After 28 days in our camper van, it was time to return it and move on to the next part of our trip. We spent most of the morning packing and cleaning! Fortunately the holiday park was well set up for people who had just collected or were about to return their campver vans, with plenty of cleaning and rubbish facilities, as well as a place to leave uneaten food for those who have just arrived in New Zealand.

The Apollo depot was just a short drive from our campsite and, having completed the necessary paperwork and paid petrol taxes for the 5,500 kilometres we travelled, we took a shuttle bus to the airport.

Our flight to Cairns went via Sydney and took around 6 hours in total, including a very long transfer between the international and domestic terminals in Sydney. We arrived in Cairns around midnight, collected our hire car, and drove to the Dreamtime Travellers Rest hostel where we’d booked a room for the night.