Not Much to Report . . .

Since returning I have parked the truck and done very little to it.
There is much to contemplate but I am not inclined to wax philosophical at the moment.
Maybe when I have had a little more time to consider everything . . .

I am thinking of a little trip around the South West of WA in the next couple of weeks so there are a few small items to fix.

The squeaking bed mechanism was caused by one of the chains slipping a tooth on a sprocket causing the bed to not be horizontal and thus rub on the guides. Relatively easy to fix.

The pesky drawer catches really need something purpose made so a few hours on the milling machine fixed that and produced these.


















Being made of acetal they are very strong and will not break. The pin which fits into the block is supported by the close fit so hopefully it will not break off. The slotted holes allow the catch to be positioned so it all works properly and then the two front screws will lock it all in place. So a half hour was spent fittting these new catches.






















I also remembered that the last time I checked the sacrificial anode in the hot water system it was corroding faster than I had imagined it would so I obtained a replacement.



















When I checked however it hasn't seemed to deteriorate significantly more than when I checked last time so maybe the country water supplies are less corrosive than the main Perth water supply???

There are plenty more little improvements I could do but I'm not going to make any major changes until my head has settled down.

In the mean time, bike rides, photography and catching up with friends and family come higher on the list.

Updates will be slow for a while . . .

Great Central Road Days 23-26

Day 23

A nice bitumen drive to Broome. I haven't been here since 1968 and I am quite intrigued to see all the changes that have been wrought to make this one of the top holiday spots in the North West since that time. I plan to maybe stay here for a couple of days and catch up with myself.

The first stop in town of course is the Tourist Centre for a list of all the caravan parks. I need to sit down and digest this for a while as everything is over $35/night!

The place is not that big so I decide to have a look around and see if any of them actually justify this sort of pricing. It's very strange to me. This is now a more popular place with more people and better access on the coast etc. etc. but to tell the truth Katherine "feels" nicer and is a damn sight cheaper for everything. I am glad I am carrying enough fuel that I don't have to fill up here. I feel an overwhelming sense of "Club Expensive" about this place. It's where the beautiful people come to show how much money they can spend doing the same stuff they can do everywhere else a lot cheaper, but of course it's easier to be seen doing it here.

After working my way through a couple, which look remarkably similar to most of the other caravan parks I have seen, except the last one I look at has the speedway next door, you are not allowed to run generators at all and asking the price before you book in is taken as the ultimate sign of a poor upbringing!

I decide to go and park on the famous beach for a while and cool off while I sort this out in my head. You can get to about 300metres away in the carpark if you feel like negotiating the 50 or so "traffic calming devices" on the way. Now there is the ultimate oxymoron in my opinion, install a device which causes frothing apoplexy in the average driver and call it a "calming device"! Never the less the phone and internet are available so I go for a walk and make a few calls and do a bit of internet update and it occurs to me that the real reason for staying IN any of these towns is for precisely that and I have just done most of what I wanted to do. I have no desire to ride a camel along the beach at sunset . . . I would be sure to get an ugly one with a bad temper and there is way too much deja vu going on there. To me it doesn't compare with the week I spent on the last horse based muster on Minilya Station over 40 years before. And my doctor says it is not a good idea to sit in the sun for long periods of time and some of the things that are thought suitable for attire in a bikini these days are completely beyond my comprehension. I can't understand why I can't get Herman Melville out of my head.

No, sorry. Doesn't look like I am going to be able to sort it out here.
I think it's time to head home for a while.
I know the inland route is a couple of hundred kilometres shorter but for some crazy reason I choose the coast road, maybe it will be cooler at least.
So now it's just a long drag with little to see along the way.
The towns have changed some since my last visits but on the whole are still recognisable.
A stop in Carnarvon, where I worked in 1967-68 and explored much of this region from at that time, where there a couple of friends in town for a while and then back on the road.
The overnight stops at the new style shire "rest points" are some of the nicest so far. The weather is cool enough for the first time, apart from Yulara, that you don't need air conditioning to prevent heat prostration but it's still "boring as batshit" down this coast.

