere where your towels will dry in time, and in the off-chance that you aren’t, you have your one back-up towel. We have used our back-up towel once in 4 months. So no, you don’t need four
- Beach towels x2
- Linen: 2x Sets.
- Pop-up laundry basket, this will be used as your dirty washing basket & also your washing basket when you go to the laundry (Double purpose). You don’t need a washing basket & as well as a laundry basket (If you can even understand what I am trying to differentiate between here haha).
- If your bed in your caravan is a folding bed, we would highly recommend a mattress protector (Just the $5 job from Kmart) in the case that you get dusted… this saved our mattress from turning orange when we got dust in the van.
- First-aid Kit & medication (Better to be safe than sorry, this is the one thing we won’t cut down on when we get home, we are happy to carry it and never use it).
- Water bottles, we just have 600ml ones and when we get home we are throwing them out and getting some bigger ones. We are also going to put the water bladder (5L) in for when we are out and about in the car without the van, so there is extra water in the car.
- 12v Fan
- Hitch lock for when you leave your van somewhere. (We have the Kovix Alarmed Lock from Protrek, our discount code is SKT15)
- Folding poo shovel & toilet paper for bush-poos – lol had to be mentioned.
- I swear there is probably so many other “essential” things, but this is just what comes to our minds.
Essential camping gear:
- Really good camping chairs: You’ll sit in them more than you think, so fork out and get yourself some nice ones. We regret our Kmart job haha.
- Small folding table
- iTechworld Lithium Batteries in your van and car, we have the four of the iTech120x batteries in our van and the iTech1420 pro lithium cranking battery under the bonnet of our car.
- iTechworld Solar Blanket (We have 5% off all iTechworld products, just use the code SKT over the phone or in check-out to save some money!)
- Clear drinking water hose
- Wheel chocks
- Stackable pots & pans: We got a little set from Outback Equipment and the three pots fit into each other so they all stack nice and neatly together. It saves a heap of space and they are actually really good quality! Our discount code at Outback Equipment is SKT5.
- Pop-up bowls: We have the companion leisure pop-up bowls and they are all fold down and stack neatly in the draw. You can also get pop-up bowls and colanders, but we just have the bowls as we try and minimise the amount of stuff we have in the van.
- If you are not in a van, a good cooker for making dinner.
- Mozzie coils & red/orange lights on your van. We learn’t this the hard way!! We had soooo many mozzies on our first few nights as our lights are led white lights and they attracted so many! We had to go out and buy some yellow tape to put over them. It has helped but apparently red lights are the way to go!
Essential car gear
- Tyre repair kit
- Spare Tyre (Obvious I know)
- iCheck Tyre Pressure Monitoring System (Use our code SKT10 for 10% off at iCheck)
- Jump Starter Leads or a Jump Starter (We have the JS80 from iTechworld, our discount code is SKT)
- Oil changing kit
- Maxtrax
- Optional for safety & communication: Oricom UHF (Use our code SKT15 for 15% off Oricom)
Essential car modifications
- Snorkel
- LT (Light Truck) tyres
- Lift Kit
- Spot Lights
- Dual battery system
Things you don’t need
This one is hard to say, as everyone is different and things I mentioned above as “essential” items, is probably not essential for others, and things I say you don’t need, someone can’t live without… but you can decide for yourself!
- Things that don’t have a double purpose. If it is an item that can literally only be used for the one single purpose, think about whether you really need it…
- Foldable clothes rack: If we had room, I would love one! But, when space saving, you have to make do and it really does the same job, so we just use a clothesline that we string up between two trees or under the awning of the caravan.
- Heaps of Tupperware containers, we just have two larger ones that stack into each other for left over dinners and a small container. That is enough for us.
For all the girls out there:
Ok, I brought some of the most ridiculous items for our trip around Australia!! I had in my head that I would need these items in the case that we were in a city and went for a date or out for drinks with friends… so far they have not been taken out once (in 4 months). I don’t know if this will change when we get into major cities over east, but so far they are useless. Things I brought that I haven’t used yet; a hair straightener, a pair of heels, a nice dress, jewellery, make-up (I have only used my CC cream and mascara a few times, but the full make-up has not been touched), numerous pairs on long pants (I have used my jeans once, you seriously only need one pair of nice warm pants if you are chasing the sun). I probably have so many other “things” in this van that I haven’t used, but they were my main things. When we go home for some weddings I am planning to cull so many items and although I’ll keep the straightener in the van for a rainy day, I will definitely be minimising my make-up case. In the chance that I do need it, probably going to be better off just going and buying some stuff because at the moment it just sits in the van probably overheating & going off…
In terms of “going out” clothes, if you are planning on travelling WA, a summer/beach dress and flats is appropriate EVERYWHERE you go, even if you go out for drinks, no one in any of the small or coastal towns you visit will be dressed up unless you go out in Perth City. Save your space and just leave them at home 
half the time you are too hot to dress up anyway 
Discounts on the products we recommend:
Useful videos on essential gear we recommend:
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