Our Adventures on the Great Central Road

 

Hi Everyone,

Well we have packed up our van & left Kalgoorlie!!!!!!!!

Our last week was spent doing final packing up:

Nearly there

Ready to go!

& of course we had a few drinks with friends in the park.

Kerry & Steve

With our good friends Cheryl & Tony - we will miss them Dearly:(

Cheryl & Tony's

Precious Grandaughter!

We spent Friday night at the free camp in Kal so that we could make a quick get away Saturday morning, & that we did.

We were both awake at 4am so decided to head off at 4.30 J

We headed up to Leonora then across to Laverton - the road was excellent - much better than the Great Eastern Hwy!

We arrived in Laverton at 9am - just in time for the Great Beyond Tourist Info Centre to open.

Great Beyond Tourist Centre Laverton

All set to go!

We called in here as we had to get our permits to cross the “Great Central Road”

Then we were off on our big “Off Road” Trip 1098 Kms of dirt road.

The Start

Letting down the tyres!

The first bit of the road was pretty bad with corrigations, we were down to 40kmh in some places.

But then it got much better & we were able to enjoy the scenery without bouncing around too much.

The scenery changed all the time - even the colour of the road!

Red road

White road!

From this

To this

This

To This!

We only saw 3 kangaroos & 1 Emu, but we did see lots of the elusive Camels J which we were very happy about as up until now we had never seen them in the wild.

This is the first few we seen on our first day:

They were just on the side of the road

& didnt seem to mind having there photo taken!

Our 1 & only water crossing:

OK So it wasnt a big water crossing!!

But there was some water in the river

We spent Saturday Night at the Tjukayirla Roadhouse. We arrived at 2.50pm to be told by the owner that they were shutting at 3! Lucky us as the brochure said they shut at 6! So we filled up with diesel & Booked into the Caravan Park. We were the only caravan but there was about 6 camper trailers.

We were amazed how many people drove in after us and had to drive off. There was a sign on the door that said a $20 fee would be charged for after hours call outs! I guess no-one wanted to pay that!

We spent the afternoon checking over the car & van to see if we had any damage, We had snapped off a fitting on 1 water tank - lost 70 ltrs water, buggar! We also had a damaged mud flap & found a dead Owl trapped under the car that we had in about 5am that morning - YUK!

That night we got woken up about 2am by Dingoes howling - it sounded like we had 1 each side of the van! That was certainly different!

We left early the next morning as we knew that the next roadhouse at Warakuna shut at 3pm.

The drive was very good more great scenery:

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And  Lots more Camels:

Single

& In Herds

Pairs

& Grazing!

We even seen a bush fire that come pretty close to the road:

We called into Warburton to get fuel - boy was that an eye opener! Wouldn’t recommend anyone staying there. There was even a sign at the roadhouse saying photo’s were prohibited!

We arrived at the Warakuna Roadhouse at about 2.20pm & were very surprised to find it all shut! We walked over to the door to read the sign which clearly said it shut at 3pm! Then we noticed that it said all W.A. travellers should put there watches forward 1 1/2hrs as they run on S.A. Time! IT would have been a big help if this was written in the brouchure!

There was a $20 call out fee for fuel, but if you wanted a site you could walk to the managers office - which we did.

We set up camp, but of course we missed out on the Giles Weather Station Tour which started at 4pm! - Not happy!

So we had a few quiet drinks!

Our Campsite

Cheers!

A Beautiful Full Moon

Next Morning we got fuel & headed off again towards Ullaru. Once we got onto the N.T. side on the Great Central it was really badly corrugated again!

First time our van has been in NT!

Photo’s were very limited due to the bumps, but there was some wildlife to see - horses at Docker River.

A mare digging for water for her foal

A heard running across the road

Another Camel:

We had lunch at Lassiter's Cave campground:

Lassiter's Cave

We could see the Olga's off in the distance:

Just beautiful!

 Then before we knew it - it was the end of the Great Central Road & back to Bitumen, so time to pump up the tyres:

& off to Ayers Rock!

We really enjoyed the Great Central Road, but we wouldn’t recommend it for any other caravans other than Full Off Road Vans. We hope you enjoyed the post,

Cheers, Dave & Shell