Travelling the Plenty HWY

chris & cheree

It's just a long dirt road. If there is no rain you will have no problems.
Just take your time and do not be tempted to travel at the posted speed.

Safe travels.

We travelled the Plenty Hwy East to West last week - Prado towing a Tvan.
There are some sections where Road Trains have left deep grooves in the road after recent rain, but the road is wide enough that you can find a smooth path around the grooves. Other than that the road is in good condition and you should have no problems making the Journey in two days.

Leachy

We traveled the road a while back

The reports we got before we left Boulia were that it was in really bad condition I spoke to 2 drivers one had blown 2 tyres on the road the other had broken his suspension badly.

Both had big fully equipped 4x4s

The council said it was pretty rough and they had not had a grader over it that year due to lack of funds.

We headed off and thought we would turn back if it got to bad for us.

We drove slowly and carefully waiting for it to get bad, it never did it was rough and a bit stony but noting that was remotely difficult or dangerous ( Unless you were traveling at unreasonable speed ) We stopped to help another couple change a blown tyre and had an easy trip.

We were driving an old 4x2 toyota ute.

Drive for the conditions and don't hurry is the trick out there.

Hi Chris and Cheree,

This is our experience....

We travelled the Plenty back in December 2007. It was the first time for us and I, probably a bit like you, was concerned about its condition. The Plenty Hwy and the Queensland section, the Donohue Hwy, had a bit reputation as a tough and changing road. Tough on tyres.

Before we left Gemtree I found very little information available on the current road condition for the trip to Boulia. I had tried calling people in Boulia, local shops, using the pay phone at Gemtree but had no luck in finding someone who knew of the road and it condition.

It was a hotter than most years, at least that is what a few of the locals were heard to be saying, with daylight hours varying between 41C and 45C. I had two young girls of 7 and 9, a lovely wife who was enjoying the trip but getting a bit tired of the dust and heat. The fridge in the camper (non compressor tyre) couldn’t handle the heat and we had a threat of rain in Northern Queensland potentially cutting the road in the Channel country in the later Queensland section.

We were driving a 2003 diesel manual Prado and towing a jayco dove outback camper. Hardly what many on this site would class and a robust off-road outfit but I had modified both the Prado and the jayco a bit to handle the dust and stones.

I had intended to split the journey to Bouila over 2 days, but with the heat and possible rain we decided to keep going once we passed Jervois.
Overall, the trip to Boulia took 10 hours all up. The storm clouds on the distant horizon kept up going, as did the heat.

The interesting thing is that of the 10,000kms we travelled over the 2 months we were away, I look back at the drive from Gemtree to Bouila as the day of driving I enjoyed the most. We still managed to take enough time to stop along the way, take a few pics and so on. I would have still preferred that take at least 2 days but the idea of rain cutting the road was enough to keep as going.

As it turned out we beat the rain, only got the tyres a bit wet.
We got into the Boulia camp ground about 9:30pm and talked with the only other camper there at the time. They also had arrived a bit earlier that day but had taken the longer way around due to his concern for the condition on the Plenty.

He didn’t say anything but as we talked I could see it in his face that he had wished he took the Plenty also.

Enjoy your travels, Anthony

gooday .
have just returned from the plenty hwy within the 2 wks .and there was nothing that you couldn,t drive your family car along with care ,
did it 2 yrs ago and it was a goat track .