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Published: March 26th 2015
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$99 - that's how it happened. $99 fares from Melbourne to Darwin and return, and as soon as I saw the headline on the email I knew that I could travel up to Kununurra to check out the 'Cruiser and say hi to Jake (the friend of Mike and Miranda) who was looking after "our" 4WD Toyota Landcruiser Hitop Camper until we got there.
Previously I had dismissed the idea as absurd (and too expensive) but that headline changed everything - now I could go up and back for less than $1,000 (hopefully).
The people at work thought that I had just gone a little crazier when I told them of my long weekend road trip to end all road trips;
Car to Hobart Airport, Plane from Hobart to Melbourne, Plane from Melbourne to Darwin, Bus from Darwin to Kununurra and return.... easy! About 9,000 kilometres.
The trip commenced late on a Thursday afternoon and I would be back in time for Sunday lunch. I arrived in Darwin around midnight local time and caught the shuttle bus into the Darwin CBD where I had booked a hotel. Took a while to find the night porter at The
Cavenagh but had a good nights sleep (albeit brief because I had to be at the bus stop by 7am). It had rained through the night (it was the wet season and a cyclone was approaching) but I still walked to the bus terminal in the morning. My bus left from the other end of the terminal so I trudged down the road as the rain started to get heavier. There were only three other passengers waiting; a young guy and two young girls, all taking separate trips. Only one of the young girls had good English, Sarah, and seemed inclined to chat so we talked about our reasons for being at the bus interchange station so early in the morning.
Sarah was off to work at Bullo River Station. I think Jillaroo might be the job title - the female equivalent of a Jackaroo. Sarah's brother had previously worked for Bullo. It seems that Sarah's family (from NSW or Qld) are all highly skilled in those attributes required for working on a cattle station; horse riding, cattle herding and the like. There was no hesitancy on Bullo's part to get Sarah on board. Sadly, their offer of sending
Timber Creek stop
Bus and trailer at Timber Creek afternoon tea stop. their plane to collect her from Katherine had to be cancelled due to the bad weather being brought by cyclone Lam (a category 4 cyclone with winds up to 230 kph that devastated parts of NT). Instead, someone from the station was driving in to town (about 300 kilometres each way) to collect Sarah. I said goodbye to Sarah when we had our second stop at Katherine.
After our break at Katherine, the bus drivers switched (we had two on board all of the time so that one could drive while the other rested). Unfortunately, the "new" bus driver had great difficulty in staying on the left hand side of the road, particularly when negotiating bends. This was quite unnerving and it was impossible to relax or sleep.
The bus company had a mail contract and so we made regular stops along the way to drop off and / or pick up mailbags. We travelled westwards after we left Katherine, and our journey included Victoria River and then Timber Creek before we stopped for Quarantine at the WA border. Kununurra (and the turnoff to Lake Argyle) is just over the border.
Jake drove the 'Cruiser into town
Introducing our Toyota Landcruiser
Soon to have a new name but you will have to wait to hear about that.... and I drove back to his place. A storm (fairly common during the wet season) had come through just a few hours beforehand and brought down branches and created small floods. I checked over the 'Cruiser and noted a few things that we would need to organise like tyres. Jake invited me inside to meet Carla and to share a drink before we returned to Kununurra. Back into town and the local motel had Boags beer to make me feel at home. Time for a meal and bed.
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