How much money do we need for our next road trip?

I have set a project for my 12 year old son to work on during the next school holidays. He has to work out how much money we need to save over the next two and a half years to fund our next road trip. The plan is to fly to Melbourne from Perth, hire or buy a campervan or motorhome and head over to Tassie for a 3 week tour. From there we want to drive from Melbourne to at least the Daintree following the coast and taking about 9 weeks before flying back to Perth from Cairns.

Having driven most of Australia with a ute and a caravan I would like to try out the motorhome thing although if we were leaving from home then a car and van would be my first choice. I’m not sure what other options we have when flying over (please tell me if you know of other options). We want to spend the maximum time travelling through Tassie and Qld, the two states we are yet to do, and that means not wasting time driving from Perth and back. I also want to avoid the nullaboring!

After spending 20 months on the road last time, 3 months might feel like a whirlwind tour however, this time we don’t want to leave our jobs permanently, sell or rent out the house, or take Brayden out of high school for too long.

So, how much will it cost for flights, car hire, Tassie ferry, caravan and camping fees, petrol, food and spending money for 3 months? How much will we need aside for bills, dog sitting, mortgage payments etc while we are gone? Well, I look forward to Brayden’s report so we can start saving!