G’day, let us introduce ourselves.
We are “Holiday Road” and currently on one of the biggest and longest road trips in Australian history.
Our names are Allison and Peter. We have 12 children aged between 2 and 22 (as of 2018). Maddison, Beaudine, Tyrrheanna, Nadeine, Kiana, Peter, Brock, Dajarra, Bono, Elouera, Neo, and Aurora. We’ve been living permanently in our bus/RV for the last 14 years. Our eldest daughter Maddison has started her own life now with her new partner Brett. Both working full time they have just bought their very own bus and will be turning it into a motorhome over the next few years, this will be another story in itself and we’ll be sure to fill you in on their progress in the future.
Yes, we live on a bus. It hasn’t always been like that, we too lived and dreamed the typical Aussie life style. We (Mum and Dad) grew up on the Southern Gold Coast and had a typical suburban up bringing. We loved growing up in one of the biggest tourism hot spots in Australia not to mention some of the best beaches in the world
Peters dad was in the Air Conditioning and Refrigeration industry where both his Mum and Dad ran their own business.
Peter was lucky enough to be one of those kids that had a boat in the family and was always fishing off shore or skiing in the Tweed River etc. He grew up riding BMX and motocross bikes, surfing, swimming, playing rugby league. He was once a green mount nipper. Later lived in New Guinea with his parents and started gaining more interest in following his fathers trade.
His first real job was a paper boy and he made $1 a day and worked 7 days a week. In high school he picked up a job at the local Chinese restaurant washing dishes, he also got a free feed after work so he said it’s still one of his best jobs. After School he picked up a job building car radiators and bonding brake shoes etc, he says the best part about that job was delivering parts in the car. He learn’t to drive in that little Datsun 120Y, he also learn’t more about cars and knew every mechanic in town. Later he worked for Greyhound/surfside buses in the body repair section.
Allison’s Dad was in the building industry and later her Mum and Dad ran their own bus company in Northern N.S.W.
Allison was lucky enough to be one of those kids that grew up camping and road tripping. She grew up camping, hiking and exploring with her parents and loved being down on the local beaches swimming and soaking up the sun. Working for her parents she put in the hard yakka washing buses inside and out. Started doing office work and accounting, this came in very handy when we ran our own business in future years. Allison also had a stint in the modelling industry up until she had her first child. She learn’t to drive in an old VB Commodore with a souped up 5.0 V8.
Yes, life was great on the Southern G.C. especially through the 80’s. We couldn’t have grown up in a better spot. Every body was so down to earth and chilled. It was almost like growing up in a surf movie. We remember all the famous bands that would come to town and hit the local night clubs, pubs in Coolangatta. Many tourists from across Australia would visit in the holiday season and we remember New Years Eve was a real party with all the visitors joining in and soaking up the Gold Coast atmosphere.
We met on a blind date set up by friends, the moment we locked eyes on each other we knew we were soul mates. Eventually we moved in together and started our new life. Living on apprentice wages was very tough, we struggled through the years until Peter finally finished his trade working for the biggest Air Conditioning company on the G.C. Around this time we were building our very first home and we had only just become parents.
After moving into our house it was a euphoric feeling, even though it was unfinished we had achieved the Australian dream of building a house, and as we only had limited funds we had no choice but to go “Owner Builder” and it had a much more gratifying feel, more like achieving the impossible.
This was a big growing curve for us and we cant tell you how much hard work and stress went into it, but in the end it was worth it. All we had to do now is finish the house, put in a driveway, dig a hole and chuck a pool in, buy a new Commodore and we have reached the summit of suburban Aussie life.
Peter’s company fell into voluntary liquidation and he was left out of a job, holiday pay and redundancy. Rather than find another job we decided to have a go at starting our own business. We filled up our old VK Commodore with tools, got some business cards printed and we were on our way. Well not really. Peter’s family reputation in the industry helped us pick up work but it was a struggle most of the time.
Then after sticking with it for a few years we started picking up plenty of work. Allison was the back bone of our business and if you had rung us it would have been her friendly voice greeting you on the phone. We worked out of home and got to a point where we had to start picking it up a gear by hiring help and renting out a work shop. This was the cross road for us. From this point on we’d be committing at least the next ten years of our life and risking every thing we own. It was a point of no return “or not”.
This is where we changed our mind and changed our life.
Not content with committing ourselves to all the stress of running a business for the next decade or more and not spending as much time with the kids as we would like we opted for a total change of lifestyle and did something we never thought we would ever do.
This is where our lives changed forever and we’ve never looked back.