Mansions on wheels: Australia’s rising obsession with luxurious RVs | Australian life-style

Our maiden campervan journey, 2021, and my spouse and I return from Kata Tjuta to Yulara’s “Ayers Rock” campground to seek out new neighbours. Towering beside our humble rental is a completely optioned monster ute with a spanking new off-road caravan. And a playpen.

We’re having fun with a sundown dinner exterior when a girl lurches down the steps subsequent door cradling a chihuahua. Scowling at us, she drops the canine within the playpen and hauls herself again inside. The canine snarls and yaps till we unexpectedly end consuming and retreat into our tiny van.

They say you’ll be able to’t select your neighbours. But you’ll be able to if your own home has wheels. We fortunately roll out subsequent morning.

For any future journeys we’re decided to not undergo the main indignity of that one: waking your entire park on a midnight sprint to the bathroom block by way of our van’s thunderous sliding door, blasted by subsequent door’s motion-detecting floodlights.

So our precedence function in any future camper is a bathroom. But what else ought to be on our checklist? How can we need to journey? Light? Heavy? Do we actually need to sustain with the Joneses and get away from all of it however nonetheless have all the things?

As rank rookies, to seek out out, we head to the Cranbourne Caravanning & Adventure Leisurefest, an expo of the newest in all the things RV. Or not. From its entrance, all we will spot among the many tons of of caravans from 44 producers are off-road fashions.

“Are there any non-off-road versions?” I ask a salesman. Paul says that any of his native firm’s vans could be ordered as much as 30cm decrease for “touring”. But, he provides, they’re solely well-liked with older consumers or these with restricted mobility. I discover aged folks struggling to get themselves up into the off-roaders. In case they don’t make it, a close-by stall sells defibrillators.

“Most people already own four wheel drives, so they buy off-road vans even if they never go off-road,” Paul says wryly. “The caravan parks are full of them.”

But the place to start out? A maze of rolling residences stretches out earlier than us, designed for both households or {couples}, from the tiny “Echidna”, a primary 10-footer for solo journey, to a gargantuan 29-foot “five-star hotel on wheels”.

But isn’t “luxury adventure” an oxymoron? Do we actually want an electrical incinerator rest room – a sewage-processing possibility that allays a bane of caravanning, the pressing want for an effluent discharge level? Heated and vibrating recliner lounges; a personal jet-style positive-pressure air filter system for a “guaranteed dust-free interior”? Or 9 shades of Italian leather-based upholstery, American walnut panelling or gold tapware?

We balk on the intimidating vans painted black and khaki with menacing tags – “Counterstrike”, “Patriot”, “Conqueror” and “Rebellion”– that convey a navy vibe. Their choices embody full-perimeter CCTV surveillance and lockable gun storage. For feral pig and crocodile nation? No thanks.

More family-oriented caravans have extendable porches, for uninterrupted views of the boundless western plains, the magnificent MacDonnell Ranges, or the bathroom block at Yulara. An alfresco life-style is aided by the refrigerated bar, espresso machine, induction hob and air fryer that magically slide from the flanks of a 26-footer. Curiously, we don’t see any bug netting. (After our journey up north, choices ought to embody an insecticide pump.) I ask salesman Adrian concerning the van’s exterior TV – “for that moonlight-cinema experience”. “With Starlink, you’ve got internet everywhere now, just like home,” he says. “But I’m still a bush-TV man, myself.”

But then, isn’t gazing right into a crackling hearth as a substitute of a TV on a quiet night time, in a distant place, so final century?

All at sea, we search recommendation from potential prospects.

Ben and Deb need to improve. “Since Ben hurt his back at work our old hybrid van’s too hard to set up,” says Deb, inspecting a $180,000 off-road behemoth that provides push-button ease for all the things that opens and shuts, together with a washer-dryer and dishwasher, with self-levelling suspension. “If we were millionaires we’d buy one of these,” she says.

Jake, Alana and their two bright-eyed daughters simply did. The sticker value on their buy: “$261,995 drive-away”. Alana says their present van is simply too small for preteen ladies who want their very own house. Their new cellular mansion has choices for a separate entrance and a examine nook with USB ports and wifi for distant education.

