German university students, Pauline Mueller, aged 24 and Simon Qualmann, aged 26, parked their campervan in the Jetty area overnight during a journey from Adelaide to Brisbane.

“It’s very convenient on the coast, because you find water and showers everywhere you go. Usually we stay every third night in a park for a clean shower and for recharging cameras and phones on electricity.”

Aware of community perceptions about roadside camping, Pauline said, “We usually leave after breakfast and we don’t leave waste”.

“(Coffs Harbour Visitors Information Centre) gave us directions to here and places to stay. It was very useful. We booked tickets to the dolphin show and they told us about the carnival here and the open air cinema.”

When Coffs Coast Independent called the centre, seeking information on showers and roadside camping locations, we were advised camping was not allowed, but there were public showers available and quite a few caravan parks.

Legal free camping locations are increasingly difficult to find, as only one of seven local National Parks permits camping for a small fee, at Yuraygir National Park. While camping is free in all state forests, it is not permitted in most forest picnic areas and none of the local forests are listed as allowing camping.

There are around 15 rest areas marked on the Pacific Highway between Urunga and Grafton, which are not designed for overnight stays.

While the RTA strongly discourages camping, as this detracts from their purpose of providing travellers with a place to rest, thus reducing fatigue-related accidents, police do not routinely move on campers.

Roadside camping is not always a scenic idyll. Simon Qualmann recalled, “We stayed at Old Bar and we were in bed when some party people came and we left the parking space at 3.00am because we couldn’t sleep”.