Look speaking of Australia, why does Simon look like he is wearing a woolies shirt hahaha

Just to clarify, we don't have "Northern Territories". It is a single territory called "Northern Territory".

Look, Simon, as an Australian, let me assure you - you were never at risk of slipping into an Australian accent.

Just for our overseas friends, we do not drive on both sides of the road as depicted in this video. We drive on the correct side - the left 😊

For an Aussie, the only thing more entertaining than Simon's attempts at Australian place names is Simon's attempt at an Australian accent.

The Nullarbor Hwy is so straight, flat and clear that one night I dipped my high beam so as not to blind a truck coming the other way but it took twenty minutes before we passed each other!!

Fun fact: you can actually encounter signs along the road saying: caution, Royal Flying Doctors airstrip, followed by airstip markings in the middle of the road.

Listening to this bloke say Cairns, Launceston and Hobart is hilarious.

And it passes by probably a hundred "big" things. Aussies will know what I mean.

In 1979, there was a huge ‘Round Australia’ car rally. In a nod to what you called ‘the big lap’ a Porsche team car had a simple instruction on the panel in front of the navigator which read “Keep the ocean on your left”.

In the 80’s I went from Melbourne to Cairns. The only way you know what state you were in was by the beer adverts. 4x for Queensland, Tooheys for NSW and VB for Victoria.

"Some roads and routes really do come to define a country, and this is Australia's." Patchwork, half-arsed, and only theoretically controlled by the federal government? Yup, sounds like home.

4 days 10 hours of the speed run was spent in traffic on Melbourne's Monash Freeway

It's funny, when you're driving down Dandenong Road and you miss your turnoff into Wattletree Road, but then realise if you just keep going in the same direction, eventually (after a huge trip around the Aussie mainland) you will end up at the same turnoff.

Brave of you to combine Queensland and New South Wales together

As an Australian we learnt in school that we are both an island and a continent.

Great video Simon! Just to add another interesting fact, the Nullarbor Plain is home to the 90 mile straight, the longest continuous straight stretch of road on earth. And Nullarbor broken down means “no trees” Null Arbor.

Fun fact, as a kid who grew up in the 70’s spending a lot of time on sheep and cattle stations in the outback trip times were not measured in miles or kilometres but in number of beers consumed. My friend Kirrilly’s family farm (which is bigger than Scotland) was a 90 km drive from the station house to the letterbox at the front gate. A journey into town for more ammunition was a big event and took most of a day, for me riding in the back of an uncovered ute on dirt tracks at insanely high speeds was made more comfortable after my old man blasted a few Roos along the way and I could make myself a kind of plush and warm bucket seat out of their (in hindsight) tick infested carcasses. I was six years old. My earliest childhood memories are absolute carnage lol. Fun times! Australia’s changed rather a lot in the following 5 decades….

For those of you not from Australia, most people would use the Hume Freeway rather than the Princess Hwy to get from Sydney to Melbourne.

Nah mate, you know what the M1 is though? The largest roundabout ever conceived. Search your feelings, you know it to be true.

This channel answers the question: what would it be like if wikipedia had a beard?

Bloke walks into a bar carrying a piece of Asphalt, bar tender asks " what'll it be mate?", guys replies "a pint for me and one for the road" Yes, thank you.

It's interesting to note that the Princes Highway between Sydney and Melbourne is little more than a tourist drive. The Hume Highway inland is much shorter and faster.

I have spent a great deal of my life driving on Highway one... Otherwise known as the Bruce Highway in my former neck of the woods. I used to drive trucks on some very long, lonely and yet hauntingly beautiful stretches of road. I don't live in Australia anymore but to this day I still get homesick for the wide Brown land. I still call Australia home.

There is but one Northern Territory in Australia, "The Northern Territories" is an error.

