When we set off this morning from Oodnadatta the section of track from Hamilton to Mt Dare was open to '4wd only' - with a caution to take care with water still being on this road.
Well what an adventure that was !! And let me tell you - that is an understatement!!
You get the impression we are in the middle of "nowhere" yet???
For Moores and myself - both novices to the world of 4wd - this proved to be good test of our ability to drive our Hilux to its capabilities.
Neither of us have driven through mud, or through sand, before - but we are driving a vehicle made for such terrain and were in good hands with all the guys in the trip with us very willing to give us guidance where/ when required.
Here we are at a fork in the road. How many does it take to work out which we we should go.
Eventually we managed to get a girl from the local homestead on the UHF radio and asked her which track was in the best condition. She was very helpful as people often are out here.
Today we went through sections that ranged from a bit wet and soft to totally churned over slushy mud along the tracks to get to Mt Dare Hotel.
Several times the lead car (the very experienced Neil - my nephew) would be heading off checking out old side tracks, or making new ones, to try and find a way around the mud.
We preferred not to go through the mud sections if we could avoid it - both for our cars and the risk of getting bogged - but also to preserve the integrity of the track as it dried out. Other people were not so thoughtful in their travels travels along these tracks and were just heading straight through for the thrill and challenge of it.
This slowed our progress quite a lot - but we all made it through without anyone getting bogged.
Towards the end of this journey as we got closer to Mt Dare the track worsened considerably and we took an hour and half to go just 11 km.
There were some pretty hairy side tracks and some more worrying sections where we had to go just straight through the extremely muddy patches of track.
Numerous times would see us having to get up momemtum snd then enter the muddy patch and finding that it still had quite a lot of,water content - so the muddy water splashed all over the windscreen and you could not even see where you were going - so you are trying to negotiate the mud and also keep on washing the windscreen at the same time.
As we approached the last couple of km into Mt Dare hotel we encountered our worst patch of mud for the entire day - it was a very long stretch of boggy mud and it extended right up to the front gate of the entrance to the Hotel property.
This was particularly interesting to negotiate as it was a hard right turn (90degrees) into an entrance width not greatly wider than our vehicles.
The owners at Mt Dare tell us that they have had a metre of water upto the front gate a week ago - when all the recent rains were coming across South Australia.
Fortunately we all made it into Mt Dare hotel safely and without anyone getting bogged.
Well Neil did come to a standstill in the mud - but he insisted he was "just parked" - and since there was no digging or assistance required to free him ( he managed to drive the Prado out eventually) it was rated - as technically "Nit a bog". Lucky escape Neil!!
Not surprisingly the cars are now filthy with caked on mud absolutely everywhere on them.
Moores drove a lot of the last section as I was not feeling too confident at one point of being able to get the car through a particularly bad patch of mud.
She did a great job getting us the rest of the way in the worsening track conditions - so since we had to face the same road out of Mt Dare Hotel again the next morning upto the turn off to Dalhousie Springs - she was given the job of getting us to Dalhousie.
On our arrival at Mt Dare Hotel - I had a Bourbon & Coke to settle my nerves - after this experience of driving in the mud today!!
We did manage to clean the windows a bit - using a squeegee provided and a bathtub of bore water- not exactly clean - but did the job.
We camped at Mt Dare tonight - where we had nice hot showers and a good campground.
We purchased our required Desert Park passes ($150 / vehicle) fuelled up our cars and filled any extra jerry cans that some of the guys were carrying - ready to head off again early the next morning.
Neil my nephew was charged with a very important task - he was asked by the owner of Mt Dare Hotel to deliver a parcel to the Birdsville Hotel. So we were now part if the outback mail delivery system!!!
That's how they get things done out here.
So we had together through to Birdsville now - no matter what!! We had to get the mail through!!!!
The fuel price for Diesel here was $2.40/ Litre. Not too bad really when you consider you are on the edge of the Simpson Desert in the middle of 'nowhere'.
Note!! ----- They did bit have a rim at Mt Dare to fit the Ford Ranger!!!!----
