Day four on the Oombi Track. Part 1 is the first days on the track, and Part 2 finished at Camera Pool. We left Camera Pool, got up the hill to a little lookout, and a call came through. Devo had done something to the car. I couldn't hear it exactly. They said they were pulling axles out.
Big shout out to my sponsor, Kilos. Without them this trip wouldn't be happening. Oombi is a very expensive one. I bought the first Kilos chair myself before any sponsorship, and now they support me with chairs and the Rover Camp Light X. Sponsored or not, it's my preferred lightweight chair and camp light, and I use them every day on this trip. That's an affiliate link.
Leaving Camera Pool
That morning I went down to the creek for water. It used to be the town water supply for Oombulgurri. Quite a few freshies in it, and supposedly salties, so no swimming. A very quick in and out.
It's always a good idea to check under the car for fluid leaks early in the morning, especially on sand, where you see a leak straight away. The track down to Camera Pool is one way in and the same way out.
Devo's rear diff
The pit crew was already at work when I got there. Everybody suspected a rear diff. Devo said that's pretty common practice for them. It happened on a little step. Nothing dramatic, just a bang.
The plan was to pull the axles and the tail shaft and roll along with no rear drive, front wheels only, while Nick sorted a replacement. He found a diff centre in Kununurra in about five minutes. He knows the bloke who runs a barge out here, so the diff would come from Kununurra the next morning and be at the barge landing at 7.30 on Wednesday. Gas was coming too, and a couple of cartons of beer. In under ten minutes of mucking around he had everything organised. The cost was half a day.
I asked Nick if he'd do the same for anyone in the group. That's the point of difference for Koping in the Outback, he said: the logistical support. Not just on Oombi but the Cape, the desert, the Canning, basically everywhere in the top end. He has many vehicle wrecks and contacts in every corner of the country. If it's a Toyota or an Isuzu or some other popular car, he'd nearly guarantee finding bits within a day or so.
They also found what looked like a leak in a fuel tank. It wasn't a leak. A breather had rubbed through after the fuel tank replacement.
Nick stayed with Devo to wait for the barge and the diff, install it, and catch up with us later.
Oombulgurri
The grass looks like fluffy grass, but it's spinifex. Very spiky.
We finally made it to the Oombi Lookout. The rest of the group had already moved on towards Oombulgurri, but it was a stunning spot to look over the Forrest River.
Old town. Not really abandoned. Abandoned by the government.
Oombulgurri must have been a fairly well set up town. It had some tarred roads, and one of the oldest huts still standing is from the mission times, all out of local rock. Apparently Warwick grew up in this house.
It was quite a beautiful situated town, with the boab alleys.
Many houses are still standing, a lot of them in good nick, along with a health clinic and individual houses. The clinic alone was about a million dollars. I heard it was in the vicinity of around $30 million of infrastructure and investment the government made in town.
In 2011 the state government shut Oombulgurri down. They said it was unviable. First they closed the shop, then the clinic, the school and the police. Then they turned the power and the water off. The last residents were forced out and moved to Wyndham just before Christmas 2011. The government said most people left of their own accord. That is not what we heard from the traditional owners. The houses did not fall over. They pulled the services, then forced the last people out. That's why it's all sitting empty now.
Someone showed us the local ant nests. You grab one by the head and lick the green bum. Very lemony.
Broken gear, and the airstrip
Three or four days in, the tally was a blown rear diff on Devo, a bent tie rod on one of the G-Classes, straightened that morning so it was driving again, and some fridge fixation issues on the Fuso. The fuel thing on Devo was just the breather.
The guys had some fun with drag races on the old landing strip. I was a party pooper and declined. I don't like stressing a heavy-loaded car in a remote location unnecessarily, and at nearly 60 I've lost some of the urge to compete and compare.
At the airstrip, a Unimog and a 200 Series. The Unimog had run out of tyres, shredded. They weren't game to go on without spares, which I understand. Pretty much every tyre I saw looked very bald, and the ones we checked were seven years old. Not something I would take on a trip like this.
The chopped 200, a tray with a camper on it, had gone through two or three tyres, shredded the sidewalls, and then folded a driveshaft. They were waiting four days for a barge. The tour guide had also stuffed his car. From what we heard in camp the first night, a customer pulled him back to Home Valley. This can definitely happen here.