All of your stock footage is of cars driving on the wrong side of the road. In Australia you drive on the left

I drove that whole highway (apart from the Tassie bit) in a Toyota lite ace van back in 1990. It took me six months Saw some incredible things and met some incredible people. It was amazing ♥

Simon, we Australians don't have an accent. Everybody else does. Plus we drive right hand drive cars on the left. Toward the end of the video there is a shot of two vehicles on a road, and both are on the wrong side for their direction of travel. Trivial point, I know. But it's a fact. Which somebody got wrong. Otherwise mate, brilliant as usual. 🇭🇲

Always love it when Simon covers stuff from Australia 🇦🇺

It's so funny that the whole world outside of australia think aussies only have either paul hogan or mad max accents

Just for a little context. Parts of the road in 1986 were known as the "corrugated highway". It was really quite interesting driving on a dirt road for 300km that was called a national highway. I am pretty sure the tarring between Broome and Port Headland was the last part sealed in about 1988.

Little disappointed that you didn't talk about the Spirit of Tasmania. It is possible to complete the lap with a single road vehicle

Not the worse attempt at an aussie accent I've heard, but yeah nah, don't give up your day job...

Aussie: "we're so proud our highway covers 3 time zones!" Canadian: " double that and we'll talk..."

Fun Aussie fact: the way you said "mate" just before the title card... You just challenged 26 million people to a fight outside...

Northern Territories. Territories? What? The Northern Territory, it's called the Northern Territory. Also, the amount of stock footage with cars on the wrong side of the road was a bit disappointing.

3:38 I’d check your math there, Simon. I think you’re missing a zero.

As someone who grew up by this highway and still lives within 10km of it I'm glad you included this mega project!

Port Wakefield on the SA section is actually marked at the location of Port Augusta. Wakefield is on the way between Adelaide and Port Augusta but Port Augusta is the crossroads there

“Driving round the block” is another term used to describe the drive

I did it all solo on a motorcycle in 48 days.

For what it's worth. Skip the "o"s in G'day mate and Simon did a good job of the Aussie accent for a pom

As an Aussie - the T in Mate is a soft T unless you are actually sarcastically calling a stranger "mate" in an aggressive manner. Like "Now you listen here maTe". Also if using the plural, mates, the T is hard. In all other circumstances it's a soft T. I don't know how to represent it in writing. But that was the most obvious sign you were an outsider imitating an Aussie, in just that one word.

There are "territories" in Australia, Namely the Australian Capital territory, but only *ONE* Northern Territory.

And that's why we had to invent the Barra.

Bloody struth, I live in Straya and I had no clue we had the longest highway in the world. Thanks for the video!! BTW 12:40 in Australia we drive on the left ;)

It's Car-nar-vn, Cayrns, Lawn-ces-tn, Ho-bart, Nuh-la-bore. Mostly, the last syllable is lessened and the first one emphasised. Mel-bn for example.

There's a reason we can always honestly say that things are "just down the road, mate" XD

Maaaaate, I’ve done the big lap and it’s a bloody ripper mate.

Might want to check that math at 3:37. 800,000km is a tad longer than 49,700mi. By a factor of 10.

God this is so accurate. “WA is the major odd one out” that’s a constant and we all know how simple those people down in Tassie are 😜

In 2018 we drove all the way from Cairns down to Sydney, over to Adelaide and all up to Darwin. As a Swiss coming from a very small country the distances and size of this country was mind boggling…but oh so great! Although the „quality“ of the roads was not always great. We were also stuck south of Carins due to flooding for 2 days - an adventure. But I love Australia! Hopefully we can come back soon.

Interesting quirky sidebar he didn't mention was that the Oz states were originally separate British colonies and so went their own way in many things...including the gauge of their railway tracks. I traveled from Perth to Brisbane in the '60's and had to change trains 5 times. Common gauge was finally put in in the '80's.

Imagine driving all that distance only to run into a dropbear.

Speaking of Australian records, where’s our video on the longest stretch of straight railway in the world (which coincidentally also resides on the Nullarbor plain) or the longest train in the world being BHP’s iron ore train in Western Australia?

Them roadworks he mentioned on the Bruce highway after the floods, yeah there still going. I only travel on the Bruce highway once a year and that’s around Caloundra. They’ve been working on the Caloundra off ramp for as long as I can remember.

