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Hiring a relocation campervan in Australia for $1 a day? Sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? Well, it’s not and I’m going to tell you how it can be done.
As many of you know, I spent a month travelling around Australia. I started in Sydney, flew to CairnsĀ and the plan from there was to book a flight down to Melbourne for a few days and onwards to Adelaide. Although, we left our schedule pretty flexible from Cairns onwards, as our plans weren’t set in stone and, with it being typhoon season in Queensland, we weren’t sure how the weather would be. So with no return flights booked, we left our schedule open to spontaneity.
And it’s a good job we did. The day before I flew to Cairns, we stumbled across Coseats, which offers thousands of relocation campervan deals across Australia. If you’ve never heard of relocation campervans, it’s a van that has been driven in one direction from one city to another, in our case from Sydney to Cairns. The van is left by its previous occupants in that city, which means the campervan rental company have to find a way to return it back to its original base.
Rather than sending a member of staff to drive the van home, the company offers the campervan to travellers at a seriously reduced price, sometimes as low as $1 a day. If you’re lucky, they may even add a fuel allowance! The only catch? You have a set period of time to complete the journey and usually must return the campervan by a pecific date. If you miss the deadline, you will have a hefty fine to pay. often in the region of $1000 or more!
The campervan relocation deal we found included…
- driving a campervan from Cairns to Sydney (2,605 km if you take the coast road)
- $5 a day campervan hire
- $100 fuel allowance
- Six days to complete the journey
Yes, that’s right…six days to drive 2,605 km. That’s approximately six hours driving for six days straight. I know it sounds like a lot, but with only four weeks in Australia, this was our only chance to drive the east coast from Cairns to Sydney, so we snapped up the opportunity.
After four days exploring Cairns, we collected our campervan and hit the road. With no plans for where to stop, eat or sleep along the way, we left everything to chance and let the journey unfold spontaneously as we drove from Cairns to Sydney in our relocation campervan. Sometimes we can be so eager to see and do everything, we plan our every waking minute to fine detail. But having no set plans and just going with the flow is sometimes the best way.
So, that’s how to nab a budget relocation campervan deal. Let me know in the comments below if you manage to find a great campervan relocation deal using Coseats!
This is not a sponsored post. All opinions are my own and I am not affiliated with Coseats in any way.
You’re welcome. 3 weeks would have been nice. When driving in Australia, there is always so much more to see and do. So I can imagine how tough it would have been to not be tempted to venture off-track.
I hope that you get the chance to do it again š
I hope so too! Definitely another trip to plan.
Great experience. Although covering 2600km in 6 days is a challenge in itself. Must have been fun though.
It was a fab experience but yes a huge challenge. Obviously if I had more time I would’ve loved to spend 3 weeks exploring the coast but with only one week spare it was the only option! And I’d do it again! Loved it. Thanks for your comment š
Great deal and experience. 6 days and 2600km is alot to cover though. But it is great for the budget traveller.
I’ll bookmark that website. That could come in handy at some point I reckon. Thanks for sharing š
Glad it’s useful!! Let me know how you get on š
That’s such a good trick. That’s a lot of driving indeed but it’s perfect for budget travelers who don’t want to spend money on flights! However, I would feel a bit frustrated not to be able to stop in all those awesome places on the way – but the $1,000 fee is motivating lol
Thanks for your comment Eloise. I agree, there are pros and cons to the idea. Ideally driving from Cairns to Sydney should take 2-3 weeks and we did it in six days. But although we didn’t see everything, we saw more than we would have done if we hadn’t got this deal! And we chose the places we really wanted to see, like Byron Bay, and made sure to stop there for the night. And yes the $1000 fee was VERY motivating ha!!
Great value, a lot of driving, however great way to explore. Didnāt know this existed so thanks for sharing.
Thanks for your comment Paul and Carole! I had never heard of it either, but if your tight on time and money, it’s a great way to save money and enjoy yourselves too! It was a lot of driving but we had a blast and are so glad we did it.