4WD Days out of Perth by Western 4WDer
For those of you looking for places to go four wheel driving around Perth, you have two options. Firstly, check out the posts I wrote; ‘Perth 4WD tracks’ and ‘4WD Tracks in WA’. If you still want more, consider buying the book called ‘4WD Days out of Perth’.
For $20, you will find a lot of value in it. The book is currently up to its 4th edition, and has 15 different tracks that are all able to be done in a day (not the same day!). Of course, there is nothing stopping you stretching the trip out overnight (or longer) and this is a great idea for some of the trips as they are quite long.
What trips does it include?
- Wandoo North
- Wilbinga to Seabird
- Up the Murray
- Boyagin
- Down around the Coalfields
- Moondyne Country
- Sand Rocks and Resevoirs
- Avondale Valleys
- Moore River Sandplain
- Collie Climbs
- Lancelin to Cervantes
- East of Armadale
- Logue Brook to Harvey
- Baden Powell to Yarloop
What are the tracks like?
The tracks in this book cover everything from beach runs in Perth through to gravel roads, mud and the occasional rock crawling (not too severe if you don’t want it to be!).
Are the tracks suitable for soft roaders?
Every track in the book is rated according to its difficulty level. Some of the tracks are suitable for soft roaders, and some are not. In many cases you could find alternative routes around the difficult ones, but it means that if you own a ‘soft roader’ you still have options.
Are any GPS Coordinates listed?
Every track has directions (EG Turn right onto Logue Brook road, drive 500 metres and at the T junction turn left…) as well as GPS locations next to each waypoint. If you have a GPS this is a great way to ensure that you don’t get lost.
How accurate are the directions?
I’ve done a number of these tracks without a GPS, and can’t really complain. As you would expect, the tracks do change over time and occasionally you will find that the track isn’t where it is supposed to be. However, if you take note of your trip metre and have someone who can read a map reasonably, you shouldn’t have any issues. It does pay to have a map of the area that you are travelling in, as the book doesn’t have much in the way of maps.
Is it worth buying?
For under $20, you really can’t go wrong. If you are someone who regularly goes four wheel driving there is a good chance that you would have done some of the tracks, but there are always more to explore. Remember that there are always plenty of tracks off the one you are being directed through from the book!
Where can I get it?
The 4th edition of 4WD Days out of Perth can be purchased online at a number of different stores – just type ‘4WD Days out of Perth’ into Google and you will find a few. Alternatively, you can buy it at numerous news agencies, four wheel drive, camping and fishing stores. It pays to ring to ask before you go there though, as not every store has it. I purchased my copy for $15 from a map shop at the Perth 4×4 show, but they are normally $17 or $19.95.
Other books in the series
You can get a number of other books in this series which may be beneficial too. Some include:
- 4WD Days on the South Coast of WA
- 4WD Days in the Goldfields
- 4WD Weekends out of Perth
Have fun exploring the many great 4×4 tracks out of Perth, and please look after them.
Hey Alex,
We’ve never bothered using the waypoints; we just go by the instructions, and words. It’s not always worked perfectly, but its easier than manually entering waypoints.
I don’t actually have the book with us now (currently in north Queensland!), so can’t play with it, but there must be a way of easily doing it. I reckon the Exploroz support would probably help you out.
Sorry I can’t help!
Aaron
Hi Aaron,
I have this book. Something I am confused by and hoping you can pour me in the right direction is how to utilise the GPS Waypoints provided ?
I use a 4WD mapping called ExplorOz and would like to somehow import the GPS Waypoint data so it can create a track for me. Do you know how one can do this ?
Thanks!
-Alex