Outback Adventures – Cairns to Darwin

The distance from John o’Groats in Scotland to Land’s End in Cornwall is 873 miles and during that journey you would travel through countless towns and cities. Well we’ve just travelled 1533 miles across what I can only compare to a desert and during that time I could count the number of towns we passed through on one hand.

We knew the journey from Cairns to Darwin was going to be entirely different to anything we had ever experienced but I don’t think we quite appreciated the magnitude of it. The Savannah Way is a mixture of sealed and unsealed roads (that’s the blue line on the map!) We followed that all the way from Cairns to Cape Crawford (with a little detour down to Lawn Hill National Park), we then headed on the red route to Daly Waters, then the yellow/blue route up to Darwin.

Before we left civilisation we stocked up on over a weeks worth of tinned and dried food and thank God we did! We visited one singular ‘supermarket’ the whole trip and the prices were rather creative to say the least. Hank does have a little fridge, but it isn’t the coldest so we can’t keep meat or milk etc for longer than a couple of days.

There is no way I can write a day by day run down of our trip because most days were filled with hours and hours of driving and to be honest the days have completely blended into one.

What we learnt…

One major thing we learnt never to trust Google maps for timings in the outback! For example, for a 320km (198 miles) stretch of road Google told us it would take 13 hours. It took us just under 4.

Another new thing we learnt was that it isn’t weird to wave at a car passing on the other side of the road like they are your long lost best friend and it definitely isn’t weird to get pissed off when people don’t wave back (rude!)

The majority of people we encountered on the road were lovely. If we were ever pulled over at the side of the road, anyone passing would slow down to check we were ok and the help and support we received from other campers when it all really did to wrong was amazing. (We will get to that later!)

The road for the most part was pretty straight, orange and repetitive but it was still pretty cool. There was a ton of roadkill. If we went 200m without seeing a dead kangaroo I would be surprised. We made sure we never drove between dawn and dust (when they are most active) to try and avoid hitting one. The 30 degree heat at midday still didn’t stop a few of them, a wild pig and a dingo from jumping/running across the road in front if us on more than one occasion though!

There were also hundred of thousands of cattle grazing by the side of the road and lots of birds of prey, including some eagles, that we also had to avoid!

Day 1 – Mareeba to Mount Garnet –131km (1hr30) – Mount Garnet Petrol Station – free camp with hot showers!

Just a short journey today as we spent the day stocking up on any last minute essentials in Atherton (and eating McDonalds)

Day 2 – Mount Garnet to Leichardt Lagoon Campground (just outside of Normanton)- 493km – 6 hours – sealed road – $8pp unpowered, no drinking water available but the was hot showers

Our first real day on the road ended with the most beautiful sunset. The sunset was followed by the most incredible sky of stars I have ever seen.

Day 3 – Leichardt Lagoon to Burketown 273km – 3.5 hours – unsealed road – Tirrana Springs Roadhouse $12pp plus $10 for power

Our first day off roading and Hank did amazingly. We stopped off at Lecihardt Falls. It is currently the dry season in far north Queensland. During the wet, the entire falls area (and probably the whole road) would be filled with insane amounts of water. It was so interesting to walk across what would normally be the river bed.

Day 4 – Burketown to Lawn Hill National Park (via Gregory) 189km – 3.5 hours – sealed road to Gregory then unsealed to the NP – Adels Grove $20pp unpowered

Adels Grove is basically like a little holiday resort in the middle of the outback. It has a restaurant, bar, fish and chip shop, canoes for hire, cabins etc and because of this, they know they can charge silly money! There is one other campsite in the area run by the National Park but it was fully booked (and I hear that is a usual occurrence) so we had no choice but to stay there.

We arrived earlier than expected, so spent the afternoon canoeing down the creek (and trying not to drown each other!)

Day 4 – No driving today we had a day off exploring Lawn Hill National park.

We have become pretty avid hikers during our time in Aus and decided to take the harder Upper Gorge Walk track. It was pretty difficult, with a little scrambling up and down rocks but it was worth it for these views!

We also got to go swimming (though we were a tiny bit apprehensive due to the fact freshwater crocs live there!)

When we got back to camp we treat ourselves to fish and chips from the takeaway in the camp. It wasn’t Whitby fish and chips but after a few days of noodles it was pretty damn good!

