Australia
How to Get Around Australia
The distances are the whole problem
Sydney to Perth is further than London to Moscow, and the interior between the coasts is largely empty. Domestic flights are the standard way to cover the long legs, with Qantas, Virgin Australia and Jetstar connecting the major cities. Everything else is driving. The single most useful planning decision is to pick one part of the country and stay in it, because the map flatters the distances badly.
Getting in
Everyone needs a visa to visit Australia -- there is no visa-free entry. For many passports that means an Electronic Travel Authority, applied for through the official app; there is no visa application charge, though there may be a service fee. The other arrival rule is biosecurity, and it is enforced seriously: you must declare anything that may be prohibited or subject to tax or duty, and you must declare if you have been in contact with farms, farm animals, wilderness areas or freshwater streams and lakes in the past 30 days. Walking boots worn on a muddy trail anywhere in the world are exactly what that question is about.
Driving
A car is the best way to see anything beyond the cities and often the only way to reach smaller towns and national parks. The main coastal highways are ordinary sealed roads and need nothing special; a four-wheel drive is worth it for genuine outback or remote-coast routes, where the considerations become fuel range, water, and telling someone where you are going. Distances between services in the interior are long enough that running the tank down is a real risk rather than an inconvenience.
Trains and cities
Long-distance trains exist -- the Ghan between Adelaide and Darwin, the Indian Pacific across the Nullarbor -- and they are journeys in their own right rather than a practical way to cover ground quickly. Within the cities, public transport is solid in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, and thinner elsewhere; each state runs its own smartcard, so a card that works in one city will not work in the next.
Verified against UK Government (GOV.UK; FCDO travel advice abroad), September 2026.
Biosecurity is not a formality
You must declare anything that may be prohibited or subject to tax or duty, and you must declare if you have been in contact with farms, farm animals, wilderness areas or freshwater streams or lakes in the past 30 days. The practical consequence for a walking or wildlife trip is muddy boots, tent pegs and camping gear: declare them and they are usually inspected, cleaned and returned. Not declaring them is what turns a two-minute inspection into a penalty.
Everyone needs a visa
There is no visa-free entry to Australia for anyone. For many nationalities the Electronic Travel Authority, applied for through the official app, is the route; there is no visa application charge, although a service fee may apply. Arrange it before you travel rather than at the airport.
Pick one part of the country
The temptation is to combine the reef, the red centre and the southern cities in a fortnight. It can be done, and it is mostly airports. The trips that work take one of them and go deeper: the east coast between Sydney and Cairns, the red centre and the Top End, or the south -- Melbourne, Tasmania and the Great Ocean Road. Flying between them costs a day each way once transfers are counted.
Seasons run opposite, and the halves disagree
The temperate south peaks in December and January, which is exactly when the tropical north is in its wet season. That is not a detail to plan around later -- it decides which half of the country a given month suits, and it is the most common way an Australian itinerary goes wrong.