How Much it Cost for Six Weeks of Travel in Tasmania, Australia

How Much it Cost for Six Weeks of Travel in Tasmania, Australia

Curious how much it cost for six weeks of travel in Tasmania, Australia? So were we! We tracked every penny to find out exactly how much it cost.

When we travel, our goal and focus are usually on nature and wildlife. We often travel to places with unique wildlife we have been waiting to see our whole life or learn of a unique species we hardly knew even existed and share that with you!

This trip, we had two main species we hoped to see:

The Tasmanian Devil

The Quoll

Tasmanian Devils are native only to Australia. Devil Facial Tumor Disease (DFTD) is a cancer that wiped out a significant portion of the population. As of this writing, Tasmanian Devils are noted as endangered on the International Union for Conservation (IUCN) list. However, we were pleased to learn a great deal of progress has been made on reducing the facial tumor disease and it is hopeful that populations are rebounding.

Not sure what a Tasmanian Devil looks like? Look no further…here is a video of Tasmania’s most voracious land mammal:

Quolls are a beautiful, spotted little mammal. Worldwide, there are six species of quolls found in Australia and New Guinea. Eastern quolls went extinct on mainland Australia around 1960. In recent times organized efforts to reintroduce the eastern quoll back to the mainland have been implemented. Eastern quolls are also on the IUCN endangered list.

Not sure what an Eastern Spotted Quoll looks like. Look no further…here is a video of what we called Quolls Gone Wild as they raced around a free campground we stayed at:

With that, this trip consisted of a lot of camping! 37 nights straight to be exact! 😊

This is what we love to do. That said, camping for that long might not be everyone’s cup of tea. Having a car to drive all around made camping feel like a luxury so we had no issues. At this point we have good gear (which this post outlines most of the items we use that makes travel like this so much easier)

When writing these types of posts, I like to remind everyone that travel is super personal. All of us save our hard-earned money to go to places and do the things that each individual enjoys. I still enjoy how Nomadic Matt describes that in his book, How to Travel the World on $50 a Day à which has been revised to say How to Travel the World on $75 a Day.

Here is our exact breakdown of how much it cost for six weeks of travel in Tasmania, Australia:

– taking note we spent AUD dollars and USD dollars – which are all clearly noted – and then the grand total converted to USD at the end.

But first….a little geography to orient us: 

Tasmania is an island at the southern end of Australia. We didn’t have time to explore Tasmania when we lived in Australia for two years because we had to get across the Nullarbor Plain to catch the whale shark migration north of Perth!

It felt like a great time to utilize our Australian funds we worked hard to acquire years ago, ensuring we could hit our target investing of maxing out ROTH and other funds at the time.

The red line is our approximate route for Tasmania.

On the west coast, there was a large chunk of the Western Explorer Road that got washed out and we could not pass it. So we had to drive all the way back to Burnie and then south to get to Port Arthur. So it goes in Tassie! 

Food: >>> $1583 AUD >>> $37.69 AUD per day >>> $18.84 AUD per person per day

A very exciting food hual!

Gifts: >>> $109 UAUD >>> $2.59 AUD per day >>> $1.29 AUD per person per day

Tasmania had lots of unicorns! I didn’t actually get this as a gift for anyone – but had to put a unicorn photo in the post!!! 

Beer: >>> $171 AUD >>> $4.07 AUD per day >>> $2.03 AUD per person per day

Beer is quite expensive in Australia. Much of the taxes from these sales helps fund the health care system. There were some great craft brews we wanted to try, so we did. We kept track of this category separately because we were curious. Beer also gets sold from the beer store, ie not sold in grocery stores or other locations, which also made it easy to track this category separately.

We loved the penguin logo on this beer. 

Camping: >>> $604 AUD >>> $16.32 AUD per day of the 37 nights camping (hotel nights separate below) >>> $8.16 AUD per person per day

This was a free camp spot. Notice we were the only small car!

We thought of an average of ~$16 AUD a night was really good! We had 11 nights of free camping in Tasmania. Many towns offer free spots (especially if you are self-contained.) Without even trying we racked up 11 nights of free camping with our longest stretch being 5 nights in a row!

Not a bad spot for a free campsite!

This was the composting toilet at the free campground. Australia has a BIG emphasis on having toilets all around. Disclaimer – it was so pretty and I might have left the door open on purpose when I went in there!

Hotel: >>> $233 AUD >>> $77.66 AUD average per night for the 3 nights >>> $38.83 AUD per person per each 3 hotel nights

We stayed 2 nights in Hobart upon arrival to get over jet lag and 1 night in Hobart to fly out. We crunched the numbers, and as a pair of travelers, it was most advantageous to take an uber from the airport to this hostal. Then we could walk to our rental car place and same thing when we dropped the car off, walk back to the hostal at the end. We did the math and the money saving difference of not picking the car up at the airport was worth it. Plus, we didn’t need a car to walk around Hobart anyway! So a win!

Coffee on our final full day in Hobart. The lady gave us a free treat! It was such a nice send off gesture. 

Transportation for Ferries: >>> $174 AUD >>> $4.14 AUD per day >>> $2.07 AUD per person per day

This included ferries to beautiful places like Bruny Island and Maria Island.

Ferry to Bruny Island. Can you see tiny Chris next to our car in this photo?

Personal: $60 AUD >>> $1.42 AUD per day >>> $0.71 AUD per day per person

Seems like every trip we go on, especially Tiff gets there and goes, oh man, I wish I had X. I went to op-shops (thrift stores) and scored a couple more hiking clothes. Australians LOVE their thrift stores!

Snapped this pic from the car on our way to the airport. A bit blurry but thought the building still looked so pretty! There were at least THREE op shops within walking distance in downtown Hobart. Amazing!

