Dowling-Dinosaur-Diamantina-Desert-Darling Trip

[Frankrhona]

The "Six D and one T" Trip
This is our first long trip for our recently acquired 2006 Canning. We named the trip after the route we were taking: Dish, Dowling, Dinosaur, Diamantina, Desert and Darling.
We left home in Picton on the 29th August 2013 loaded with fuel, food and water and headed to Forbes then on to Bourke via the "Dish" out of Parkes. The Tvan fully laden behaved superbly on the tar behind the Patrol and settled in to a comfortable 95km/hr.
From Bourke we headed up the Dowling Track through Hungerford, Thargomindah and Toompine to Quilpie. In Thargo we crossed paths with the Lisa Curry Aussie Roadtrip, travelling around Qld trying to get mums healthy. Just before Quilpie we turned off to Baldy Top for a panoramic view. From Quilpie we continued on to Welford National Park , near Jundah, where we found a good camp at Little Boomerang Waterhole, on the banks of the Barcoo River. The Tvan was easy to tow on the dirt at +80km/hr and whilst the stones were flying we incurred little damage so far. We saw a huge number of kangaroo's , emu's, goats and pigs and the numerous roadkill was a indicator of the drought conditions. Our Waeco fridge had been short cycling and running the auxiliary battery down.
Then it was on to Longreach to do the tourist bits: Stockman's Hall of Fame, (OK); Qantas Founders Museum, (Great). Early Septemberis the tail end of the "Grey Nomad" season and with caravan parks full we stayed in Apex Park for free. We visited the fridge doctor to learn the compressor oil had got up into the capillaries: verdict, 3 days to fix, cost 2/3 of a new fridge and it could still be problematic!! It was off to find a new fridge. After being told they only sold Engels in Longreach we eventually found Auto-One sold Waeco's. However, we were still thwarted. The new CFX-50 has thicker insulation and wider than our CF-50 and would not fit into the purpose built storage in the back of the Patrol. Off down to the Engel agent and $1500 later it fitted like a glove. We still needed to do some modifications, with the compressor located at the other end, the storage needed to be modified to get more air flow. A temporary job was done until we got home.
Winton was our next stop to see the Matilda Centre, (Excellent), and we camped in Bladensburg National Park. This was the furthest north we travelled and the country was looking very dry, with no rain since January. Travelling SW we visited Lark Quarry and the Dinosaur stampede, (one big Dino and a lot of little ones). We camped near Old Cork on our way to the Diamantina Lakes. We had anticipated staying here awhile, but it was so dry the lakes had been reduced to muddy waterholes. We left and headed over to Bedourie, staying in the local camping area, we made good use of showers and washing machine to wash the dust off and a beer at the local to wash it down. Most refreshing!
We still had problems with the auxiliary battery and the spare Anderson plug I bought in Longreach proved handy. I made up a short lead and plugged the fridge into the Tvan battery when we stopped for the rest of the trip. This proved successful with the fridge running 24/7. When we got home a hydrometer found one cell dead in the battery and it was replaced under warranty.
From Bedourie we headed for Birdsville arriving on race day, Saturday 7th Sept. A trip out to climb Little Red for Clare, a drink at the pub and one race was enough of the crowds for us. We headed down the Birdsville track and turned off towards Walkers Crossing to camp. The narrow Walkers Crossing track was criss-crossed with superhighways supporting the many gas wells.
After the disappointment of the Diamantina we were off to Coongie Lakes via Innamincka. Absolutely fabulous two days camping on the water's edge with the lakes full of bird life and good to cool off in.
Back to Innamincka we did a circuit to the Dig Tree, Burke and Wills graves and stayed at Cullyamurra Waterhole before passing through Innamincka for a third time on our way to Cameron's Corner. The drive down the Old Strzelecki track was sensational with the Tvan hanging out a little on the fast sandy turns. We had picked up a bad load of fuel in Innamincka and needed to stop every half hour to empty dirty water out of the fuel filter. We continued doing this into the following day when I fitted the one spare filter we had and all was good again. The irony is I had packed a "Mr Funnel" funnel for filling fuel in remote areas and did not use it, a lesson for next time!
We crossed 215 sand dunes from Merty Merty to Cameron's Corner and completely missed seeing the yellow double decker bus at Bollards Lagoon! Into NSW and through the jump-up country in Sturt National Park offered another change of scenery and wildlife. The drought conditions were not as severe here with a green pick to be found. We meandered down through Tibooburra, White Cliffs and east to the Paroo Darling National park and Lake Peery. On our way we bush camped near Salt Lake between Tibooburra and Packsaddle. Just before we turned off we passed our first and only sighting of another Tvan, (with red and black mural on its side)! By radio we found they were from Adelaide and on their way to Coongie Lakes, (the "one T" in the trip name).
Somewhere near here we got some contamination in one of the stove jets and despite tapping the burner, it remained a low flame for the remainder of the trip.
From the Paroo we headed down to the Tilpa Pub on the Darling River then on to Trilby Station. On the way we passed through a huge mob of cattle in the "long paddock" heading south out of Queensland and later we stopped amongst a mob of 100+ emu's that crossed the road in front of us at a leisurely pace. Trilby was a fabulous stay on a working property, camping on the banks of the Darling River in amongst huge river red gums and entertained by goats and pelicans! We left Trilby behind and travelled through Louth and back to Bourke to catch the "Back of Bourke" show. Staying once again at the Kidman Caravan park and enjoyed the "Jandra" paddlewheel boat ride down the Darling and "Poet on a Plate" evening meal around a campfire.
Our next camp was out on the plains at Burren Junction. This was our first overcast day for the trip and a 38C swim in the artesian bore was great if you didn't have to get out into the cold winds. At 7pm that night a huge front came through. The sides of the tent were pushed in nearly 2 feet and the bungee cords at the base were stretched to their limit. We were rocked around for an hour before the front passed. In the morning we inspected the damage. The Tvan had stood up well with only one of the bungee cords pulling through one of the eyes attached to the tent base. We rethreaded it and changed all the knots to figure of eight. Others had more damage with several bent and twisted awnings.
We were on the way home via the Compact Array near Narrabri, Lake Keepit, Glenbawn Dam and through the wineries to our last night camped behind Wollembi Pub. Our home run was on the dirt down to Wisemans Ferry and back into suburbia.
We had travelled 5865km with 3140km on dirt roads, used 1016 litres of diesel, averaged 17.3 litres/100km and averaged $1.74/ litre bowser price. We left with 110 litre of good Nepean water, filled one 20 litre jerry once for washing up and returned with some left over. Our gas usage was minimal using less than half of one of the two 4kg bottles in 23 days. I will look at having smaller bottles to reduce ball weight in the future.
The stone damage to the back of the Patrol was noticeable, but minimal and the 3mm lexan rear window covers were unscathed. I believe the 10mm thick insertion rubber fitted to the front of the stone deflectors on the Tvan played an important role. However, we need improve the Velcro attachment method for the lexan and review the whole stone protection method. The Tvan mudguards and suspension arms faired worst.
We did get some dust in the Tvan. Half way round we were getting dust in the front locker. On inspection I tightened up all the screws holding the Thetford locker door up 2~3 turns. Although we had no dust in the Kitchen I found its locker door the same. When we got home there was a pile of dust under the carpet that had come up through the water tank well. I have replaced the floor seal and need to look at sealing the external water pipe holes. There are some small holes around the top that seem to serve no purpose other than pressure equalisation that I may seal up as well.
We have a list of small modifications we would make that I will save for another day. Our first major trip in our Tvan was a great success and we loved every minute, (less the storm front)!
Cheers,
Andrew & Clare

