Thread: Outback Way - additional bitumen

I think sometimes we become too caught up in the new bigger vehicles. In the early seventies my retired neighbor did a drive from Brisbane to northern Western Australia return via the centre in a HR Holden wagon - no caravan just a swag. This in late summer. Now he had grown up out there but on the roads and infrastructure that existed on those roads back in the early seventies compared to today. ….

Originally Posted by 3toes

I think sometimes we become too caught up in the new bigger vehicles. In the early seventies my retired neighbor did a drive from Brisbane to northern Western Australia return via the centre in a HR Holden wagon - no caravan just a swag. This in late summer. Now he had grown up out there but on the roads and infrastructure that existed on those roads back in the early seventies compared to today. ….

Back in the early 70's there wasn't much in the way of 4WD's on the road most of the traffic back then was 2WD.
I did a solo trip from Geraldton to Townsville via the Nullabor and from Townsville back to Geraldton via Mt Isa in 1972 ( I was 18 years old at the time) with a flash fairly new XY Falcon station wagon.

No bullbar, skinny stock tyres, a bit of camping gear and my dog the only drama i had was a busted widscreen that I got fixed at Tamworth.
Lots of dirt roads some wet some dry and the service stations were nowhere as thick on the ground as they are today either , It wasn't that "Tough" to do even back then with only 2 years of driving experiance behind me.
It would be another 10 years or so before I got my first 4WD and in the meantime I did some pretty remote trips on mediocre roads/tracks using various 2WD's and I had a ball doing them.

It IS "Nice" to finally hit the bitumen after travelling on the dirt and I still get a "Buzz" out of this But with all the dirt roads getting a coat of blacktop it is slowly taking the sense of adventure away from road travel.

quote..t has been my observation that as the roads improove the behaviour of those that travel it declines unfortunately and the destinations that once took a bit of effort to get to tend to get trashed as the roads improove.

not my observation, in SA. Bitumen all the way to Roxby Downs.

Bitumen all the way to Marree.

Bitumen all the way to Alice Springs.

The Strezeleckie Track is getting more and more bitumen every year.

Bitumen all the way from Brisbane to Innamincka.

As road conditions improve so do the services from local councils eg rubbish/road kill patrols.

I think it'll be allright.

Some people have always been willing to trash sites no matter how remote.

When I visited the Dig Tree in the early 80s, there was not a lot of bitumen on the way. Most of the vehicles visiting then would have been 4WD.

There was a 200 litre drum (probably a 44 gallon drum back then) placed near the marked tree, I believe by the local station owner.

Not only was the drum full, but the pile of rubbish around it would have filled a couple more drums.

Originally Posted by vnx205

Some people have always been willing to trash sites no matter how remote.

When I visited the Dig Tree in the early 80s, there was not a lot of bitumen on the way. Most of the vehicles visiting then would have been 4WD.

There was a 200 litre drum (probably a 44 gallon drum back then) placed near the marked tree, I believe by the local station owner.

Not only was the drum full, but the pile of rubbish around it would have filled a couple more drums.

Visited the same spot in 79. No bin then and no rubbish that I recall but am sure there would have been the ubiquitous beer bottles everywhere. No protection you could walk up and touch the tree. I believe there is a boardwalk or similar now.
There had a been a couple of floods in the late 70’s and a very big one a think 73/74 were the station staff had to camp in tents for six month on the high ground until the water went down. These would have washed a fair bit of rubbish away.

Was that the flood that washed away the world's biggest pile of empty beer bottles?