More About Camping

The Kimberley Trek

In June / July 2003 we started our next adventure with friends from Melbourne and Sydney. We left for an exciting trip to The Kimberley. We left from Victoria, travelled to Coober Pedy, Alice Springs, went north then up the Tanami Track, past Wolfe Creek Crater to Hall Creek.

Then we drove to the Bungle Bungles, just incredible to visit. After that we went westerly back past Halls Creek headed for Fitzroy Crossing, Broome, Cape Leveque, Derby and did the Gibb River Road, stayed at Bell Gorge, Old Mornington Camp, Mount Barnett Roadhouse, Manning Gorge & ElQuestro.

Then we went to Kunnunarra & Lake Argyle, to Katherine and south down the Stuart Hwy to home. It took 6 weeks and we travelled about 10,000kms.

This was a great trip we saw so much in a very short time and all of it was spectacular, we didn’t get to see it all so we hope to go back sometime.

Houseboat Holiday

A couple of years later we had a week on a houseboat near the junction of the Murray and the Darling Rivers near Wentworth NSW. This was quite a different holiday, much more relaxing, we moved the houseboat each day which usually took a couple of hours.

So then we could relax, go fishing either off the back or in the ‘tinnie’ fishing boat we towed along with us. We could go for walks along the banks, have a sleep, and play games with the kids, whatever we wanted to do. We had the comfort of getting inside if it was cool outside and a big kitchen, also had a BBQ on the back deck.

The first night we watched a DVD of the ‘Eagles’ sitting up on the rooftop of the houseboat, which was very cool. Sometimes the kids would play ball on the roof and the ball would go overboard so my eldest son would jump in the fishing boat and go and fetch it. Any excuse to drive the boat was a good one!

When the week was over we said we must do it again, which hopefully will be in 2010.

Eastern Central Australia 4WD Tour

In July 2008 my family and our friends from Sydney did a 4WD tour of Central Australia. In 2000 we did the western side including Uluru, Olgas, Mereenie Loop etc. So this time we did all the eastern side of Central Australia and drove as much as we could on gravel roads.

We met at Mildura Vic, the first night we stayed at Hawker, the next day we travelled to William Creek Hotel. This hotel is typical of most Outback pubs with anything and everything hanging on the walls, We camped out the back in the campground with quite a few other campers.

The next day, we stayed at Mount Dare then travelled to Finke and drove on the Old Ghan Railway, which was quite an 4WD adventure as it is mostly sand or quite rough, some of the buildings wre still intact so they were interesting, we got through without any trouble. We then travelled to Chambers Pillar, Stayed at Alice Springs for a few days to catch up with the shopping and went to the Royal Flying Doctor Service Visitors Centre which was very interesting.

We left Alice Springs travelled north to the Plenty hwy to Boulia and south to Birdsville, which we stayed for a few days, which was our favourite town with quite a few things to do, like visiting Birdsville Hotel several times, seeing the start of the Simpson Desert, visited the Working Museum, had a look at the race track and more.

Next we went to Innamincka and camped on the banks of Coopers Creek for several days. Near Innamincka is where Burke and Wills started and finished heir trek so there was a lot of historical places to visit. There is not a lot at Innamincka which is very typical of outback towns, the hotel and general store is the main stop for every traveller so it was usually quite a busy.