Driving.
We had always considered our time down to the Centre as a 'detour' and now it was time to get back on to our lap. But to do that, we needed to cover some kilometres. And quite a lot of them...
The next 3 days consisted of:
- Watarrka NP to Alice Springs - 475km
- Alice Springs to 41 Mile Bore Rest Stop - 600km
- 41 Mile Bore Rest Stop to Mt Isa - 575km
That's a solid 1600km...
Now whilst they aren't perhaps the biggest days ever spent in cars, and certainly not even on our trip, but to back them in 3 days in a row even asked a lot of our intrepid crew. We were all very happy to roll into "The Isa" for a few days on our feet rather than on our butts.
However, the trips weren't without highlight or issue....
A quick dunny stop at Mt Ebenezer Roadhouse. Wasn't exactly rush hour and as you could see, reasonable driving conditions!
I'd been hanging for a greasy roadhouse burger for a while and we all kept joking about whenever we'd go past a roadhouse. Well, I decided Erldunda was a spot to break the drought, and the burger, complete with styrofoam case, hit the spot very well.
James and I had joked that you could almost drive the road with your eyes closed, due to the lack of bends and curves at times. I did point out to him that fatigue and sleeping is a very serious problem, and that's why I "needed" lots of rock music. Still we did joke a few times about sleeping. Here I was making it look like I was (he couldn't see my eyes wide open behind the sunnies for those worried!)
And this was his attempt at "sleeping" as well. About as convincing. I think that's Sam in the shot too, but I'm not sure. He was reading his Harry Potter book for the 4,324th time so we didn't hear from him.
We called in a favour from my old mate Tim and asked if we could borrow his driveway for the night. He was more than gracious and so we paid him in roast chicken wraps for dinner and an evening of board games. Was great to spend some more time with him and his daughter Bree and I hope we can repay the favour down in Victoria soon.
What?? Another Harry Potter??
Another roadhouse, another fuel stop. This one at Ti-Tree.
Selfie time at our lunch stop at Wauchope Hotel. This was where we were going to stop on our way through if The Marbles were full. We'd heard the grub here was good and people weren't wrong. I doubled up and grabbed another awesome burger!
The pool at Wauchope Hotel had this rather ingenious sign in it that the kids thought was hilarious. Evie in particular keeps rolling this one out at most pools we come across.
And after a few hours we turned East onto the Barkly Highway and we were once again on a "new road", a road that we hadn't ventured on before. It's a term we use to highlight our push to go to new places previously unvisited.
By this time though, the shadows were getting long and not wanting to play "Roo Roulette" be pulled into 41 Mile Bore Rest Area.
Which was a blood good idea as when disconnecting the van for the night I nearly burnt my hand off! Looking down I saw the trailer plug smoking and the smell of melting plastic was everywhere. With some caution I managed to pull the plug off and found the plug as above on closer inspection!
Current theory is that over the year of ownership, the plug connection has loosened and rather transmitting through connection, the current was arking (jumping) from car to van. This creates heat and over the long day, became too much for the wires to cope with.
So I heeded the great words of advice of a colleague who has done a similar trip, and...
"when things go wrong, don't try and solve them straight away. Grab a cup of tea/beer and go for a walk to clear the head".
It was great advice and B and I did exactly that. B and I strolled around the very large rest area discussing options as to what we could do, now that we couldn't plug the van into the car. This means no signals and most importantly, no brakes!
On our walk around we found Evie playing with a bunch of similar aged blonde haired loud girls in near their van. I love the way that kids can simply strike up brilliant friendships without suspicion, judgement or prejudice. And how glad are we that she did. Talking to one of the dads in the group, he explained he had a spare trailer plug in the back of his 'cruiser that was surplus to requirements (it was a Ranger plug) and that I was more than welcome to it.
So I decided to have a crack at rewiring the van plug (the socket on the car seemed in OK condition) as a first trial before we take more serious measures...
So the plug and small screwdrivers (also borrowed!) and let's have a crack at this...
James often becomes my "spanner man" in times when things need fixing or adjusting and this was no different. And whilst we weren't wiring the International Space Station, it was new territory for the both of us...
And it's amazing... you sit down to work on something and up will pop one or two grey nomads (three in this instance) asking "what's up mate?" or "I had that happen back in '84" or "wouldn't happen to the 'cruiser". I reckon if I was ever stranded in the middle of nowhere, I simply start to pretend to fix something broken and I'd have a handful of well meaning (but more often than not nosey) nomads walk out of the scrub!
The final product! Thankfully the people who design these things have enough brains to label and number the wires, so I simply put the green one back where the green one was, then the brown and so on and so forth!
And after plugging it back in to the car, all the lights and brakes worked! Winner!! So we were happy to trundle on tomorrow periodically checking the connection for heat and more significant problems.
(I can confirm that there were none)
I then returned the screwdrivers with the universal currency of travellers across Australia, a six pack of beer, and thanked Mark for his gear as it helped us out of a bind.
It's strange how it works isn't it. We could have stopped elsewhere (like we'd been looking) or Evie might not have struck up a conversation with the other girls, or a whole range of things. But there in the middle of nowhere we found the part we needed.
I then proceeded to "take my time cleaning up the tools" whilst the kids put together some Father's Day cards.
The next morning we were met with another terrible day and we gave our new plug a short test on the drive down to Barkly Homestead. This was also where we celebrated Fathers Day with a few small presents on the grass over breakfast. I did have the distinct impression that, based on the "roadhouse souvenier" theme to them, that it might have been a last minute thing... :)
Still, it was the thought and moment that counts. A unique Fathers Day nevertheless!
The McGuirks had informed us that they had left their van at the Homestead as they flew back to Ireland for family duties. I snooped around and could confirm that I could still spy it over the fence and reported back to Joe and Teresa the same.
And so we headed out onto the Barkly Highway. It was an alright drive for most, but then all of a sudden, the landscape became completely devoid of vegetation and well life. We might as well have been on Mars. And that's how it was for quite some distance...
...at least to the border to Queensland! Where there was a queue for the cliche photo of the border crossing. Who would have thought it!
Looking back into the NT. Sparse.
And we made it to Queensland. Goodbye NT, let's hope it's not another 20 years until I return.
Another fuel (and lunch) stop in Camooweal with a relatively short leg in the afternoon to Mt Isa. Anothe interesting fact about this shot, I can now confirm that we've been to every place labelled on it, further highlighting the distance travelled.
Rolling in to The Isa we could once again resume our "jobs" during set up. Sam is my top helper. Fully disconnects the van, levels it and then stabilises it using the legs. I have every confidence he could do it without me walking around and often corrects me if I have the set up jobs out of sequence.
So a long few days on the road, with a some great memories created. And whilst I wouldn't want to drive that leg frequently, it was a great reminder as to just how large the country is, when you drive non-stop for 3 days and you go from one shade of red dust to another....
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