Greetings from Australia, great video, covered some things I hadn't heard before. Love your work in general, especially BB

True Fact: In addition to being the world's foremost magician and escape artist, Harry Houdini has one other claim to fame -- he was the first man to ever fly an airplane in Australia.

Sideproject: three- and four-trailer Australian “road trains” Geographics: the outback

As a Australia I am very happy with this video because when ever I leave town to go to another city I use the M1 and I had not idea that it went all the way across the county or was even called the National 1. Thanks for teaching me about my own county that I should know.

I did the ‘Big Lap’ on motorbike when I finished high school. Love this country!

Being a traffic controller in Queensland means that work will never slow down or run out as constant repairs & upgrades on the Bruce highway are being done every day. My area also has the Capricorn highway & Burnett highway so keep on truckin finally means something to me lol yeah Idk either I just wanted to throw in my 2 cents

My grandfather remembered when highway 8 was dirt and impassable to even horses. God rest his soul. This is the main highway from Melbourne to Adelaide.

Simon you blundered there, Melbourne also wasn't settled by convicts, there was a brief penal settlement in the early 1800's which lasted for about 6 months just inside the Port Phillip Heads, but that was abandoned and they were returned to Sydney. Melbourne as a settlement didn't come into being till much later.

Can you do a video on Canada’s highway 1

Conversion is off by a factor of ten there at 3:37

I want to drive this one day. From my home town off the Pacific Hwy and around clockwise. I've never felt the urge to go overseas, there's plenty to see here on our own continent.

A terrific piece. Thank you.

Adelaide - the only capital city in Australia not founded by convicts in Australia.... *Canberra coughs loudly

Imagine driving on this road, loving the sights aaaand then you get into Melbourne. Dodge the kamikaze yuppies and ubers in a rush only to be t-boned in Springvale by some nuffie who wasn't paying attention. Straya m8

Back in '79, drove from Townsville to Perth with one other driver in 3 days and 3 hours with 350 miles of corrugated dirt road across the Nullabor...long drive mate!

Thanks so much for compiling and sharing this information, it was extremely interesting. I was born and raised in Sydney but now I live in Perth [4,000 km away from Sydney] and I never knew as an Australian [believe it or not] that we had such a huge road system. Even though our roads are not perfect, your explanation of when, why and how these roads were constructed makes me very proud to be an Australian as to what we can achieve. Thanks again. DM.

also used by Australian wild life to scare the sh*t out of people and caused a road accident.

I've moved states and still have never lived more than 30 minutes drive from it in my life

Excellent job on the video Mate 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻 Yeah Straya is a massive place so it always gets me when people online think it isn’t as big as what it actually is. Aside from road trips by car I’ve toured by bike and yes even nowadays you’ll get a sore bum. As for crossing the Nullarbor yeah my parents were fool hardy taking me as a baby from the East Coast starting in Brisbane in 1963 to a place called Wyalkatchem WA for work on a farm in a run down early 50s Vangard and returning back to Queensland over a year later after my sister was born. It was never dole growing up here and our highways outside of our major cities will always will always give you both beautiful and jaw dropping scenery.

Simon, there was a section of the Nullarbor Plains that was still dirt in May, 1972. That was the stretch from the Border Village back to either Penong or Ceduna. If you went through after the graders had done their pass, it was a reasonable road. However, if you went just before the graders, there was a good chance you would shake your vehicle to pieces; blow tyres and destroy a windscreen or other window. The trucks that used to cart for Kellogs, they had an interesting trick to keep the dust out of the load. They used to double tarp the load, but, they would leave the front of the trailer without a tarp, but, would have other ways of keeping the water out. By doing this, the wind flow would blow the bulldust out of the load, meaning the load would arrive in good to excellent condition at Perth. Another feature of the highway across the Nullarbor is the air strips that are built into the Highway for the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS). These are generally spaced about 200 km / 125 miles apart, and are worked in conjunction with the Ambulance Service that is based at Ceduna. On the Western Australian side of the Nullarbor Plains, that has Australia's longest straight stretch of road, at 143 km / 89 miles long. You travel that long in a straight line, you get to the corner, go around the corner... "Gee, can we go back and do that again?" There is also the Alternative Highway 1, which runs from Ceduna, and goes via the coast of the Eyre Peninsula, and takes you via Port Lincoln. It rejoins the main Highway at Lincoln Gap or 'The Tanks'. If you are going through there, watch out for the "Mermaids"... Since the concrete pad went in... it has been hell there!!!

