Monday the 4th of July, we headed south 25 km to Lyndhurst to fuel up. The instructions for the automated fuel station required us to download an app called FuelCharge, and even though my mobile showed 4 bars, it still took nearly 10 minutes to download. Unlocking the bowser was reasonably straightforward after putting our Mastercard details in. The fuel was @$2.59 PL.
I inquired at the pub opposite the fuel outlet as we had been told that the bitumen stretched some considerable distance and was surprised to be told that the first 76 km was sealed.
We stopped at the "Dog Fence" rest area to reduce tyre pressures before continuing onto the dirt.
The track was quite stoney but with few corrugations. We came upon two grader drivers who were working on the track. We've often found that graders tend to bring the stones to the surface on their first pass, and over the next 40 km, the track was quite stoney.
We were initially going to camp at Blanchwater Ruins.
But after making such good time because of the sealed section, we just stopped in for a photo before continuing onto Montecollina Bore for the evening. The bore has now been capped, and the camping area is quite vast. Two more groups arrived after we arrived to spend the evening.
There were no fires tonight as the wind was quite strong and cold. I put the drone up the following morning to take some sunrise shots even though the wind was starting to pick up. The camping area and surrounding countryside are pretty sandy, and some of the small outcrops of sand remind us of the luna scapes found in Mungo National Park.
We left just at 9 am and soon passed the turnoff to Merty Merty and the road that eventually leads to Cameron Corner and onto Tibooburra. With just 40 km to travel to Moomba, we encountered road crews laying bitumen. The lollipop lady had us stopping while trucks ahead were moving back and forth, laying a white sheet before putting down the tar.
We stopped briefly at the Moomba lookout catching up on emails and making calls as our phones were using the tower at the gas field.
The road for the next 53 km heading east from Moomba was the worst condition we'd experienced since reaching the dirt yesterday. The road would have been at least 60 metres wide, and the corrugations covered all the surface, so it was fun trying to find the best line to take whenever no road trains were approaching.
Once we turned north for the final 49 km, run into Innamincka, the road, while still dirt and recently resurfaced with new dirt, and was like driving on a highway.
We had planned to camp on the Innamincka town common, but because the Cooper was in flood and the causeway was underwater, the camping area was closed. We found a site without a view of the creek or its magnificent river red gums and were camped in the bulldust, which wasn't ideal, so we decided we would leave the following day.
Before leaving home, we'd picked up a tec screw in one of the tyres that we had plugged and then put it back on the van, and when we woke the following day, Ros commented that something wasn't quite right with the van and low and behold the very same tyre was flat again.
Lucky, I had all the necessary items to change the tyre in the bulldust, like the large tarp and the jacking plate, to ensure the jack didn't disappear into the dirt. Luckily we still had 60 litres in jerry cans that I emptied into the Chev and thankfully only needed 41 litres to top up the tank as the fuel was @$2.76 PL.
Also checked and found out from the fuel outlet that the 57 km stretch to the QLD border was now sealed since our last visit here in 2019, so I pumped up the tyres to bitumen road pressures before continuing into Queensland.
We were surprised when we arrived at the Wilson River at Noccundra that there were only a few vans here, although more did come later in the day and even more the following day.
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