Thread: Bundalenes Daughters 130 repair job

Day 3 of our trip

We swagged it under the stars but were awoken at about 4.30am when it started to rain - huge freezing drops of rain. There was a choice of putting up shelter, sleeping in the back of the 130, sleeping under the 130, or driving on. I was feeling quite refreshed and declded to drive, letting Andrew have a nap.

We stopped about 2 1/2 hours later, at a roadside stop 45kms out of Threeways where we boiled the billy for a nice hot coffee and cooked breakfast. The weather was still bloody freezing, for the Barkley.




Our stop before Threeways. The gas cooker can be seen in the lee of the rear tyre



We drove on through Threeways, Elliot, Dunmarra. Mataranka. 'the Gove turn off', Katherine, Pine Creek and on to Darwin, arriving there at a bit after 4.00pm. We went through a severe rain storm on the outskirts of Palmerston, one of the heaviest I have ever encountered. We had to hurriedly close the vents into the rear. Other than that, the only leak was onto the drivers accellerator foot, because of a hole through the firewall which we forgot to plug (The spot where the cable used to go before the drive by wire accellerator.

We met Sharon and Alfred at the Palmerston turnoff.

Sharon had booked us a cabin at the Lee Point Caravan Park, which was quite nice. The next morning we went to the Shaws Transport depot to pick up Alfred's new Honda quad. They bought the quad in Perth and had it trucked up to Darwin. There were no similar quads available locally and also it was far more cost effective.


Day 4

Unbeknown to us the quad was wrapped and packed in a framed container, which was too large to fit onto the trailer. We had to dismantle the crate and re-pack it on the trailer.


Due to repacking the quad we were a bit late leaving the Shaws depot in Darwin, then had to drop off Alfred & Sharon's hire car, pick up all their stuff from the hotel, pick up a few more supplies before heading south towards the Gove turnoff (the Bulman track) which is about 4 hours south of Darwin

We got to the turn off a bit before 5.00pm. a bit late to be tackling the road really, but what the heck, we had a few willing experienced drivers. Gapuwiyak is a bit over 500kms from the turn-off, all but the first 55kms are dirt road.



I have travelled this road over 20 times and know a lot of the pitfalls, so decided to drive the first leg to the Minarou River. As it turned out there had been about 4 inches of rain in much of this area, so the drive was quite interesting, with many washouts and huge puddles.

An intersting thing was as we approached the Minarou, we could see several fresh water crocodiles swiming very close to the actual causeway over the river.

Due to poor light we took no pics of the road in, but it would have been interesting. At times the muddy water off the road came streaming down off the roof after going through large culvits amd streams. There were literally hundreds of them. The Goyder river crossing, which closes this track for up to 6 months of the year, was a non event.

After several driver changes, we got onto Gapuwiyak at about 12.30 (NT time) or about 2.00am Sydney time - which we were still on.

Day 5


A few pics of the car at Sharon and Alfred's after the trip in.









The inside of the tray was absolutely spottless - no dust or mud. Yes, a third of the track in was thick dust as the rain was patchy.






The 130 went like a dream from Sydney, yes we had a few hick-ups, all in areas which we didn't work on, other than the wheel nut issue.

We made it up here on pretty good time - almost 5,000kms in 4 days including a stack of crook dirt road, leaving us with a lot of free time. Sharon and Alfred had taken the rest of the week off so there was heaps of time for exploring. Our flight back to Sydney wasn't for another 6 1/2 days

To be continued ....................

Erich

Day 8


This was a huge day. We were lucky enough to be invited down to Balma on Blue Mud Bay over 100kms to the south east on some indifferent roads and tracks.(Google this for a location). This is one of my favourite spots in all Australia, probably because of how the locals make us so welcome.

We left around 8.00am and the roads / tracks required a lot of concentrating. Here are a few stretches of the 105 km drive

The first few pics were taken from the back seat while on the move








The road surface varied from sand to bush track to buffalo wallows to detours around fallen trees and mud holes etc - hard to get over 40kms per hour








Sharon and Alfred raise many orphaned wallaroos and wallabies. The one which came with us on the back seat of the car was on 4 hourly feeds of Wambaroo a special roo milk supplement. They have 4 altogether, 2 antilopine wallaroos and 2 agile wallabies. They have also released quite a number over the last few years in a sanctuary near Batchelor







Buffalos are a constant distraction when driving - We hit one earlier this year and were VERY lucky with the outcome. On this run to Balma we saw lots, some even wallowing in mud holes in the middle of the road as the next 2 photos depict. They are especially unpredictable when driving at night. You can actually smell them before you see them. When driving through their wallow the stench is extremely intense and once smelt you will never forget it.




Another wallow - there were many of these on the road







The road from Gapuwiyak to Balma is actually the Numbulwar road (Google it). About halfway between the Koolatong river and the Balma turn off is a massive sinkhole. When we first saw this years ago we were totally blown away. You can drive right up to this and not realise it is there. I guess this is way over 50 meters down to the water level. This is a sacred site to the locals and their permission should be sought before going here (permission is rarely denied)














Balma is an out station of Gapuwiyak about 1 hours drive from Blue Mud Bay itself - that is now in the build up to the wet season. In the dry season it is a15 minute drive.

We stopped here and caught up with some good friends, Shane and Leonie and their 2 children. They live out here most of the year. This is a community with about 10 buildings and is solar powered with about 100 panels and a reasonable battery bank. There is also a stand-by generator. In the wet season supplies have to be flown in, quite a cost to the community.






We tried to get out to a good barra spot where we did very well last year but an early start to the wet season put paid to that. There was a lagoon across the road and the bypass track was thick mud as far as you could see. So we decided to go to the bay via several detour tracks. Andrew has the pics of this road - track




We dropped a line in on the way out to the bay but didn't try hard, Here is a pic of a reasonabbly clean 130




Blue Mud Bay literally - nothing special to look at




Andrew and Shane looking for a few mud crabs





We caught plenty of these and ate well that night






The pre-arranged plan was to go out in Wesley's (Shanes dad) boat but time and winds were against us, this will have to wait until next time.




We went back to Balma and got there just on night fall. Here we had chicken on the barby, a huge feed of Mudcrab and damper with golden syrup for dessert - what a night. We then drove back to Gapuwiyak and got back quite late.

To be continued ............

Erich