Home at last!

After 510 nights away and 47,820 kilometres travelled we are finally home in WA. Still living in a caravan park (daughter rents our house J) till we head off again next year in March.  We have found a lovely Caravan Park right on the Murray River at South Yunderup minutes by boat from the Peel Estuary so have recommissioned my larger tinny and looking forward to getting sick of eating crabs (blue swimmers) and whiting fillets whilst we are home based. Only 15 minutes by road from Mandurah and 25 minutes from home so perfectly positioned. The grandkids have already stayed several times and love the park.

Now for some stats from our recent trip around Oz.  I have kept a Spread sheet running since leaving in May 2011 and have collected all sorts of data:

Stays

·         510 nights away

·         Average cost per night $14.70 for somewhere to park our van

·         Total Expenditure on caravan sites $7,495

·         We stayed at 41 different free camps for a total of 113 nights

·         The most we paid for a caravan site was $54/night which was at Forster during NSW school holidays.

Fuel

·         We travelled a total of 47,820km –most of which was with 2.5 tonne of caravan and roof top tinny attached.

·         Average Litres/100km was 14.93 – which is great considering we were around 5 tonne of moving mass.

·         Average cost to travel 100km was $23.60

·         Average cost per litre was $1.58

·         Highest price for diesel was $2.33/ltr at Kings Canyon!

·         Total spent on diesel was $11,284

Other Stuff

·         Our power and battery management unit in the van failed about ½ through our trip meaning out batteries were never fully charged. Replaced this with a REDARC BMS – great piece of equipment and I have no hesitation of recommending the product.

·         Our in van TV which we purchased just before we left (Grundig LCD) failed twice and we now have our third unit. All covered by warranty by Grundig who were excellent to deal with.  Problem with TV’s was that after some 6 months or so they would not remember the channels scanned when we moved to a new area. This meant that every time we turned the TV from Standby to ON we would have to re-tune all the stations again. A real pain in the butt! New (3^rd )TV provided under warranty seems to be OK after 8 months.

·         We are now on our 3^rd windscreen on our Pajero having copped rocks from other vehicles coming across the Kimberly last year and again travelling through inland QLD this year. All covered by insurance – if your considering travelling around Oz it’s wise to have a windscreen option in your insurance policy as a new screen is upward of $600 fitted.

·         We did a lot of upgrades as we travelled – mainly whilst we were staying at my sisters place in Brisbane:

o   We replaced all existing fluoro and incandescent lights with LED lights

o   We moved the gas bottle holders at the front of the van and installed an aluminium checker plate box for our generator

o   We manufactured an outboard motor stand at the back of the van for my 10HP Tohatsu (thanks to my brothers welding skills)

o   We installed an Airtronic Diesel caravan heater system – bloody great for those below 0C nights of winter.

·         We lost a wheel on our caravan 65km south of Alice Springs – lucky that we have twin axels on our van and we didn’t end up upside down in the gutter. 4 days back in Alice Springs and after $3500 in repairs, parts, towing and emergence accommodation and we were back on the road again. Insurance came good for $2500 which was a relief.

This will be my final blog for 2012 – looking forward to being back on the road again for a planned 2 years in March 2013 at which time I will re-start my travel blog.

To all our friends we met on the road, old friends and family we caught up with, and friends who followed my emails and ramblings over the last 17 months – safe travels if you are still on the road and a Merry Christmas to all from Linda and Kerry.

Bight Me

Happy travellers and Killer the pig dog

We stopped three nights  whilst travelling across the Great Australian Bight from east of Ceduna in SA to Kambalda in WA. This is a long and at times boring drive across the treeless Nullarbor Plains and through scrubby country at either end -  145.6 km without a bend in one section.

 

 

 

 

The section of road that follows the coastline at the start of the Great Australian Bight is by far the most picturesque with those much photographed cliffs and bright blue southern ocean.

Post card stuff!

 We stopped once to view the spectacular sights of the Bight and stayed overnight at the 13km Peg Camp site (by coincidence just 13km east of the WA borderJ). 

 

 

 

 

 

 

on the SA/WA border looking south

Once again we were hounded by strong winds but found a spot where we could light a fire to keep warm.   

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now for a whinge – I now know what SA stands for – it’s SHIT AMMENITIES. 95% of the SA roadside camp sites that we stopped at for a cuppa and occasionally stayed (including those coming down from Alice Springs) do not have toilets or well serviced rubbish points. You pull up at a scenic location only to find every tree, bush and vacant piece of ground covered in toilet paper and rubbish. It’s a brave person who wanders from the camp area as the risk of stumbling onto the dreaded “brown log” is extremely high.  Contrasting this – as soon as we were over the WA border we found camps that had eco toilets, lots and lots of bins, even a couple with dump points and therefore were much cleaner.  I’m not saying all WA roadside camps are like this but most are 100 times better than the SA sites.

The SA Government needs to seriously do something about these sites as it’s the only state we have travelled in that has such poor and dirty facilities. I have logged onto the SA Government web site and put in a complaint – if you too have travelled in SA and found the road side stops below par lodge a complaint on the website http://www.environment.sa.gov.au/About_Us/Provide_feedback and perhaps they may do something about it?