Comment: Gary Junction Road
Submitted: Tuesday, Sep 22, 2009 at 18:49
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luxtourer
Re the road north from Sandy Blight
Junction, Len writes in his book "Beating About the Bush": "Our earlier intention was to make a further 150-kilometre link northwards and eastwards to join up with the existing Tanami-
Halls Creek track at Mt Doreen, but as it happened the 1000-odd kilometre access to
Marble Bar became more urgently needed." He then came back to
the junction and did the road east to Liebig
Bore, then headed west towards
Marble Bar (though it was a couple of years before he eventually made that connection). No doubt a road to Mt Doreen became something "for the future", but never completed.
Reply By: Dandj - Wednesday, Mar 04, 2015 at 00:56
Wednesday, Mar 04, 2015 at 00:56
John, many thanks for that explanation. It's been bugging me for some time and I'm glad my basic assumptions were correct.
In Len Beadell's biography "A Lifetime in the Bush", it says that the SBJR was completed on 4 July 1960 as far as "the SBJ area" but the exact location of Sandy Blight
Junction itself (and hence the position of the
Gary Junction Road) wasn't determined until 27 August 1960, and obviously that was south of the end of his SBJR workings. It also says "a further 16
miles (26 km) of road was constructed but never used". So now we know. The rest of 1960 was spent on the GJR east and west from SBJ. The completion of the SBJR to
Mount Doreen (only 50 km NE from
Vaughan Springs) on
the Tanami Track presumably got overtaken by other priorities as you suggest. Pity, it would have made a pretty interesting drive.
Dandj.
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