London to Sydney
Paul's Diary !
Day 25, Australia Mungarannie, Cowarie, Birdsville, Maroo Hill, Windorah.
Well, let me start by saying sleeping in a tent at zero degrees when you are not really prepared for it is not my idea of fun . Bloody freezing. Anyway, up at 7 for an 8am start. Today the 2 long stages have been cancelled because of washouts, so we really just have a long tour off 313km down the Birdsville track to Birdsville for lunch, then another 390km into Windorah all through the desert on dirt roads. Well, once again the roads are just fantastic and loads of fun. Everyone sits on 120+. About 10km down the road . Our rear wheel locked on handbrake cable had been damaged the day before so we disconnected it and off we continued.
I was driving today and we just had a fun trip on the gravel with a little sideways action provoked every now and then. We reached Birdsville and I went and had a shower at the local Caravan Park fantastic. We changed tyres here and did a spanner check again pretty much everyone had left before us but we still had about 8hrs to do 400kms. Off we went and we couldn't have made a better decision. The road was gravel for the first 250km and we really didn't have any traffic or dust for about 200km of it. Lots of fun just playing around all safe on the wide open roads.
In a lot of places the surface was like marbles, so you can imagine what it was like. We finally arrived at Windorah for another night of tents and this time its around 5degrees! The Astra checked out all fine and we are happy with it to start tomorrow. We had a lovely dinner put on by the locals and a very early night (8.30pm) as we start at 7am again tomorrow they did say this was a marathon!
Day 26, Australia Windorah, Ingella, Cooper Creek, Quilpie, Dingo Gate, Tenham and Roma.
Today was a great day being the second longest day with both stages in the early part about 850km in total starting at 7.10am with a quick tour down to Ingella Station for the first gravel stage of 56km. We are in cattle country here and the stations are just huge. It was a great run as today we decided to be a little easier on the Astra and aim for a finish poor little thing is starting to look a little second hand by now.
The stage was flat with a lot of long stretches through varied surfaces of sand and rocks. Lots of gully's and ant hills to make us a little wary of any off-road excursions! The run went pretty smoothly although a lot of the corners come up fast when you are charging down the road at 160kph and a few caught us out ending up going wide into the rough but just bumping our way back on track. We got through fine .. about mid way we caught Theo from South Africa in his little yellow Porsche .. he did a great job of pulling over and letting us through cleanly. No real moments just a lot of fun.
I think everyone got through this one OK. Towards the end it seemed like we had a huge alignment problem so we got Troy to pull the wheels off and have a good look to make sure everything was OK .. a little paranoia has set in by now but it turned out just to be about a kilo of sand buildup in the wheels putting us off. A quick clean and 10km tour to the next stage of Tenham at 47km. This is the last of the wide open stages we have in the desert.
Again a huge variety of surfaces, lots of gully's, ruts, creek crossings, dips and a few 1km rocky stages. Some of the sand was about a foot deep and quite challenging. During this section we came hooting around one corner only to see a cow lying in the middle of the road. Fortunately we had enough time to scoot around it but I must say it made us a little more cautious for the rest of the stage.
No real problems just lots of fast sideways action but when we arrived at the end there was a damaged red Porsche that had hit the cow! He had come around the corner and had nowhere to go then BANG did a fair bit of damage to the front and side of the Porsche but they were OK and the car seemed to keep going. It was the only Porsche with a significant bull-bar on the front . I think they came off quite lucky really but not so for the poor old cow.
When we came through he was injured but we didn't know at the time the farmer was informed and went off to deal with the situation. This stage was actually quite amazing how the terrain changed so significantly throughout. It went from deep red sand and baron desert to rocky outcrops with loads of termite mounds to open grassy paddock with trees and fences. It was like moving through different countries. From here after the end we changed the wheels over again to some worn tyres for a long tour of 740km down to Roma. A long drive with a quick stop for petrol and a feed at Quilpie not much else to do there and continue on to Roma.