I imagine almost all of the daily traffic figures comes from Sydney commuters. Highway one As the M1 goes straight through the city and is a major arterial route.

Why am I watching this at 1am in Australia?

If you ever drive on the Midlands hwy in Tassie, rest assured you'll be doing 40 km per hr for a big chunk of it as its been undergoing roadworks for all of my 23 years at least 😅

Did Perth to Sydney on a Honda 400 back in 1980. It took 6 days and at the end of each day my ears rang for at least an hour after I took off my helmet. Showering in bore water is an experience I'll not forget. You get a bubble per bar of soap. Lonely as hell out there, but so glad I did it now.

Ooh he is talking about the M1. I thought it was weird I didn't know what he was on about with the white shield

The reason Australia still has so many dirt roads is because the local councils take Federal and State infrastructure money and spend it on themselves... ( I live on one of the oldest and most travelled dirt road in Australia. We've had money to tar it three times. Yep. Still dirt.)

I travelled from Darwin south to Alice Springs: quite a trip! Beautiful landscapes and very few cars on the road. Our car had a extra large fuel tank and water supply which were both needed since fuel station were rare. I love to go back sometime.

As a kid in the 80s we did the East to West road trip multiple times to visit family. In a non air conditioned Holden Shuttle van. Books, colouring in, closing the blinds my dad installed and lying down on the bench seats to have a nap, listening to tapes on your Walkman until the batteries went flat. And looooots of staring out the window in utter boredom. Daily highlight was staying in a different cheap ass motel each night, and getting the motel breakfast. Cold toast, cereal in tiny individual boxes, tinned fruit etc. Exotic stuff when you’re a little kid 🙂

Oh also lastly if you run out of ideas you could maybe show a mega project on the Sydney Harbour bridge or the opera house.

im AUSTRALIAN good job mate. im in nsw on the nsw/vic border on the hume highway

as an australian it’s so interesting to see where my daily commute connects to the entire country

Missed some cool stuff like the Min Min lights and the great ocean drive. cheers for the vid.

12:39 minor problem.... Australia does not drive on the right, they drive on the left..... and normally have double paved lines in the middle as a way to indicate both lanes not to overtake other vehicles

I just checked now, there are no more "no limit" highways in Australia anymore. Northern Territories used to have them, IIRC.

Thank you for your Channel update

I recently done Brisbane to Darwin and back. Took 5 days. Admittedly if I drove more hours in the day you can do it in 2-3 but our roads can be dangerous. There are fatigue areas where you will get tired, honestly feels like your not moving at all and the scenery can in some parts be a full 6 to 8hours of the exact same view. If you ever visit or live here and plan one of the big drives stop regularly, avoid drive an hour each side of sun rise and sunset, and add 2 extra days min for trips above 2000km

I’ve ridden the entire length of it on a bicycle. It’s long

Seeing this as an Aussie from Perth makes me happy!

Well done, very accurate. This is pretty good coming from someone outside Australia

bro that roundabout at 2:15 I literally drive through every day. lol

I'm surprised ya didn't mention that the song Highway to Hell was written about a stretch of this exact highway.

800,000 km = 497,096 mi @ 3:38 because 49,700 mi wont get you to the moon and back🚀🌝

great work simon, i travel on that road every day and have driven the east side of oz. its an amazing place of you get here

Simon, Perth was settled by Free Settlers in 1829. The convict era of Western Australia was the period during which Western Australia was a penal colony of the British Empire. Although it received small numbers of juvenile offenders from 1842, it was not formally constituted as a penal colony until 1849. Between 1850 and 1868, 9,721 convicts were transported to Western Australia on 43 convict ship voyages. Transportation ceased in 1868, but it was many years until the colony ceased to have any convicts in its care