Back after 3 glorious months

" there are many crappy roads in SA apart from that one" seems harsh Mr Lexic, thought many interesting roads may be more of a drawcard.

Hi Trevor - Murphy certainly fixed the Kingoonya to Wirrulla road for us! I hope he's still out the flattening the corrugations with a teaspoon. Actually he was quite kind as he followed us around.

First he caused endless problems getting the rear view camera working, but we won when we got to Tasmania. He let it work for most of the trip - until just after that corrugated road, and it was invaluable on the narrow roads of Tasmania.

Then he somehow put the jack back down on the caravan just as we took off - or more likely he distracted the driver for long enough for him to forget to put it up! He waited until by chance we had purchased a second bottle jack when we saw it in the hardware store a few days earlier, because we needed it to get the fixed jack out of the bent casing before we could move from our camp. We got the bracket straightened at a welding shop later that day; serviceable but not perfect so it was difficult to use.

We gave away our ULP before going on the Tassie ferry, and didn't think about refilling the jerry can for some time. Murphy waited until we re-filled it before the locking pin in the beleaguered jack broke. We would have been stranded in the bush campsite forever if we hadn't the fuel to run the gennie to grind the pin off. A couple of days later, the gennie and grinder rescued another camper who had broken a wheel nut on his camper truck. Lucky Murphy let Jim bring the grinder 'just in case'. He didn't stop us from purchasing a jockey wheel before we left even though we didn't need it - that is until we had to remove the jack and used the jockey wheel for the rest of the trip.

He waited until we were off all those dirt tracks and on the Stuart Highway before busting the tow bar. He also let it happen on the bitumen so it didn't dig into the dirt and upend the van or something horrible. He made sure it was race day in Roxby so no-one would be home around Woomera area, and that no-one on the road would stop and offer help, but left a lovely station owner at home, to try ringing any source who could help, and to re-assure me he would find somebody to help, as call after call was unanswered. He let someone else from the station family walk in at that moment and say there was someone new at Glenambo who could help (can you imagine someone making a change from the city to the tiny road stop of Glenambo - just one wonderful family that Murphy couldn't stop). They had only been there for just a few weeks, were home on a Saturday afternoon, and willing to make emergency repairs for me. When it came time to pay (my cash was low toward the end of our holiday), they had just organised to take credit card the day before - i was their first customer to use it. Beat you there Murphy.

He also let us have beautiful weather for touring - i just wish he would let it rain here now we so desperately need it.

I hope he hasn't been near you lately. Stay away from the Kingoonya road!

Motherhen

Hi Brewman

Most of it was rather corrugated; the northern section not so badly, where the red dust areas were OK, but further down the track it was all pretty rough, and i couldn't convince Jim to let the tyres down low enough, although letting the car tyres down a bit certainly improved our ride - lowering them in the caravan just may have saved the fridge from breaking down. He also was on the homeward stretch, so going real slow for long periods was not on his agenda, although 60 kph was about the max. we did. Corrugations didn't really disappear until around 20 k North of Wirrulla. We had been warned that the road from Glenambo to Tarcoola was shocking, as it was being used by trucks for mining exploration and even when recently graded, was just as bad in a couple of days. They didn't know if the mining exploration was also taking these trucks down the Wirrulla road. We thought we would be over the worst when we turned off at Kingoonya, but not so - much of it was worse.

What do you call Skull Tanks? We noticed a lot of old tanks along the road - was it once a stock route? Corrugations come up quickly once they start, especially on the shire road into our farm - we usually say it's about the worst road of a trip when we get home - this time SA won. Didn't stop at the pub - must confess
i don't share your love of a beer.

Motherhen

Skull tanks is north of Lake Everard station and is on the corner of the road to Mt Ive. And yes this used to be a stock route. You would have also passed smith tanks and middle tanks on the way down. A funny story about my time on Lake Everard station. We had the geologists from a mining company staying in the shearers quarters for a while whilst they sampled creek beds. After their departure they phoned to say they had lost a camera and thought it was left in the shearers quarters. It was nowhere to be found. Some six months later whilst mustering a paddock i was riding along a creekbed and went a gutser on the bike. Ends up i ran over the pelicase(a water and dustproof case) which the camera was in. What a find, a Ricoh SLR which at the time was worth about $700. This was a case of finders keepers. When you think that Lake Everard station is some 5000 km sq this was a needle in a haystack find.