We arrived at about 6pm and noticed the front brakes vibrating badly. We pulled into the Roma Holden dealer and they were very obliging to machine our front disks problem sorted. Its now 9pm and time for a quick feed and reasonably early night as we have yet another start at 8pm tomorrow. My turn for the driving.
Day 27, Australia Roma, Bell, Bunya Mountains, Rosies then Noosa.
Today was a total change of scenery for us back to the Australia we know. A total of about 700km with 2 special stages in gravel of 24km each at Rosies the same one done twice. The day started early at 7.30 from the Big Rig at Roma with a tour of 330km down to the town of Bell.
Not much along the way, but as you finally get out of the desert areas the trees start to get noticeably bigger. The run into Bell was full of cotton fields that had recently been picked so there was a lot of left over cotton on the side of the roads that made it look like snow. We stopped at Bell for a service of the car and noticed the front driver side CV was a bit noisy. We had some spares but their rubber boots were damaged during the event at some stage so Troy had to make one up out of a few pieces and use some cable ties to hold the grease and boot together.
All back together and off to the start wee go .. about 20km from Bell. We are still nursing some damaged suspension here the rear spring we damaged a few days ago has started to sag badly and is just hanging in there and the rear end of the Astra feels like it is dragging on the ground.
We have ordered a couple of new springs for Noosa and will change them tonight so we need to nurse the car a little through today. As we arrive at the stage start I noticed a few rubbing noises from the left front and upon inspection found the CV boot had come adrift and all the grease had gone not a good start. A little bit of a mad panic we get the wheel off and just cable tie the boot back on hoping it will hold.
Now covered in grease we are ready to start but by now we have lost a little start time and set off behind the Suzuki Ignis GT second last. I basically just drove the stage at a reasonable pace it would have been a good stage for the little car if all was well as the roads were tight and narrow through the forest. There were a few tricky parts that almost caught us out but fortunately everyone else did the same and run wide so there was plenty of room to get through.
About 5km to go and I couldn't believe it we caught the Suzuki and basically almost crawled the last few kms in. As it turned out checking times with some of the others we still did a reasonable time. After this we had an hour for service so we had Troy sort out the CV boot again and send us on our way. This time we asked to go back in front of the Suzuki as we knew even driving slowly we would still be faster.
The first half was good fun and a little quicker, but as the stage got rougher the rear end was really suffering and I was very conscious of losing the spring which was just hanging in there. No point to push it so I backed off a little for the second half. Just as I did this the front started to get a little less controllable and rear was really suffering. Another KM down the track and it finally happened the front tyre blew. Nowhere to stop so I just had to drive out on the flat for the last 6-8km very slowly.
I kept watching for the Suzuki but it just never came anyway, finally got to the end and changed the wheel over, the tyre was totally stuffed as you can imagine, but at least the rear spring was in tact! Another quick spanner check to make sure we can do the final 270km tour down to Noosa and off we go.
By this time its about 3.30pm and we expected to make Noosa by about 6pm.Well, they had us on a scenic' route, which really translated to lots of farmers on small roads going slow and very few chances to overtake! Also along the way the exhaust started to get louder as the flange had come loose we were starting to fall apart, the Astra was looking and sounding very second hand by now.
We finally arrived at the Sheraton Noosa around 7pm. Lots of work tonight we changed all the tyres to a new set for the run home, had new springs and did a complete spanner check to give us more confidence of finishing. The Astra is basically a road car off the showroom floor with a roll cage, decent shocks, a few bash plates and some rally seats, belts and tyres. Considering what it is and what it has been put through its quite amazing its still going really, when you look underneath the car you just cant believe anyone could do this much damage, but, we are still going. We are now in survival mode to make it to the end tomorrow is the biggest competitive stage at 55km so we will be listening for every strange noise and backing off at the slightest thing we deem out of place. Tonight pizza and beers as we fix the car followed by another reasonably early night as we start at 7am again tomorrow. I wonder what Noosa really looks like this time of year??
