A Flat Day

 

Sunday 4 June 2023 – Home Valley to Ellenbrae

We weren’t that keen to hang around at Home Valley with which, it must be said, we have been a little disappointed.  Can’t help feeling it’s being run with the bare minimum of maintenance etc which is disappointing given the rates they charge per night.

We left before 8am and headed on up to the lookout on the hill for a photo of the Pentecost and the Cockburn Ranges but the amount of smoke in the air and the sun in the east meant it was all a bit hazy for photos.  A couple in their MDC XT17HR saw our vans and stopped in to join the MDC club and for a bit of a chat.  He had had trouble with his fold our bed hinges collapsing on the Cape last year so that is something for Shaun to keep in mind with his fold out bed given the vibrations we will experience over the next couple of weeks.

We continued eastwards slowly but surely and after about an hour we found a gravel pit to pull into to let the suspension cool down and the others catch up.  Shaun  soon found us but we waited in vain for the others and couldn’t call them up on the radio.  Worrying that something that happened to them we tried calling other cars to see if they had seen them on the road but to no avail.  We decided that wasn’t much we could do sitting in the gravel pit so decided to continue on to Ellenbrae.

Just as we got to the top of the hill looking down to the Durack River crossing and were about to stop and take a photo the tyre pressure monitor alarm went off.  Larry leapt out to see the rear right tyre of the car rapidly deflating so we leapt into the car and back up the hill to where there was, luckily, a truck rest stop with a nice flat area for tyre changing.

As we have never had to change a tyre on the Gibb before (and given this is our 5^th time crossing it was probably only a matter of time) and indeed never changed a tyre on the Cruiser before, it took a while to work out how to get the spare tyre off and where to put the jack etc.  The others had all caught us up by this time and Shaun was able to help Larry with the heavy lifting of tyres and getting the ridiculously tight nuts off.  This is why it’s handy to travel with others as between two or three cars/vans you usually have tools aplently to cover any sort of repair work.

The Adamsons continued on the Ellenbrae and after Larry and Shaun had finished rolling around in the dirt putting the deflated tyre back under the car, we followed on behind.  We thanked our lucky starts for the tyre pressure monitors as the Durack River crossing is quite high and fast flowing and if we had plunged in there with a flat tyre we could have well and truly killed that wheel trying to scrabble through.

As it was we made it safely to Ellenbrae on the spare tyre where the Adamsons had already ordered us scones and jam and cream which we wolfed down as, with all of our delays, it was nearly lunchtime.  After food and a rest we made our way down to Stringers camp and were still early enough that we could find a nice spot up the  back around a campfire ring with enough space for the three vans.  After setting up Larry then got the punctured tyre off from under the car and we found the split in the tread with the help of a little air and water to make the hole fizz.  Larry had a go at fixing it with a plug but the angle meant it didn’t really plug all that well so we hefted the tyre into the car and took it back up to the station as they do tyre repairs there.

The guy had all the right tools so was able to spin the tyre off the rim and inspect the tear.  At first he sounded unsure as to whether it was fixable but he was up to the challenge and so, in the end, it cost us $70 for the puncture repair versus $680 for a new tyre (he did have one in stock which matches our others so all good either way – just the price difference!)

The guys put the repaired tyre back on the car for us very quickly and efficiently (once again, so much easier with all the tools and gadgets) but left L to put the spare back under the car as they didn’t much fancy the grovelling under the car bit.  L decided it would be much easier to do on their flat piece of concrete but realised he had left the tools back at the van so headed back there whilst J went back over to the shop to pay for the repair and to look at the souvenirs.  L took a long time to come back and had J a little worried.  Apparently the tyre monitor kept going off while L was driving back to the van and L was worried the guy had left too much air in the tyre so had checked it back at the van.  In his hurry he had left the tyre pressure gauge on top of the tyre and then reversed over it and lost it in the grass and had spent some time trying to find it.  He had left the others looking for it whilst he returned to do the spare tyre only to discover he had still left a bracket he needed behind.

A few choice words and another trip back to the van to retrieve it and to drop off Jenny who spent her time wandering around the campsite area looking for the tyre pressure gauge which the others hadn’t managed to find and also looking in places where Larry might have alternatively absent mindedly put it down.  Not to be found unfortunately so did a bit of setting up of the van until Larry returned.  He was puzzled because the monitor was taking readings of the tyre without any monitor on it which he found a bit strange so we had another look all over the car thinking it must be somewhere close to be taking readings but still no luck.

Jenny decided to have one last kick of the dry cut grass around the area L said he though the tyre had been and lo and behold turned up the monitor.   A gleeful shriek of “I’ve found it!” and Jenny is in the good books and can’t be told off for the rest of the holiday!

Having everything finally sorted there wasn’t really time or inclination to go down to the waterhole so instead we got a cracking fire going and sat next to it chopping veggies for our camp oven meal.  Last time we had a meal at Ellenbrae we cooked up beef, red wine and mushroom casserole which went down so well there were no leftovers and the same happened again tonight with Shaun having about 4 helpings and making clean up a breeze.

A full moon tonight so not much opportunity to look at the stars so it was some colour changing flame stuff on the fire and some staring at that and drinking Amanda’s fabulous mojitos followed by lots of red wine and chat.