Trip Report: Warraweena

THE WARRAWEENA GATHERING.

The Foreplay…………

We are only a few days away from the National meet. Excitement builds on the forum. Duncs begs us to record all the stories that arise over the weekend. Muddy Doe declares that he is not going to miss this event for the world and his doe ‘trippin’ promises to spill her guts. Ross from QLD warns his fellow statesmen that they will suffer the wrath of King Canetoad, whilst Pezza sticks to the unwritten QLD rule of not ratting on fellow ‘maroons’, otherwise there might be stories of t-shirts being used as motorbike helmets and driving Nissans in birthday suits and other similar tales being released to those of us who do not live inside their glorious Kingdom.

Lucy admits bringing his deficiencies to the forum and Roachie declares to us all that there is a plot to disparage him.

John LG wishes us all well for a great weekend and Ruth wishes she was attending too.

Gob and Denny want us to take it to another forum as they are green with envy. Aussie Chef declares to us all that he “is just leaving, with coffee mug in tow”… and ‘poor’ Muzbry has one and half sleeps to go….

Willem gives us some last minute notes and Robin wants to know “Will there be vegetarian sausages?” John R comes in with some breaking news about a ‘Big Desert firebug’ who will be amongst our midst….

And so the scene is set……..

The participants in the weekend’s events start to arrive as early as the Tuesday beforehand. Goodness only knows what they got up to before your’s truly arrived late on Friday afternoon. Suffice to say they were all well-primed by the time we arrived and the tall stories were already flowing as freely as the liquid refreshments.

The weather was not terribly inviting, but did nothing to dampen the enthusiasm of the vast throng. From far and wide they continued to roll into camp in all manner of jalopies. Some had a caravan or camper trailer weighing heavy upon the drawbar, whilst others had the garden trailer or a roof rack stacked high. One bloke even brought his green Otto bin on the drawbar of the 7x5 box trailer!

Willie was in fine fettle and had taken a ‘taskforce of the willing’, on a reccy trip up to Mt Gill.

The Main Event: Let the fun begin……..

Saturday morning arrived right on time (that’s how we do things here in SA). A drab morning of sorts, with a misty haze and the occasional sprinkle from above.

Willie had pre-arranged a small number of reliable types (as well as me too) to act as trip leaders for the 3 Saturday trips. Each of these trips was to take the better part of a full day to complete and there was a limit of 10 vehicles per group.

I had the “pleasure” of the company of Des Lexic as my co-pilot and navigator for the day. As expected, he led me up the creek on more than one occasion and tried to make out it was all my fault.

We hadn’t gone far into our 55 kilometer day trip, when the UHF crackled with news that Lucy had a flat tyre. The convoy came to an abrupt halt as we all gathered round to watch the job being done, only to be told that it would simply need to be topped-up a bit and all would be okay. With air from his Endless supply having been duly deposited into the offending General Tire, Lucy declared that we could all rejoin our own steads and continue to conquer all before us. So, all the people who had gathered around to watch a tyre being changed, left the scene thoroughly disappointed. We needn’t have worried too much…….we only managed another 100 meters or so, before the dulcet tones of the voice of the said Mr Lucy once again brought us all to a grinding halt. “No, it’s going down faster than any black thing I’ve ever experienced before” was the call. So again, we all trooped back to the sticken Blandcruiser. My navigator assisted the process of changing the tyre, minimizing the amount of rear-crack we had to suffer the sight of, as Lucy’s dacks revealed more than our stomachs could cope with in one sitting!

We managed to make it relatively unscathed for the next section of the trip to our lunch stop at Dunbar Hut. There was a long-drop there with a pong you’d have to smell to believe. The small hut provided some temporary relief from the wind, allowing me to boil the billy without the gas flame being extinguished. Given his poor track record with gas and cooking devices, Des Lexic was forbidden from going within 500 meters of the hut.