[Alpaca]

Andrew and Claire, That's a great report and made good reading. Thanks for going to the effort of submitting it.
Glad everything went well except for the fridge and battery and I suppose the blowy night will be remembered too.
We pulled into Venus Bay a few years ago and the place was nearly empty due to gale warnings. We hardly noticed it in the Tvan but friends in a Candy Canvas set up opted for a cabin the next night. The Tvans just keep on keeping on.
Cheers

Alpaca

[Graham Norfolk]

Fantastic trip report Andrew and Claire, like you we missed the Yellow Bus the first trip across there, there must have been something better to look at around there. The T-Van certainly is a good place to be on a stormy night, we had a storm hit us one night the embers from the fire were travelling up to thirty meters away and apart from a little rocking and rolling the T-Van fared well.
Once again great report.
Cheers
Graham

[Footbrush]

Excellent write up Andrew and Claire.  I have just returned from the Simpson desert myself.  Unfortunately there were three in our convoy and none of them were towing trailers, so with deep regret I left the tvan at home.  We crossed the Simpson on the French line from east to west and it was hot and the sand soft.  I don't know I would have liked to tow the tvan across there anyway. I loved the time away and are keen to go back and visit some of the places you mentioned.  What did you think of the flies.   

[gnome 52]

Hi  Andrew & Claire great report.  The reason you probably missed the yellow bus was because it has been buried !  We were out there in april and wondered why we couldnt find it (we had been there a couple of times before). The locals at Camerons corner store told us that they had recently buried it because it was becoming a problem !!!???  Sounds like you had an enjoyable first outing.   Cheers  Neil

[Ninmoore]

Great trip report guys. Thanx for taking the time to entertain us all.

Shame about Diamantina lakes - we went through there in late June and it was pretty good then. Must have dropped a lot in those few months.