Anny Chih

I had decided last week that it was time I moved on from Brisbane.  So, I set a date (September 1st), told my co-workers and roomie that I was leaving, and paid the rent only up until then. I didn’t know what I was going to do or where I was going to go, but it just felt like this was what I was supposed to do.

On Wednesday, I had a day off work and decided I’d phone up Wicked Campers and see if they’d sponsor me on a month long road-trip. I thought it was a long-shot, but what the heck right? You never know unless you try.

I spoke with Cassie in the Marketing Department for a couple of minutes, and she said to e-mail a proposal. I wrote one up and sent it in that afternoon.

The next day (Thursday) I got an e-mail from her saying that Wicked Campers would be happy to sponsor me with a van for a month! I was jumping for joy!! At the same time though, I was really nervous. You know how when you find out something really great there’s a part of you that can’t quite believe it and worries that somewhere along the line someone got it wrong and accidentally told you instead of someone else the good news? Well that little part of me was kicking up a little storm. The other parts of me just wanted to tell it to shut up and enjoy the moment.

Then of course, something did happen. But, it was just a little bump in the road. Cassie phoned me a couple hours later and left a message saying that I would have to pay $1,240 upfront because they’ve had experiences where bloggers who said they would blog about Wicked Campers in exchange for a van rental never held up their end of the bargain.

Note to Bloggers: Please keep your word. If you say you’re going to do something, DO IT. When you don’t, you make all of us look bad and people are less likely to trust bloggers in the future.

Now, paying $1,240 upfront would be a bit of an issue because quite frankly, I don’t have $1,240 in extra cash just floating around for this kind of situation. So instead, I wrote up a draft agreement that night stating that if I didn’t hold up my end of the bargain, they’d be entitled to charge me the full amount.

During my lunch break on Friday, I phoned Cassie to make sure everything was ok with the agreement, and I got news that just about gave me a mini heart-attack! Now keep in mind that I had already started tweeting about this #wickedroadtrip and was already making plans about where I was going to go and who I was going to meet.

Cassie and I hadn’t talked about whether the Wicked Campervan would be manual or automatic. I had assumed it would be automatic and she had assumed I drove manual. Do you see where I’m going with this?

They didn’t have any automatic vans available because most Wicked Campervans are manual-drive. Wicked Campers wouldn’t be able to sponsor me afterall. NooOooOoOOooo!!!!!!

*ba-bum ba-BUM BA-BUM* <– my heart

Henry, my automatic-drive car back home

Now technically, I should be able to rent a manual-drive vehicle with my licence without legal implications because the province of British Columbia Canada doesn’t distinguish between manual and automatic-drive; you get the same licence regardless. In Australia, they have different road tests and licences for automatic and manual drivers. It’s much more difficult to get a manual licence, and I’ve been told that most people fail it at least once.

I started thinking about how long it would take me to learn manual. Who could teach me? What would I use? When would I learn? I told Cassie that I could stay in Brisbane for the first few days of the trip just to learn manual before heading off. She said she would phone another Wicked Campers branch to see if they had an automatic available and phone me back. That hour waiting for her call back felt pretty darn long. *Ba-BUM BA-BUM BA-BUM-BUM-BUM-BUM-BUM Ba-BUM-BUM-BUM BUM* Oi…

Cassie phoned back to tell me that the other branch had an older automatic van that wasn’t as nice as the new one they wanted to loan me, but that at least it was automatic. I breathed a huge sigh of relief! YAY!!!!

I’M GOING ON A WICKED ROAD TRIP!!!!

The moral of this story (ie Tip for Travellers)

1. If you can, try to learn how to drive a manual-drive vehicle before you set out on your travels.

Rentals

I had thought that most car rental companies rent automatic-drive vehicles, but I was very much mistaken. Some campervan rental companies (ex. Hippie) only rent manual-drive vehicles. Other campervan rental companies (ex. Wicked Campers) have both, but the majority of their vehicles are manual-drive. You can request an automative-drive vehicle, but they might not have enough to go around so give them lots of notice if you require automatic-drive.

Purchase

Other reasons to learn manual, are the price and selection of cars available if you’re looking to purchase a vehicle. When I told people back home that I was leaving for Australia, everyone who has made the trip (and there were a lot of them) told me that I should buy a car when I got here and sell it when I left. It’s very common for backpackers to do this so there are a lot of used cars on the market. But, because backpackers normally don’t have a lot of money, they usually purchase and sell manual-drive cars (which are significantly cheaper than automatic). If you find an automatic-drive vehicle, phone them right away because cars sell FAST here (like within a week fast).

Tips for Travellers When Purchasing a Vehicle in Australia

1. In Queensland, the seller of a car must have obtained a safety certificate (aka roadworthy certificate) for the car within two months or 2,000 km (whichever comes first) of putting it on the market if s/he is selling privately. If you are buying from a dealer, the dealer must have obtained a safety certificate within three months or 1,000 km (whichever comes first) of putting it on the market. This is for your own safety.
2. The listed price of a vehicle can be deceiving. If the car is not registered (they call it “REGO”, pronounced “reh-jo”), be aware that it will cost you roughly $200* more to register a car in Queensland for six months and another $100-$200 to insure it with the minimum insurance. It costs under $30 to transfer existing registration from the previous owner to the new owner.

Other Tips for Travellers I Learned Through All This Car Business

1. Don’t bring your camping gear to Australia!! Me, being the silly person that I am, decided to bring all my camping gear from home with me. This was stupid. Please learn from  my mistake. Not only does it take up space and is heavy as heck, but there’s a plethora of camping gear in Australia left here by other backpackers. If you purchase a car here, you’re likely to find that it comes with “free camping gear” including tents, sleeping bags, mats, cooking gear and utensils etc. I even found a car that came with fishing rods and a 12V mini-fridge. Another came with not one, not two, but THREE tents (one-person, two-person and three-person) and three sleeping bags plus a bunch of other stuff. Even Sarah had extra camping gear left over from a previous roommate (student from Norway). For Pete’s sake, even my workplace happened to have a free one-person tent lying around! *sigh*

*all prices are in Australian dollars (AU)