Boulia to Alice via the Plenty highway

Thanks for posting this thread as you saved me the trouble. I was also just about to ask for any recent reports on the Plenty Hwy. as we are going the same way as you in about four weeks time. I know it's only been recently reopened but was just wondering what condition it's in.

Jon

I have not done this road for quite a few years now but when we got to Boulia we heard horror stories of how bad the road was and how damaging it was to cars and tyres.

One large 4x4 had ripped 2 tyres to shreds on the rocks another had smashed much of his subframe on a washout.

We were on the verge of abandoning our planned route and taking the longer route through Mt Isa.

We decided to give it a go and headed off saying we would turn back as soon as the going got rough.

We sat on about 60 kph down to 20 kph in sections but we kept going waiting for the horror stretches we had been told about.

6 hours or so later we arrived at the NT QLD border and had not seen anything close to bad road conditions!

we easily traveled road that had smashed big 4x4s in a little 2 wheel drive toyota ute :-)

The moral is take it slow and drive to the conditions.

We passed and stopped to help several 4x4s on the track with busted tyres all of them had been sitting on 100kph on a rough stony road that chewed tyres at that speed.

We did not have any damage or trouble at all.

My story is very similar. It's just a gravel road that gets beaten about in places until they grade it again. Done slowly you should have no problems. I was amazed at how fast some people were going over the rocks and ruts...asking for it. Still doing 800 or so kms at 40-60kph is not everyones cup of tea. I passed several towies with busted forbies on the tray during my trip last August.
Mike

we have spoken to a guy who had just towed his van over the plenty with a nissan last week, he stated it was quite bad in places, he had sustained window damage to his van from rocks kicked up by another vehicle..he was not a happy camper! He did add however that there were crews working from both ends doing road repairs..hope this helps..Cheers Steve.