Utilities: $50 AUD >>> $1.19 AUD per day >>> $0.59 AUD per day per person

This is mostly laundry! It was quite luxurious traveling in Australia to be able to do our own laundry at campgrounds! The average price was $4 a load for wash and $4 for dry. We also bought clothespins for $4 saving us some dryer loads.

A nice laundry room was pretty typical service at most campgrounds!

Visa: $40 AUD 

This was $20 AUD per person. We were surprised, saddened, and also delighted that there was no more stamping and standing in line for immigration.

Per Australian Immigration, we downloaded an app, paid for our visa, and had our information in the app. When we arrived at the airport, we scanned the app at one station, got a little printout, scanned that at the next station, and we were in! So quick. Almost no line. Incredible.

Entertainment: $776 AUD >>> $18.47 AUD per day >>> $9.23 AUD per person per day

This included activities like Arthur River Cruise, MONA museum, Robotic Dairy farm tour, steam train ride, and our parks pass.

No big deal – went to Tasmania to sail boats with Captain Andy. I was born for this stuff. 😉 

Uber: $86 AUD

The skybus fare from the airport to Hobart was $38 AUD return per person while an uber was around $43 AUD per ride. So we took the uber both ways and saved money.

Petrol (Aka gas in American lingo): $461 AUD >>> $10.97 AUD per day >>> $5.48 AUD per person per day

We had a small car so getting good gas mileage was a big plus! At time of writing a liter of petrol was $1.74 AUD. So $1.74 AUD x 3.8 (liters to a gallon) = $6.12 AUD = $3.89 USD per gallon.

This general store had the best fish and chips!!!

Camping Gear: $93 AUD >>> $2.21 AUD per day >>> $1.10 AUD per person per day

I mentioned in a facebook post how of course we wanted a van…but at $120 AUD per day vs $35 AUD per day for our car…we didn’t need a van.

Chris had the brilliant idea that we would buy some basic items of comfort for our time in Tasmania. We spent under $100 AUD for creature comfort items, including camp chairs, a cooler, a frying pan, and an easy camp stove. On our last night in a campground, we had a yard sale. We sold the lot to a fella for $20 bucks and he got it all as a gift for his grandson. Talk about win-win!

That was our yard sale with a sign. It worked because we sold the lot!

Showers: $29 AUD >>> $0.69 AUD per day >>> $0.34 AUD per day per person

We decided to keep this category separate because at a lot of the national park camp grounds the fee was usually $13 AUD per night and then you could buy a shower for $2 AUD per person. We didn’t always take a shower every time because of timing, other factors, and some national parks didn’t have showers – so kept this category on its own.

Nice shower facilities were typical at caravan parks. 

Nice shower facilities were typical at national parks. In general – camping facilities were nice everywhere. That’s why it was so easy to camp for so long!

Car Rental: $1438 AUD >>> $34.23 AUD per day >>> $17.11 AUD per person per day

Oh you know we loved our car and all the beautiful places it got us! 

Stopping here to do a calculation because the above amounts were AUD dollars spent from our Australian bank account for this trip:

Total How much it cost for six weeks of travel in Tasmania, Australia on the ground: $5907 AUD >>> $140.64 AUD per day >>> $70.32 AUD per person per day

Converted $ AUD to USD at exchange rate of November 2024 of $1 AUD = $0.65 USD.

$5907 AUD = $3862.80 USD >>> $91.97 USD per day >>> $44.98 USD per person per day total spend on the ground in Tasmania (excluding flights and insurance)

Flights are a cost that varies so much depending on your geographic location.

For us in North America, a flight to Australia is what can make this trip so expensive. Other locations, visiting Australia is not that big an undertaking or expense. Flight cost can affect the overall budget for a trip so much – that’s why I like to do a budget breakdown of a trip cost with and without the flight cost included. We also paid about $600 USD more than we needed to for our flights because last summer our work got so busy, we failed to buy tickets when they were a better deal.

Flights: $3192.80 USD for 2 people return >>> $1596.40 USD per person

IMG insurance: $248.10 USD for 2 people >>> $5.90 USD per day >>> $2.95 USD per person per day

Total Spend $USD: >>> $3440.90 USD

Grand Total Spend of $5907 AUD converted to USD is $3862.88 USD + $3440.90 (USD flights and insurance) = $7303.78 USD total spend for six weeks in Tasmania.

Complete total of how much it cost for six weeks of travel in Tasmania, Australia: $7303.08 USD  >>> $173.88 USD per day >>> $86.94 USD per person per day

Keeping in mind our actual USD spent for this trip was:

$3440.90 USD >>> $81.92 USD per day >>> $40.96 USD per person per day for this trip is technically what this trip cost us.

Whew.

Ok, that is a lot of info and budget options to consider. However, given the drastic difference of what flight prices cost depending on your location, your own trip to Australia could cost a lot less or a lot more.

So much of a travel budget is relative as it reflects the interests of the people going on the trip. We felt like this was such a smooth and delightful trip. We absolutely loved all the amazing places we got to sleep.

Going to Tasmania in off season was one of the best trips we could have imagined for that time of our life. We didn’t have to plan anything ahead, get booked out of anything we wanted to do, and often had no neighbors. Talk about a recharge.

We love Australia so much. We still have strong connections to so many wonderful friends we met there. Being there brought up all the feelings once again how much we love Australia.

Thank you Tasmania for letting us recharge our lives and have such a wonderful time. I hope this post is helpful for anyone trying to plan their own travel to Tasmania, looking for travel inspiration, or is just curious how much a trip like this cost. Until next time, happy budgeting and traveling! 😊

Loved this post – try another budget post!

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