Again the few obligatory "nice" sunsets and finally back where I started.







































A lot to think about for a while now with regard to how well the truck "works" and the lifestyle it represents.
I am sure this trip was not representative or really even indicative of what to expect for true long term cruising but it sure tested a few concepts both physically and mentally.

Great Central Road Day 22

Despite being up early and another lap around the park I can't find any better photo's and I'm not going to wait here 'til May. I'll have to come back.
I have spoken to a couple of people at El Questro who have come up the Gibb River Road and tell me it has been graded from the South as far as Mitchel Falls but I have decided to have a look at The Bungle Bungle
















and save GRR to another time. Back the way I came to the main highway. I can’t think of any reason to go into Wyndham so it’s turn right at the highway and drag all the way down to Purnululu National Park. You have to go 30km across Mabel Downs Station to get to the park entrance and the another 30km to the park proper.
















There are restrictions on the type of caravans you can take in, no dual axles and vehicles must be 4wd. The logic appears to be the trailing axle scrubs and breaks up the track. What complete and utter trash! Not that I mean it doesn’t happen but the road is so bad it could only improve it to break it up a bit. Turn it all into sand NOW. These corrugations make the ones in Kakadu pale into insignificance. I think, OK, I will go slow and just take an hour or two even to go the 30km I can do that. No I can’t! My speedo doesn’t register that slow but the GPS tells me I am making3-5km/hr average. My brain must have been bruised by all the shaking because it takes me a whole hour to decide there aren’t enough hours in the day to make it there so I turn around and spend another hour crawling all the way out. The video here looks quite easy! I would like to leave the truck out on the highway and take the motorbike but there is nowhere even remotely safe to leave it. The local wisdom is it takes less than 24hrs to trash and burn a vehicle by the wayside. It is very frustrating as a normal 4wd with soft suspension can go over it at about 50kph, and quite a number do as they pass me both ways, but it seems the truck suspension is just too hard and for reasons explained once before I don’t want to let the tyres down anymore. I’m really ticked off but I have broken enough already so once back on the highway I head off toward Derby. Halls Creek is a straight drive through and just short of Fitzroy Crossing there is a nice sunset
































and then a pleasant overnight spot with about 10 vehicles at Mary Creek.
That’s enough for one day.

Great Central Road Day 21

Day 21

I pressed the wrong button on the GPS sometime today and lost the track but it goes between the two overnight stops for Day 20 and Day 21 . . . the yellow bit and part of the grey bit.

This is the park at the end of the main street in Kununurra.

I can’t believe Kununurra has the second most expensive fuel I have come across $1.70/l!!

But I really don’t have a choice so $350 later I head off to El Questro.

I’m told that the area around there is as good as anything down the Gibb River Road but that’s a big call. Never the less it’s about 60km off the main Gibb River Road and 50% is bitumen so I’ll take it quietly and see how we go.

Some great views in this part of the country but hard to photograph at 11am with pretty bright skies.

It’s not a bad place but of course they get you in subtle ways. The $20 park pass so you can wander around plus the $20 camping fee (unpowered).

It’s only just after lunch by the time I get there as the road is pretty easy so I get the bike down and have a blast to all the 4wd lookouts and tracks. For some reason despite the light I quite like these couple of images.

In fact by tea time I manage to cover everything but the gorge walks which I am told are really best done in May. That’s a good reason to go back!

A quick blast out about 20km to the boating jetty produced this just before it was time to return for the evening.

On the way back I finally worked out what was wrong with what I was seeing in El Questro. I remember when it first started to be promoted and there was always a photo of a building overlooking a gorge but I could not find it in the main part of the park. But if you go down a "Private Road" you can see it's the main homestead for the station. ie the owner's house. Great for advertising but not for public access.
















Fair enough . . . the rest of the park is pretty good anyway.