It took a long time to get this trip happening but finally, I was done. The trip from Sydney to Perth across the Nullarbor had been a distant dream and I have been preparing for it. My trip from Sydney to Alice Springs around was 6,000 kms. So I had dropped my plans for a one way trip to Perth and putting the car on a truck for the trip back. I was going to drive back and forth, twice across the Nullarbor. And so I did. What's more, I took an occasional detour to push it over 10,000 kms.
The enforced slower pace towards the end meant I was not too tired. Two weeks in a car seat or a hotel bed seemed to have no after-effects. The food choices on the road could vary. Sometimes, it would be a nice restaurant. A hearty pub dinner and a schooner here and there. With several Ks on the road and a few beers, sleep came a lot easier than usual. If it was late, I was at the mercy of the fast food outlets. I discovered KFC actually did a salad. I had chicken strips and the salad more than once. I did not pack much food this time and even then, I did not use most of it.
On this trip, I used a dashcam - the Garmin Dash Cam 47. I stuck it on the inside of the windshield. The reflection off the inside of the ashboard is a bit of a problem. The memory card fills up in a bit over a day. This meant I had to download it to my laptop and clear the memory card every day. The camera produces a large number of 1 minute clips. This gets a bit annoying to use. There may be utilities out there to make something useful out of it. I ended up using ffmpeg to convert each days's files into a single time lapse video that compressed a 12 hour video into a 6 minute clip. This is handy when I need to track down where I took a particular pic. Just move to the part of the video where I stopped to take the pic and get the onscreen GPS coordinates. Then go to google and find the spot. I also used exiftool to scan through the files and produce a .kml file of coordinates. I could overlay this in googlemaps and see the route I took and hover to see the time I was there. The markers showing the route are in blue and anywhere I stopped are in red. A bit of chicken wire and duct tape (i.e. utilities and batch files), I had a fair amount of information at my fingertips.
One problem is to record any events worth looking at in the video. If you saw a dingo on the road, good luck finding it in a 12 hour video. I got into the habit of using the voice recorded on my phone to record a small voice clip stating the time and what I saw. later, I could use the timestamp on the video to track it down.
I took my Canon EOS 7D DSLR on the trip. I took a mix of photos on the camera and on the phone. The camera photos were higher quality but the phone pictures looked a bit brighter - artifically so. I would take both on the next trip.
For all the hype in my head about the nullarbor, the drive proved eventless. The road is good quality. I was not going off road nor consorting with taipans. Traffic is light but not non-existent. I have come across roads in WA that are far less travelled. And to see roads of poor quality, the trip from Broken Hill to Dubbo were way worse. The 90 mile straight was a good drive - both ways. What is less well known is that it ends with a bend that comes as a big surprise after 146 kms. And it continues for another 88 kms. Below is a video of the entire length of the 146 km plus the 88 km in one and a half minutes. Pretend that I drove down it at 10,000 kmph!
The only car breakdown was the blown tyre outside Wilcannia. It took around $1000 to fix! I never had to resort to the emergency 10 litre petrol jerrycan. The 10 litre water jerrican was also not needed. The trip was on major highways or roads. All accomodation was booked in advance. So it was a pretty smooth trip otherwise. The satellite phone was a godsend or I would have been in big trouble. And the Iridium was a good choice - the Thuraya on the previous trip was next to useless. Cannot believe a torch was not on my essentials list. Well, live and learn.
What next? This was in my mind the ultimate trip. But I can't stop now. On the cards is a drive around in Tasmania. It has to be on my own car, so the plan will be to drive to Melbourne, put me and my car on the Spirit of Tasmania and then drive around in Tasmania, returning the same way. The distances in Tamania are miniscule and the roads windy, so it will be short daily drives. Trying to reach every corner while still sticking to decent roads would be under 2,000 kms, may be over 5 days or so. The whole trip should not take more than 7 days.
For sheer distance, the next step up would be a loop of Australia, covering all mainland state capitals. I estimate it at 14,500 kms, perhaps over a 3 week period. I would like to spend a whole day in each capital if I can.
When? Let us see - last major trip was 2016. There was an Alpine Road trip in 2021. So I would say Tassie in 2026, Aus loop in 2030? And is there some way I can ship my car to New Zealand and go for a drive there? $3,500 to ship the car one-way? No, thanks!
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