OK, so we've had the summer at home and done the Christmas thing and all, but I'm getting itchy feet and need to get our next trip organised.
Broome is still there to be done having failed in our attempts last year due to that dodgy gearbox in the X5. That's all fixed, along with the harmonic balancer, and the unit should be good to go. Why would we persevere? Because I'm a firm believer in the devil you know being better than the one you don't, and besides, I just like the thing!
Went to book Broome for July only to find that its fully booked even the overflow. Judy changed our plans so we could be there in June and that is now confirmed. Leaves us with a bit of a dash from Bourke to Broome, but we can take our time coming back across to the coast.
We'd like to get to El Questro but that Pentacost River looks a bit daunting for our van, which is a pretty normal tandem axle 18 footer. We'll have to play that by ear. Hell, we might just park the rig at Kunnanurra and fly out there, that'd be a blast.
Had one small problem to deal with today, namely the 9kg gas bottle we got as a swap&go is somewhat smaller in circumference than the old one and hence, I'll have to do some work on the bottle carriers. actually, it's a mini-saga in itself. Our bottle was the original off the van, dated 2006. I took it to Bunnings and at first one little man told me straight out that they couldn't possibly take mine because it was 'too rusty'. The only rust was a brown patina on the top where the valve goes in, just like everyone else's. I went back inside and down to the other gate where they swapped it with no questions asked. Sadly, the bottle they gave me was from 1996 - 10 years older than mine, which I reckon is a bit much. It wasn't that long ago when no one would even take a bottle more than 10 years old, now they can hand them out when they are 17 years old and expect you to be delighted with the deal. Then I found that the carrier wouldn't clamp up on it because the new ones circumference was 96cm and the old one 104. I took it back and gave them a yarn about the size, found a nice new one and pretended to measure diligently. Finally i selected a 2011 bottle and took that home. It doesn't fit all that well either and I'm going to have to modify the clamp to give it more adjustment.
Oh, and we have a warm up trip to Melbourne in April to see the Australian Grand Prix and visit the flower show. Have to make a few more little shake-down runs to make sure everythings as good as we can get it before the big one.
Cheers for now
Brian