Their dad and mom can get pleasure from privateness method up entrance in a king-size mattress within the increasing master bedroom, behind an opulent oak-veneered partition with designer hand basin, exterior the glowing incinerator rest room en suite.

I ask Alana and Jake the place they’ll take their spectacular new rig. “We don’t know yet,” Jake says, grinning. “Anywhere, I suppose.” The expo’s official blurb is “Start here, go anywhere”.

I ask if Jake’s automobile will haul it. “We’ve got a Ford F-150. I think so.”

It’s an apt query, as caravans observe the automotive weight problems development. Even carbon fibre-clad fashions can weigh as much as six tonnes, and the impact of weight on gas consumption has at all times been a think about caravanning. But particularly now.

Salesman Ian reluctantly admits van gross sales slumped when the US-Israel battle on Iran started. “But now fuel prices have dropped again, things are back to normal,” he says.

I ask him about options to diesel automobiles. “Going electric isn’t viable yet,” Ian says. Though EVs can have equal torque to a six or eight-cylinder diesel, they’re severely range-limited when towing, and charging infrastructure in Australia’s distant areas is sparse. But he’s optimistic. “Even if diesel becomes too expensive, the new battery and hybrid technology looks promising.”

It will must be. In ultimate circumstances, towing a big van can see gas consumption rise nicely above 20L/100km. Traversing hills or sand, or utilizing low-range gears, makes use of much more. On arrival, nevertheless, the dream of off-grid residing is possible with a brand new era of “smart” caravans.

Their electrical tech is outstanding. Almost all of the examples we see have photo voltaic panels related to onboard batteries with as much as 20kWh capability (with 8kW backup generator). These energy techniques electronically monitor options comparable to reverse-osmosis pumps, providing an “endless” water provide or, alternatively, atmospheric water-scouring units producing as much as 50L a day “from thin air”. Air conditioning is a given. For heating, there’s onboard diesel models (with carbon monoxide detectors), battery-powered techniques providing automated five-zone consolation, and even under-floor choices. There appears to be nothing within the common home that isn’t obtainable in considered one of these uber-vans.

So is there a draw back to life on the street? After many years proudly owning a caravan, my spouse’s retired family Rob and Sue bought theirs 4 years in the past. The finish of Covid lockdowns noticed the scene change. There was no extra serendipitous travelling. Sites needed to be booked nicely forward as a flood of recent, cashed-up travellers made ghost or double-site reservations. Sue and Rob would arrive at “booked-out” parks to seek out them empty. Popular areas immediately had five-year ready lists. Site charges rose. Rob says they economised through the use of web sites providing non-public lawns and paddocks. Then diesel costs shot up.

“When we started vanning we’d live like kings for $1,200 a week,” Rob says. “After Covid it cost us almost double that.” For low cost holidays, Sue and Rob now have common gigs home and pet-sitting interstate.

Australia has among the many highest per capita charge of possession on this planet. In 2025, it hit an all-time document, with 938,000 vehicles registered, up 32% from 2019. This suggests there are actually two nice Australian desires: proudly owning a house and likewise having the means to depart it as usually as doable.

Like many different trendy existence, the RV market and its tradition is dealing with disruption. Despite this, any lengthy weekend nonetheless sees thousands and thousands of Australians flee town for the bush. Many keep there – that vast cohort of retirees generally known as gray nomads. Our pals Joanne and David are up north someplace now, fortunately uncontactable. The attract is apparent: Australia is huge and rugged and exquisite, and comparatively protected.

Will we be part of them? Maybe; however proper now we’re solely window purchasing. Besides, our small automobile received’t pull any of those monsters. That leaves campervans. We spot one with increasing partitions, Tardis-like inside, and extra luxurious than our home, for less than $198,625. There’s a bathroom, and my spouse’s different non-negotiable possibility: 240V retailers for a hair straightener.

My spouse is puzzled once I nominate mine: a full-perimeter CCTV surveillance system.

“What for? Pigs? Crocs?”

“No,” I reply. “Chihuahuas.”