We're back from Toowoomba to WA and back via a lot of dirt

Submitted: Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 10:11

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Member - Geoff C (QLD)

We arrived home yesterday after towing our Jayco Destiny Outback down the Strezlecki, Oodnadatta, Geat Central Road to WA then by tar to hall's creek and down the Tanimi road.We had a few problems mainly on the patrol TDI ute. I reckon it was overloaded in hindsight. Loved the Great Central Road and while the first 300km was rough I'd go again as soon as I can afford the diesel.
The Strezlecki and the Oodnadatta were no problem at all. The GCR was rough from the Olgas to nearly Warburton, got better the closer we got to Warburton, and was good thereafter.
Before doing the Tanimi we checked out the condition of the road with the local council and was advised it was rough and not to do it with the caravan on but as we had come so far to do it we thought we'd ask some people who had just finished it what it was like. They reckoned no worries and that they'd sat on 100kph for most of itand as they were towing camper trailers we thought we'd give it a go and just put up with a bit of damage as we won't be going that way again. It was very rough, not just corrugations, the first 300km had great holes in the road where the road trins had been using it in the wet.
Unfortunately with the caravan we couldn't get off the road to camp until the border which meant we traveling on dusk. The shadows across the road hid one of the holes, I was already going around one, and into it we went. There was an almighty bang and we thought we'd broken the front end of the ute but couldn't find any damage so we carried on with no problem.
When we finished the 880km of corrugations and got to Alice Springs we discovered we'd broken one of the main leaves of the rear on the ute and split one of the wheels.
Canceled the planned trip down the Plenty and started to limp home when the rear spring let go completely at Winton. Repaired there and now home.
Really enjoyed the trip buy now have the cleanup to do, not nice.
The worry when we set out was the caravan as its not really an offroad, more of a dirt roader but there was virtually no damage to it after about 3300km of varying dirt road and as it has the shower/toilet and carried 200l of water it wasn't light.
We did 2 tyres on the ute as well, probably overloaded.
Geoff

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Reply By: briggzee (WA) - Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 14:57

Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 14:57

Geoff, thanks for the report, especially the caravan as we eventually want an offroad van cabable of those type of roads. I was wandering whether we had to get a "true" heavy offroad van
(bushtracker etc) or a van similar to yours would be sufficient. Did you have any problems with the dust in the van?
Cheers Craig.
P.S. You must have covered a fair bit of W.A. as you have 2 photos of beaches, one right down South and one right up North. Both magnificent places which bring back pleasant memories

AnswerID: 315423

Follow Up By: Member - Geoff C (QLD) - Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 18:24

Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 18:24

Yep, we had a lot of dust and couldn't stop it, it was still falling out after 100s of km on the tar. Most seem to be from behind the air conditioner where I eventually found a couple of stripped screws holding on the cover. The lift up flap in the roof didn't seem to achieve much. But when you consider how many dirt kms we did it wasn't a problem.
Geoff

FollowupID: 581600

Reply By: Member - Footloose - Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 15:24

Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 15:24

Don't you just love those people who tell you that the track's a "piece of cake" ? "Yeah mate we towed a road train through there yesterday at 100k/h, sweet!"
When I post about a track I always stress that it can change depending upon the traffic and the weather. Then at least half a dozen people will post comments similar to the above.
I've known vehicles roll on the Tanami at quite low speeds. There have been fatalities and near misses (usually caused by driving too quickly) on that track.
And people still tell me that you can do it in a day !
I think that by the sounds of it that you were lucky not to have more damage than you did. A cow and a roo almost wiped me out in the shadows, along the Tanami. Luckily I managed to miss both of them.
Maybe I'm an "old lady" driver, but I'm a live one :))

AnswerID: 315428

Follow Up By: Member - Geoff C (QLD) - Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 18:34

Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 at 18:34

We spent 3 nights on the track and wouldn't have wanted to go any faster. On the corrugations we found about 72 to 75km was the best speed for both the caravan and the ute. Where needed we did a lot less than that obviously. We didn't see another caravan and there wasn't many tourists out there, most of the vehicles we saw were trucks. We might be slow but nobody overtook us.
Geoff

FollowupID: 581603