Not so Drysdale

 

Wednesday 16 June 2021 – Not so Drysdale

We didn’t rush off this morning as we didn’t have terribly far to go so time for a cooked breakfast of scrambled eggs with cream again (as it’s getting close to its used by date).  We were still on the road by 8ish though and continued our journey westwards.

The road between Ellenbrae and the Kalumburu Road turn off was actually pretty good – recently graded and a good top coat of light grey road base and very few corrugations so that even we skimmed along faster than usual albeit probably still averaging about 65km/h.

We caught up H&M at the rest stop at the Kalumburu Road turn off and just managed to pull in ahead of an APT bus so that we didn’t have to queue behind 20 people to use the toilets.  Mind you, if we’d been 10 minutes later we could have at least taken advantage of the toilet paper roll they left behind!

We checked the cars and caravans over and one of the APT passengers pointed out that one of the shackles on the back of our caravan had nearly worked its way loose so that was a good pick up and Larry just removed both of them and put them away as we are hoping we won’t need the van to be towed backwards out of anything!

Hendrik is a bit worried about his warning light that keeps coming on telling him he is low on coolant so that is something we will have to investigate further over the next day.  He had checked it before leaving on the trip and it has only come on since we’ve been on the dirt so we are hoping some indicator gauge has jiggled loose except that the coolant level had dropped when we checked it at Ellenbrae.

We turned on the Kalumburu Road with some trepidation as this road is notoriously rough and a caravan killer.  Well let’s just say some of it was good and some of it was really, really bad.  We passed on dead New Age caravan on the side of the road with a broken axle and obviously abandoned until a tow truck can come and pick it up.

We both made it Drysdale River Station with a certain degree or relief, checked in and headed into the campsite.  We then opened up the vans to check for damage from the first section of really rough road.  Our van wasn’t too bad except for a couple of rogue screws on the ground and some semi mashed bananas, but H&M’s oven had pretty much fallen to pieces so some thinking and discussion on how best to deal with it was required over lunch of ham, cheese and mountain bread for H&M and banana and honey sandwiches for L&J.

After lunch some repairs, cleaning and checking of cars and vans occurred before we decided the camp ground was just a little too hot and dusty and a swim was in order.  Larry knew that nearby there was a place to swim called “Miner’s Pool” about 5km away from the station so we grabbed bathers and towels and piled into the Disco (the Jeep still being hitched up) and headed off.  We didn’t quite know where we were going but presumed that there may be a sign.  We made it to the Drysdale River crossing where there were a few people camping (possibly illegally) and splashing around in the creeks but we didn’t think that was Miner’s Pool so kept driving for the required 5km but, thinking it couldn’t be right as we were driving away from the river, chucked a u-turn and headed back the way we had come. 

                                                                    

We went over the river crossing again and then Larry spotted a road that looked relatively well travelled off to the left so we headed off down there.  There was no one else around and we didn’t really know if we were on the right track but there were lots of tyre tracks and the road looked well used so we figured it must lead somewhere.  Sure enough, after a few k’s it turned and headed down to the river and there was an area to park and a path leading down the water’s edge.  It was very quiet and peaceful but our smugness in finding this hidden gem was short lived when, after about 5 minutes, two other cars rocked up.  They were part of a 4WD club and had got back from the Mitchell falls campground early as the group leader had been stressing about roads etc.  So they all headed in for a swim but we ended up just paddling our toes on the edge.

Back to camp and we decided to walk up to the bar and have a drink and see about booking dinner for Sunday night as a sign in the laundry had suggested booking ahead was a good idea.  Alas, we were told chef has one night off a week and he was taking Sunday night off as there would be no tour groups in that day so we will have to plan a meal for that night instead.  It’s no biggie as both Miranda and I have extra “just in case” meals in the freezers but it still would have been nice to have a night off from cooking.

Still, tonight was Jen and Larry’s night off from cooking as Miranda had baked a big lasagne a few weeks ago and it had been defrosted and was ready to be cooked.  Fortunately, as H&M’s oven is still looking terminal at this stage, it was just the right size to fit in our marine cooker so, although it took a bit longer to heat through, it was still cooked and ready to eat by a decent dinner time and I think we just about managed to polish the whole thing off!

An early night after another big, and slightly stressful day, and tomorrow we have to tackle the other half of the Kalumburu Road and apparently that’s no walk in the park either with quite a few people in the camp ground having a bitch about the state of the road and the damage it has done to their cars and vans.