‘Our trip from the bottom of Tasmania to Queensland during coronavirus restrictions’

We had been locked down in Dover for nine weeks and when the opportunity to leave Tasmania presented itself, so we hightailed for the border. We’d been staying in such a lovely place and had met some wonderful people, but the weather was changing — becoming closer to winter and it was cold, rainy and there were gale-force winds. Time to move on!

People had been saying, “Oh it’s a lot worse than this in winter”. It was only autumn, but temperatures were as low as 0C.

I wondered what could get worse in a caravan. The floor of our van felt frozen and we’d tried every form of heating. With both of us suffering because of medical conditions and not being able to get the equipment necessary for our health, the doctor suggested we move north to warmer country (read: go home) where everything was available.

From the bottom of Tasmania this meant a very long drive to Queensland during the coronavirus restrictions.

In order for us to travel we first needed to organise medical certificates from the doctor. We drove 44 kilometres to pick up the paperwork from Geeveston. Then, we downloaded Queensland Border Passes and changed our boat tickets on the Spirit of Tasmania to the nearest weekend (originally we’d purchased tickets when we’d arrived, but had to postpone our departure to September when lockdown hit).

I contacted the Covid-19 Hotline and was advised that we were not able to travel through any of the coronavirus hotspots on our return otherwise we’d need to quarantine when we reached Queensland. I wasn’t aware of the listed Covid-19 hotspots or how they would affect our route home.

Sydney and the central coast of New South Wales in particular were hotspots at the time and had to be avoided, which meant we couldn’t take the M1.

When I spoke with the police in Tasmania to see if there was anything I had not thought of they indicated I needed to have all my paperwork available to show I was returning home. I rushed down to the post office and they printed everything out, the boat tickets, the border passes etc.

With everything organised I looked up some sites regarding travellers to see what everyone said they needed to go across the Queensland border. Being Queenslanders we seemed to have the right documentation. We’d heard of odd stories of violence or abuse with people travelling through towns so we put a sign on the back of the caravan saying ‘Essential Travellers — Going Home’.

We were told to drive the distance quickly and not go and stay in odd places. Another recommendation was to keep all our dockets on the way so that we had an exact record of where we had been. The last thing to do was to attach our Queensland Border Passes to the front windscreen so it was obvious what we were doing.

Our first stop was Devonport. We had to drive the 420km in one day and booked into a caravan park near the Spirit of Tasmania port. We’d been worried about being pulled over and asked what we were doing, but we sailed straight through.

We were allowed to wait in this caravan park (being self-contained and essential travellers) until our date of departure to the mainland and they had put us on a grassy spot near the front gate for quick exit. I did go to the shops but nobody seemed to be social distancing so I got out of there very quickly.

As we drove onto the Spirit of Tasmania we noticed there were only six cars and about two caravans. We were instructed to go straight to our cabin and stay there until we were called in Melbourne.

To our surprise they had upgraded our cabin to one with a port hole and supplied us with water, breakfast and treats. Settling in for a night of sleep on the boat, we set our alarms so we’d be ready for driving off in Melbourne. We had decided to do the trip to Queensland in three days once on the mainland, so had packed drinks and food so we did not have to stop other than for petrol and breaks.

Melbourne was so welcoming with a lovely day of sunshine, but we had chosen to drive on to Coolac Cabins and Farmstay in New South Wales 526km away, which was a long drive ahead. The trip was rather easy driving, as once out of Melbourne we went onto the Hume Highway, which is a double carriageway, and just drove. With our little dog on board we did have to stop a number of times for her convenience. As we drove into Coolac in the late afternoon it looked so green compared to a few months before when we stayed during the fires. We received a lovely welcome from all residents and were put in a position for an easy drive out in the morning at 6:30am.

The next day was filled with back road highways to Tamworth, which was not easy driving with a 23ft caravan in tow. My husband was not impressed with the bumps and we were both amazed that the caravan held together so well over the 621km.

One road in particular seemed to have a big dip every 100m. My gosh I was tired when we arrived as I do all the driving.

There were few cars, just utilities and trucks on the road, and we were not pulled over by anyone. A lot of the trucks coming the other way moved over to let us pass easily. Arriving again in the late afternoon, it was a long trip!

Finally leaving Tamworth we joined the New England Highway and the driving was much easier. When we arrived at the Queensland border we were greeted by a soldier (who carefully moved some witches hats out of the way so our car and caravan could pull into the marked area) and a number of burly policemen.

They had seen the border passes on the windscreen, but I had another copy and handed it to the policeman along with my Queensland drivers licence. I had put down the window and expressed such a sigh of relief reaching this border point that everyone was smiling.

I was asked if we were going to live at the address on the back of my licence and I said we were. My husband also showed his licence. The policeman was friendly and we had a quick chat about what we were doing and then we were waved on.

There was much excitement at being back in Queensland at last! The roads were still bumpy but I found my main nightmare from there was travelling through Cunningham’s Gap with 9km of steep descent in second gear. I was so relieved to get to the bottom and I am sure I experienced high blood pressure on the way down, dodging huge trucks and cars.

From there the majority of vehicles were cars and the trucks became scarce. The roads were very busy as we drove into Brisbane. In all the miles of travel we had not been pulled over once except for the Queensland border checkpoint.

Arriving home after travelling such a long away was so exciting. We spent the following days relaxing and catching up on sleep. It was so nice to be home and warm!

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