We have planned this trip to coincide with the Victorian State School Holidays.
Most of the driving will be straight forward easy driving, with some challenging driving up the Googs Track (for those who haven’t been on Googs track, Just think Simpson Desert Crossed with Canning Stock Route but on a miniature scale, its a 180 KM track with about 100km of significant sand dune country. Googs track runs from Ceduna in SA up to the east-west rail line. We plan to return to Melbourne down the BORDER TRACK between SA and Vic.
Googs track is now one way south to North and the Border Track is the opposite ie one way North to South, hence that sets the direction of overall travel.
We are towing an offroad camper, a Vista Crossover, which is fairly light and has full offroad suspension, behind a well setup 200 series with plenty of grunt to take the camper over the sand dunes.
The itinerary is as follows
From Melbourne through the Mallee country via Renmark where we get our fresh fruit/Vegs (cant take them xMelb of course)
Cut across to Port Broughton on the Spencer Gulf
Up over the top of Spencer Gulf across to Lucky Bay on the Eyre Peninsula
Across the Eyre Peninsula to Elliston and Venus Bay then up to Ceduna. So far all Black Top stuff.
Then up Googs track taking 3 days, camping at Googs lakes
East along the Trans Rail Access track to Kingoonya dropping down into the Gawler ranges and Lake Gairdner area (of Bluebird fame).
South to Eyre Hwy then east towards SA/Vic Border.
Come down the Border track and home to Melbourne via Western Highway.
We plan on a mixture of some Parks with facilites and some bush camping.
As with any trip you need to Plan but be willing to improvise on the fly to deal with emerging situations.
80% of the driving will be easy, either blacktop or maintained roads. 20% will be more challenging
We are experienced outback travelers having crossed the Simpson 5 times (twice towing), the Canning, The Anne Beadell, The Connie Sue, The Gary Junction, The Gun Barrel, Cape York a few times etc. So we will be able to assist the less experienced with driving advice on any difficult tracks. But we are not 'bush mechanics' so other than advice on vehicle preparation before hand, we won't be able to do running repairs. We ourselves have well maintained and well spec’ed equipment to minimise risk, as we know we are not capable when it comes to the mechanical side.
The trip is family friendly, although none of our 5 children are coming this trip, as only 2 are still at home and they are both off to Canada for the June school holidays.
We have set the meeting point at Sea Lake, a few hours out of Melbourne, People from SA or NSW/QLD could agree a meeting spot along the route somewhere more convenient if coming from the north and break off at an appropriate point to head back North or South.
I plan to hold a pre-trip meet and greet / ask any quesitons 'get together' at Fairfield vic at 8pm on Thursday 1st June 2017 for those who can make that meeting time/place.
Feel free to call me if you want to discuss anything or if you are interested. 0411 220 200 Richard.
Requirement