The mastering of Suicide Hill gave people a reason to breathe a sigh of relief, once they’d reached the base. It wasn’t anywhere nearly as forboding as we had all been led to believe by it’s name. It gave some drivers a all-too-infrequent chance to experience the low-range engine-braking capabilities of their rig.

A little further along, we were heading along a dry, somewhat sandy riverbed. The only vehicle in the convoy to experience any difficulty (again!!) was “Lucy”. Bogged to the sidesteps in sand that all the other vehicles simply tippy-toed through. The excuse offered-up this time was “forgot to put her into 4 wheel drive”. Yeh, right!!!

We reached the end of that creek-bed and the convoy was required to turn around and return to a point adjacent to the foot of suicide hill. There was a short drive up another creek-bed, but “Lucy” was not able to go with the other 9 vehicles, as it would’ve meant going through a shallow puddle. I’m talking of literally 2 inches of the wet stuff!! Lucy knows only too well that ANY water will make his dash light up like a Christmas tree.

By now, you’re probably starting to think I must have it in for Member Lucy. Let me assure you here and now, nothing could be further from the truth. Shortly after starting our return journey, Pud and Barb announced over the UHF that Lucy’s _Affordable_Storage_Drawers.aspx were flapping open at will. Yet another hasty stop ensued and we are all informed that a latch has broken, allowing the errant drawer to do whatever it pleased. Further along, another drawer latch decided to call it quits. I think it would be fair to say that Lucy needs to be a bit more careful with his _Affordable_Storage_Drawers.aspx and their contents. We stopped at a lookout, not far from our camp, only to have Lucy bemoaning the fact that his hugely expensive stainless steel, underslung water tank has sprung a leak (again!). I was beside myself with joy as the cameras continued to click at will. Poor Lucy knew not whether to look fore or aft; everywhere he cast his evil eye, another fault jumped out at him. Thank goodness for cable-ties and occy straps he says.

Upon returning to camp, we mingled around camp for a little while. Noel Fullarton enlightened us with his stories of camels and considerable perspective on the life of Aboriginal people throughout this great country. At around 1900 we all drove the 1.5klm up to the homestead where Judith and her band of merry helpers were busy cooking a seemingly endless supply of snags. These were sold with a bit of bread for $2.00 a piece. I understand that over $1,200- was raised to go towards the remote education of kids.

We were then entertained by 2 bands. They took it in turns to pound-out some great songs from the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s (I think)as well as some of their own creations. Suffice to say that I was totally hoarse the next morning as I tried in vain to match the volume being emitted from the huge Bose speakers. It was pretty cool at the homestead and there were a couple of 44’s filled with fire to keep the folks warm. As the night drew on, the numbers at the homestead dwindled gradually; attendees choosing to return to camp and either hit the hay or sit around smaller fires to exchange yarns.

At various times over the weekend, stories and tales emerged of incidents from other trips (that I wasn’t a part of). Aussie Chef got himself into a bit of strife with a flat tyre. However, that’s okay of course. He is always prepared with a spare tyre AND a puncture repair kit. Only trouble is that the spare tyre was as flat as the one on the ground AND the puncture repair kit was back at camp in the trailer. To add insult to injury, Aussie tried to blame his son Warren jnr for these misdemeanors.

Sunday dawned sunny but cold; frosty in fact. I finally had a chance to have a decent conversation with Trevor R; one of the cane-toads who managed to find his way over the border to bless us with his presence. Unfortunately, Trevor informed me of a horrendous crime he committed en-route to Warraweena. He willfully wasted WATER. Despite having copious quantities of other, less-valuable liquids on board, good ol’ Trevor decided the road needed wetting down with a commodity which we may not have available to us for much longer. Anyway, rest assured I admonished him severely and told him in no uncertain terms that XXXX and Bundy Rum were invented to throw on dirt roads; no our precious water.

