Family Road trip: Darwin to Alice Springs - Britz

Eight nights and 3,135 kilometres from Darwin to Alice Springs in a campervan, down the Stuart Highway, with the short days placed where children need them.

Kakadu comes first, with Cooinda, the Yellow Water cruise, Nourlangie and Ubirr and its rock art, then Edith Falls and Katherine, where Nitmiluk’s gorges can be taken by canoe and the thermal pool in town is free and open all year round.

Daly Waters follows, where the pub has been collecting travellers’ oddments since the 1930s, then Tennant Creek and Karlu Karlu, the Devils Marbles, a scatter of split granite boulders that is a sacred site and an easy walk. Gemtree comes next, where visitors can fossick for garnets, then Uluru and Kata Tjuta before Alice Springs.

Britz supply the camper and the day-by-day plan, and the hire is priced live per vehicle rather than per person; campsites, fuel, ferries, park fees and activities are all extra, with a nil-excess insurance pack available at booking. Nine days for 3,135 kilometres means some long highway stretches, and the itinerary places the short days at Karlu Karlu and Katherine deliberately to break them up. Winter is the only sensible season for the southern half of it. This is a one-way hire, so a relocation fee is worth checking at booking. The highway is sealed throughout and the camper needs nothing special, which keeps the cost of a trip this long within reason for a family. Kakadu at the start is the part worth an extra day if the dates allow it.