Big Lap of Australia Begins | Murray Paddlesteamer | Great Ocean Rd | Spirit of Tas

We finally get on the road and our Big Lap of Australia begins after a delay waiting for a car part. We have to race down the East Coast to make our booking on the Spirit of Tasmania, but we stop by the Gondwana forests near Gloucester in NSW, we spend a terrific 3 days on a Murray River Steam Boat, drop by the Great Ocean Road before we load the rig onto the Spirit of Tasmania.
Gloucester Tops - Echuca - Great Ocean Road - Geelong - Spirit of Tasmania
Welcome to our Big Lap Gap Year. We're David and Paula ‪@nextleveloz‬. Like many of you, we've worked hard for 40 years, but we are too young to retire. So were taking a gap year from work, we've bought our first ever caravan and are doing a Big Lap around Australia taking in the iconic destinations of our fabulous country,
This channel is for fun and to share our trip of a lifetime and if we get enough subscribers and watch time on our videos, 100% of any ad revenue earned will go to charity. We'd love your comments, questions and tips. We hope you will like and subscribe and we look forward to sharing our journey around this magnificent country.
Some links from the video below:
Spirit of Tasmania: www.spiritofta...
PS Emmy Lou: psemmyloucruis...
Port of Echuca Discovery Centre: www.portofechu...
Gloucester Tops Walks: www.nationalpa...
Twelve Apostles Information: www.parks.vic....
Drifta: www.drifta.com.au
ZoneRV: www.zonerv.com.au
We have no affiliation with any of the above organisations.

[@PeterRowe-ip7ow]

Awesome scenery guys. Very much looking forward to your videos from Tassie.

[@nextleveloz]

Thanks for the feedback. We love Tassie, and next week the short Tassie series kicks off. Is there anything in particular you’d like to know in case we can address it? ❤️😉🤔😀

[@PeterRowe-ip7ow]

@@nextleveloz we are from Brisbane and planning a trip in our van down there and across to SA after that. Just very interested in your travels and tips and hints.

[@kathleenwhelan6500]

Great video, looking forward to the rest of your big lap. We venture out June or July this year.

[@nextleveloz]

Thanks so much. We love the feedback and hope it gives some ideas to others as well. Maybe we will see you on the road somewhere! Either way the more people who subscribe means we can send some ad revenue off to charity and do some good as well as have a good time.

[@Chance_It_Oz]

Really interested to hear your experiences with the Defender and the Zone. We are looking at both so very topical! Cheers and safe travels.

[@nextleveloz]

Stay tuned. I’m working on something currently. In between having fun of course 😉

[@nextleveloz]

Jack, our review goes live tomorrow (Sunday). Warts and all. Mostly good but for us we are managing an issue. Hope it helps.

[@The_GetawayZone]

From fellow Zoners, great episode. You're best so far, and we quite enjoyed it. We are headed along the Murray some time in September this year so enjoyed the Echuca part. Tasmania one day... for reference, what date did you head over to start your Tasmania travel?

[@nextleveloz]

Hi guys, thanks for the feedback. Murray in Sep (spring) should be lovely. It was very hot while we were there and the bugs at Pericootta were insane! We headed to Tassie in late Feb to late March (too short). The weather is cooling off at that time of the year but not yet alpine in most places - but it’s Tassie so pack some winter gear even if it’s summer! We’ve been to Tassie a few times so we wanted to avoid the summer holidays but not leave it till late autumn winter. That suited our general Lap timings as well.

[@wallacegromit]

Hi David, Really enjoying your videos. I'm from NZ and like you have a L663 Defender 110. I am really interested in what I guess is a modified tow insert for the Do 35 Cruisemaster. We are about to take delivery of our Urban xtreme and I would like to get some extra height for the DO35 towing pin. Hope this makes sense. The std LR has a drop in the tongue of approx 76mm that I would like to eliminate. Cheers Greg Fenwick

[@nextleveloz]

Hi mate, thanks for watching and reaching out. I know what you mean for sure. We had to change tow hitches in the hitch receiver as the Zone is a high clearance van and to tow safely it needs to be level (or slightly nose down). If you look at the towing sections in the e manual for the defender it stipulates a recommended tow hitch length (from hitch hole (ie the hope the securing hitch pin goes throug) to the hitch (the point on the D035z i think it is 175mm. You van manufacturer should give you their preferred tow hitch height (base of -do35 as it sits on the hitch, down to the ground) In my case its 490- 530mm from the ground. All we did is took the car to a Hayman Reese dealer (distributor for a range of hitches and accessories) gave them the figures they trialed different ones until we got closest to the right heigh and right length. I couldn’t say whether mine will suit your van because it depends on the van tow height. But a Hayman Reese dealer in NZ should be the best bet if you know the right heigh for the van. cheers