Once again trips were planned and departures arranged. Our group’s intended trip to Mt Gill was stymied due to the disappearance of the key to a particular gate. Two other groups had preceded us up that hill, so we were provided an opportunity to do The Old Coach Road and Old Angepena Goldfield Tracks instead. With the elderly Mr Des Lexic acting as our fearless leader, we proceeded along the first section of this moderate-rated track. It was indeed interesting to watch the hapless Mr Lexic take no less than three attempts to get his bucket of bolts over a small mound of dirt. The remainder of the convoy was able to easily tackle this slight obstacle without any drama at all. This track consisted mainly of many “whoopsies”……a technical term meaning in and out of creeks thousands of times. Upon stopping for lunch, Pud noticed a certain amount of steam emanating from under the bonnet of his Chev-Nissan. Tools were hastily withdrawn and the task of establishing the cause began in earnest. It turned out to be a case of the air-conditioning aluminium tubing being worn through by the air-cleaner canister. Nothing that would cause any inconvenience at this time of the year.

We returned to camp at around 1700 to continue the task of meeting old friends; ones we had seen before and others with whom our only previous interaction had been via the keyboard of our PC. Surprisingly, a number of people whose acquaintance I met for the first time, commented that I was younger than they had imagined me to be. I took that to mean that I must “sound” older on the ‘puter than my number of elapsed birthdays would otherwise indicat;-)).

After tea, we were treated to a half-hour or so session around the Sunday-night campfire, conducted by Willie’s close friend, Uncle Milton. Following that very funny and witty performance, the tone of the whole evening started to take a turn for the worse. Willie had prevailed upon me to conduct a “Muck-Up” awards ceremony. Unfortunately, to say I was gazumped by Member Lucy would be a gross understatement. He flabbergasted me with his well thought-out presentation along the lines of “This Is Your Life”. Working on the basis of never letting the truth get in the way of a good story, I was (again) made to look like a total Wally.

Along the way, we were able to hand-out small prizes and awards to various participants for those deserving souls.

It would be remiss of me not mention the generosity of our website hosts. A big thank you to David and Michelle Martin of Exploroz for providing a quantity of merchandise which was handed around.

Also, I would like to acknowledge the fantastic effort put into organizing the whole shooting match by Willem and Judith in collaboration with Stony and Gina from Warraweena.

The Afterglow…..

Monday morning came upon us and some of the blokes gravitated to the rear end of John R’s Patrol. John’s diff was making some rather gnarly sounds and it was pronounced D.O.A. when a couple of bits of steel came out the bung hole when an inspection was undertaken. Discussions ensued as to whether it would be appropriate to remove the rear tail-shaft so John could drive to Port Augusta in front-wheel drive or if much more damage would be caused if he were to drive there in 4 wheel drive. In the end it was determined that as he had an extended warranty, the vehicle would be trailered to Port Augusta for repairs by Nissan. That duly happened, but not before the RAA bloke had to return to his base (at Leigh Creek I think) to get his trailer’s spring and a tyre repaired.

Of course, with John’s vehicle being out of action, he was faced with somewhat of another dilemma. How was he to get himself, Heather and their Kimberly Karavan to Port? Enter, stage left, Willie Kempen! Although young Willie was supposed to be heading to warmer climes, he jumped at the opportunity to tow the KK in a southerly direction as well as entertaining John and Heather (with Uncle Milton’s assistance) for the duration of the journey. What a mate!

The journey home was not without several incidents. Whilst most of these were tyre related, Out’n’about David (who had actually left camp on Sunday to return to Adelaide), managed to break the axle of his camper trailer. Instead of being home by evening on Sunday, he arrived after dark on Monday night.

I’m sure that I have missed several of the important events that took place over the weekend in this account. I am equally sure that there will be numerous reminders of other stuff ups that I have either forgotten about, or never knew about in the first place. If anybody has some photos of the weekend and knows how to upload/download (or whatever the term is!!!???), could you please add them to this thread in a follow-up.......that'd be great. Thanks.

I reckon it’d be a pretty safe bet to say that everybody had a great time. I will be looking forward to the next big bash.

Cheers

Roachie