We met a young family from Newcastle by the pool at Cape Hillsborough Tourist Park and they told us about their adventure they were currently pursuing. Dad, Mum and their 6yo daughter are in a sedan and tenting their way around Australia in 3 months. I couldn’t help but to gasp at the thought and explained we were doing the same but we had it planned over two and a half years.

The whole of Oz in 3 months – Wow!! Good on them.

Cape Hillsborough

For what feels like the zillionth time they showed envy at our planned 2.5 year sojoin. If I had a dollar for every time someone has said to us “we’re so jealous” we could have funded this trip entirely. That night, it got me thinking……

How did I really get to this point where I’m doing something so amazingly ambitious as packed the house up, left family and friends, bought a Motorhome and just departed on a whim.

Leaving my brothers place the first morning of our adventure

Two and a half years is such a long time to be away. There’s likely to be lots of things we will miss and with both our Mum’s now in their early 80’s it wasn’t an easy decision. We are both very very close to our Mums. Our youngest son is just 22 and with his work commitments, he has remained in Brisbane.

Reflecting back recently, Adele and I always have loved to travel. When Adele and I met she was 9 weeks from leaving to travel around Europe for 3 months. There were no Mobile Phones, No Facebook, No Instagram and no text messaging back then. Just postcards and snail mail!! Everyday I’d check the letterbox in anticipation but so often nothing would be there.

Soon after we married we bought a 4wd and our first trip was with a tent to Stradbroke Island, a beautiful place easily accessed by Barge in Brisbane. We loved it so much we began making regular trips to Straddie and Moreton Island, with other trips to Double Island Point and Fraser Island thrown in.

Christmas on Moreton Island about 1989. My first 4wd.

Since we left, I’ve received news that two friends have lost their mothers who have passed away, another friend has lost her sister after losing her short battle at just 42 years of age, my cousin has just passed away after a short battle with Brain cancer and others too have received terrible news. It was the passing of my Father in 2008 that changed my life and has taken me on a journey to discover what I’m really meant to do in my life and it has turned out to be entirely different to what I thought.

When my Dad succumbed to melanoma in January 2008 I was a Company Director and Board Member of Australia’s second fastest growing franchise (*according to BRW Feb 2009). My role was travelling around Australia and New Zealand supporting and training new franchisees and all of a sudden I didn’t want to leave home, I just wanted to be with Adele and my two sons.

The passion for working long hours and making massive wealth died the day I buried my father. It no longer provided any interest to me.

My Dad

In fact, it was then I realised that life does have an end date and for me, working my arse off was taking me away from everything I had enjoyed in life.

We had loved going camping and once travelled down the NSW coastline from Brisbane with friends to North Haven and back, just stopping a few days wherever we thought the beach looked perfect.

North Haven, just south of Port Macquarie in NSW

I also love playing cricket but business and my career took over.

I got back to playing cricket when I turned 40 and in June and July 2015 Adele and I travelled to London and Wales where I played cricket with Cameron, my youngest son.

Cameron and I playing cricket in London in 2015

It was early 2015 we had met some backpackers from Germany who had just hired a Motorhome and been to Cairns and back. I knew it was something we should do and when we drove home that night we began to talk about it and I couldn’t believe it when Adele, the conservative one in the relationship, didn’t hesitate in agreeing. The travel bug was still living inside us.

My brother suggested hiring a Motorhome first to see if we would like it but we knew, this was meant to be. We weren’t daunted in any way.

The Great Australian Bight

I believe we need to find what it is that we are here on this planet for. Why were we put here, what is our purpose?

It might simply be to be the best partner and parent you can be. Or possibly it’s to achieve great things in your career. It might be sport or it might have something to do with your artistic talents. For me, it’s time now for adventure and travel.

Work funds life – it isn’t life.

Sunrise at the Bay of Fires in Tasmania. The dawn of another magical day.

Working my butt off for long, long hours and going through the motions of the daily grind until one day the stress has me carried out in a wooden box has zero interest to me any more. There just has to be more to life than working, mowing the grass, watching TV, paying bills and doing it all over and over again like Groundhog Day.

There has to be more to life!!

Whitehaven Beach in the amazing Whitsunday Island on the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland

We are given just one shot at this earthly existence, don’t waste it!!

If you’re like us and you love to travel, make it happen. Don’t wait until the kids are old enough, until you have enough money, until the house is paid off or any one of another multitude of reasons you may be hesitating. With great planning and preparation you can do it very cost effectively if necessarily. You can home school your children and experience all that life can offer at the same time. Let the highway be their greatest education.

Loch Ard Gorge, the Great Ocean Road, Victoria

Here’s a Tip from someone whose children are now in there 20’s and I can reflect back on fatherhood of youngsters. It may not seem like it while they are young but the thing they crave from us as parents the most is Time.

We just need to be there.

It’s not what we leave for our children but what we live in them.

Karijini National Park, Western Australia

If budget is an issue, everything you need to buy, buy it as cheap as you can. Look for great value second hand items and stay patient until it happens. The old adage “you get what you pay for” isn’t actually true any more. With thorough research you don’t have to buy the most expensive of anything. Great research, patience and product knowledge will help you buy what you need without having to sell a kidney.

We have a storage shed full of “stuff” back home and to be honest, I don’t need anything more than I have in the Motorhome.

Australia is an amazing country. Each state is so different and provides incredible sights and lots of fun things to see and do. There is also so much to see and do that costs very little or nothing at all.

Coles Bay, Freycinet National Park Tasmania

So what are you waiting for?

Get planning, create a deadline and make it work for you.

Enjoy your travels.

Thanks
Kev & Adele
Indefinite Leave

Website: www.indefiniteleave.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/indefiniteleave

YouTube: www.youtube.com/c/indefiniteleave

Pinterest: Indefinite Leave

Instagram: Indefinite_leave

Twitter: IndefiniteLeav3

Email: hockeys@indefiniteleave.com.au