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Desert Odyssey 2


Boydie

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I guess this is for Oz members, but who knows.

Julie and I will be setting off (again) in late August this year and heading out west from Bullaburra NSW.

First stop will be north to Byrock then Tibooburra, up the old bore track to Inaminka,camp up for a day or so on Cooper Creek then west overland to the Birdsvile track, up to Birdsville, stay a day or so then again west over the Simpson Desert via the French Line track to Dalhousie Springs, after a couple of days rest and recovery north to Mt. Dare, cut across through the Finke gorge, Kings Canyon and south to the Uluru, the Olgas and west through Docker River into Western Australia, then to Warburton and south down the Connie Sue track to Neale Junction and east to Ilkurlka Roadhouse where we will rest up for a couple of weeks before going back north and up the Canning Stock Route through the Gibson Desert and into the Hammersley Ranges in WA., The route back will be via the Tanami Desert, Alice Springs and back to Dalhousie Springs, Oodnadatta, and east to Maree, the Gammon and Flinders Ranges and home via Broken Hill.

Anyone interested in joing us? estimated distance 15,000 kilometers, time duration 16 weeks but who's counting.

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Geeee you just came back from a adventure, 16 weeks? I wish, we would love to do something like this, especially with someone as experienced as you. Maybe one day if I retire I will join in on something like this. I will wait for your write up when you return, the last one was amazing.

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Being 66 and retired helps, these days I just take on casual work to top up the pension (AKA diesel money) and get the Disco ready for the next outing.

In 2015 Julie and I will be doing the Cape York trip, April-August to miss the wet season and leave the top end before it gets too hot.

The trip will be to Cape York, via a couple of days on Fraser Island, then up to Airlie Beach, where we will hire a sail boat for a week to fully explore the Great Barrier Reef then up to Cairns, The Daintree Rain Forest and up to the top of Australia, Cape York, then south and skirt around the Gulf of Carpenteria - enjoying a buffalo hunting safari on a mates property who has too many of these behemoths for his liking, into Arnhem Land, at least a couple of weeks in Kakadu and then home again via the Tanami and Simpson Deserts.

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  • 7 months later...

Well, it's that time of year again and Julie and I will be off on our little trip on friday 24th of this month, no ideas on our return date, but not before the middle of March -- we will take my lap-top and Ipad so we will, when we are in range of a transmitter me in contact, the car is ready, new suspension bushes to be fitted next week (the last items on the loooooong list of things to be done) and then we are away, to you in the UK, enjoy your winter while we face temperatures of up to 45 degrees centigrade

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We're off as of tomorrow yesssssssssssssssssssss Doc's given me the all clear and a box full of med's and 100 Panadol Forte tablets for the constant headache, I'm betting that will disapate the moment we get into the Simpson :-) talk to you all soon

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

Just a quick note before we head off again - required return home to meet an unforseen event - I have cobbled up some pics in my gallery of our Simpson Desert crossing, I hope you enjoy them, we are still sucking on lemons to take the silly grins off our faces. I've learnt a lot about driving on very, very soft sand. When crossing the Simpson East -West the "problem" is that the route is up the steep side of every sand dune and then down the slow, over tens of thousands of years of prevailing westerly winds ALL of the 1,140 Simpson Desert sand dunes are in North/South configuration and like a saw tooth roof are arranged with the slow angle on the westerly side and the steep side on the east, which is why the South Australian Parks strongly advise to cross the desert from the west to the east. The dunes vary in height from 10 to 50+ metres in height and are, on average 300 - 400 metres apart for the 380 odd kilometre trip from Birdsville to Mt Dare.

Going over some of the dunes (by the way, to quote Griselda Sprigg, DUNE is a four letter word!! - read her book of that title and you will get an inkling of the Sprigg's achievement in their first vehicle crossing of the Simpson, to do it before the French line was made and guided by astral navigation alone in a 6 cylinder petrol Nissan Patrol with narrow cross ply tyres, 2 parents and 2 kids is a mind-blowing achievement) anyway I digress, what we learnt was firstly keep your truck as light as possible and leave the Zodiac 2.8 metre inflatable boat with 3.5 outboard motor at home next time,(yes, we took an inflatable boat across the desert !!!) our all-up weight of around 3 tonnes was a hassle we didn't really need. Secondly driving up the steep side of the sand dunes with an angle of up to 45 degrees after 3.00pm with ambient day temperatures of over 35 degrees C - well forget it, by then the sand is too hot and soft, the best method was to start very early (around 6.00am) when the ground/sand is cold and even slightly damp with early dew. Thirdly don't - as I did -ever relax, we were driving over a clay pan, dead flat and as hard as concrete and I even managed to get up into high range !!! came off the clay onto the sand and right into a deep bull dust hole !!! Julie spoke about 20 words in one sentence without any repetition and not one word of which was printable! I hit the roof lining with my head, came down hard and split the rubber "spring" on my seat (resulting in my having to use a cushion) and three of the four roof rack brackets on the passenger side came out of the roof gutter resulting in the rear door becoming inoperable until we reached Mt Dare and I was able to use their fork lift truck to lift the roof rack up, knock the gutter back into shape and refix the three brackets, I have yet to get around to re-bending the steel sump guard. The only other mechanical hitch we experienced was a loss of coolant - 2 litres a day - which we traced after about 2 weeks to a tiny hole in the supply hose to the heater which over the years has been rubbing up against the brake line and worn a tiny hole in it, this was easily repaired with some silicon tape.

Chat to you soon on our return.

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