Day 5 – Lawn Hill National Park to Hells Gate Roadhouse – 185km – 2.5 hours – mainly unsealed – Hells Gate Roadhouse $12pp unpowered

We took a different route on the way out of Lawn Hill and as we staring at a junction trying to decide which way to go (as there were no signs!) Our knights in shining armour pulled up beside us and showed us the way. To our left was a gate, that went into a cattle station and to our right a little road that disappeared off into the distance. Surely it was right, right? Nope! It was off through the cattle station, several gates and a couple of rivers and it was awesome. I have also never seen so my cows in my entire life. Luckily only one or two decided they wanted a head to head fight with Hank.

Day 6 – Hells Gate to Borroloola (the day it all went wrong) – 317km – 4 hours – unsealed – McArthur River Caravan Park

We set off this morning feeling a little apprehensive as travellers coming the opposite way told us that this section of road wasn’t in great condition. The plan was to take it slow and steady and just get there in one piece.

Right up to the Northern Territory border it was fine. A little bull dust (which is basically holes in the dirt track that have been filled in with tons of dust and sand, so they’re slightly camouflaged) but not too bad! We got out and did the typical border snap and got on our way.

Matt drove half way and I drove the other. It was pretty rocky from the border onwards to say the least! Hills, tons of bull dust, lots of corrugation and a pretty deep river crossing.

We were so proud of ourselves when we arrived at the campsite, we made it without popping a tyre and that was our last bit of off roading before Darwin. Yes. I got out, paid at the camp office, got back in and we pulled up at our spot. Matt usually puts the tent up and I thought he was joking when he looked up and said “Lauren what is missing?” My heart fell into my arse when I looked up and saw that Hank had been shaved bald. The cross bars, the 6ft long rack, the awning and the 50kg roof top tent were gone. The roof was bare. The people in the camp next door thought we were joking.

After, a couple of seconds of pure disbelief we burst into action (luckily managing to remember to get fuel before we set off). We stopped everyone that past driving the direction we had originally came and the responses to our ‘erm have you seen a roof top tent in the middle of the road’ varied from a straight out ‘no’ to ‘the couple of Land Cruisers ahead took the tent and rammed it into the back of their car’. At that point I burst into tears, we had already asked the drivers of the Land Cruisers if they had seen anything and they said flat out ‘no’. I was just stunned at how people could be so cruel. Through our investigations we had gathered that it was around 100km back and were convinced by another couple not to bother to try and find it because the major part was long gone and the rest was probably mangled.

Devastated we turned back around and drove back towards the camp. We came to the conclusion that the Landcruisers must have stopped at either our camp in Borroloola or the one another 100km or so down the road. Do we go and confront them?

At that moment, we regained signal and a message request came through on my phone. It was the owner of the first Land Cruiser who told me they hadn’t seen anything telling me that actually, their friends (who were directly behind on the road) had indeed picked it up and they had left it at the local police station. Fishy at best (I assume they suddenly grew a conscience) but we gave them the benefit of the doubt. (Also how they found me on Facebook is a total mystery).

We collected the tent from the police station. It’s a little battered. But seems to be ok. We procariously rachet strapped it to the roof and returned to camp to great cheers from our fellow camp mates. The majority of people we had asked on the road were camped near by and everyone else in the camp somehow knew about our little mishap.

We set the tent down on the floor (no need for the ladder!) Went and bought some beers and tried to plan our next steps.

We phoned around multiple mechanics and nobody could help us and there was no parts available until Darwin. We would have to limp to Darwin and hope and pray the rachet straps worked.

Day 7 – Borroloola to Daly Waters – 390km – 4 hours – sealed – Daly Waters Historic Pub – $24 unpowered

We managed to limp to the famous Daly Waters pub! I made Matt drive the whole way because I was too scared. Well done Matt.

The pub was rammed but the beer was cold and welcome. They had a family circus (who were actually fantatsic) and a band on that evening and the atmosphere was great.

Again we slept in our floor top tent and got some mighty funny looks.

Day 8 – Daly Waters to Darwin- 590km – 6.5 hours – sealed – Down Under Hostel on Harriet

We had so many more awesome spots planned between Daly Waters and Darwin but unfortunately due to the tent situation they needed to wait. Luckily we need to head out the same way to get to Broome so we will get there eventually.

Luckily we made it in one piece (kind of).

Now to save up some money to get the damn thing fixed and get back on the road. We are coming for ya West Coast!