Devo, on the diffs: third one in 12 months. Bearings fine, brand new crown wheels and pinions. Guess we're just heavy, rough on the gear.
Camp lights
That night I cooked under the Rover lights from Kilos. I really like the extendable stand and the yellow light, which is not as bad with the mozzies. I use three of them. One sits next to the stretcher as a night light and stays on all night, and I had the big lights running two or three hours in the evening. Full review of the Kilos camp chair and of the Kilos Rover Light X.
There were fires burning about two kilometres away. I flew the drone over. A salt pan between us and the fires, so I wasn't worried about it jumping.
The day's driving statistics looked bad again, but it was one of the better days. Two hours in Oombulgurri, one hour with Devo's diff, and 30 minutes talking to the stranded guys.
Rock, side angle and tyres
Next morning the mozzies were out in force. My only damage so far was the bushes on my extended sway bar links, which had just been replaced. I removed the whole link.
We drove on with Warwick. The next camp was supposed to be a river camp at the De Lacourt River, two nights and a rest day.
The track kept up with rocky sections, dry and wet creek crossings and smaller boulder fields. Nothing really challenging, but always enough to keep you interested.
At one section with a slight side angle, I wanted to see how I'd go. With two doors, my side panels came too close to the rock wall, so I reversed out and took the detour. The rest of the group did some road building and tree clearing on a stretch with only a mild side angle. It wasn't needed for the four-wheel drives, but it helped the Fuso.
This track puts hard demands on tyres. My Kenda MTs have held up well. For once I'm carrying an extra tyre carcass on the roof, just in case. I don't usually carry two spares. My tyre management seems to be spot on. In over 15 years of driving I've never had a catastrophic failure I couldn't fix well enough to get out.
The hill climb
Warwick told us a tricky, steep climb was ahead. It had only been cut in recently, because the old track out of the valley was impassable after the recent wet and storms.
It was probably the hardest climb on the Oombi track. In perspective, it's not comparable with hill climbs in the Victorian High Country, like Hern Spur or Dingo Hill, which are way steeper and more technical, and where mistakes can be fatal. This one was reasonably steep with a loose, rocky surface, and you needed to find traction. The consequences of failing here were unlikely to be dramatic. Tyre pressure 4 psi lower would have helped me, but I made it without issues.
Five days in, I'm very happy with the new Superior Engineering three-way adjustable shocks. I can't complain at all. It's probably the hardest test you can put them through.
Waiting on the truck
It was very slow and painful. We'd drive about two kilometres, then wait 10 to 15 minutes for the big truck to catch up, then drive two more, and sit in the heat again. I stood on top of that hill for one and a half hours waiting for the Fuso. They were stuck sorting something on the tail shaft, and Woz headed back to help. The track is fairly overgrown and they were doing a lot of pruning, packing every little step, and trying to keep branches off the camper at the back. That's nearly impossible on this track. A stretch that took the rest of us about 20 minutes took them two and a half hours.
There is always a slowest car in the group and that's fine. A few minutes is perfectly OK. But this is advertised as one of the harder tracks, and if you bring a truck onto it, you can't expect everyone to wait. You have to accept you'll probably do some damage. We still had about six days to go.
Oombi is very expensive, not just for the customer but for the operators. As I understand it from talking to Nick and other operators, they have minimum fees to pay to the traditional owners, which is why you often see trips with 12 or 13 cars. Nick had quite a few cancellations because of the incredibly high fuel prices and was feeling the pinch. I understand why, financially, he accepted the Fuso.
Personally, having led hundreds of trips, I would not have combined a truck and regular four-wheel drives on the Oombi. With two tour leaders, Warwick and Nick, my suggestion on day two was to split the group and let the Fuso start two and a half hours earlier, with the rest of us catching up during the day. That wasn't an option for Nick.
I also sympathise with Elodie and Alistair. With little four-wheel drive experience, it's easy to underestimate the challenges. Alistair only joined at short notice. He had some experience with Land Cruisers, and suddenly he's driving a Canter that isn't his own and that he doesn't want to damage.
I was very frustrated. On a club trip you'd brush it off. With two weeks of travelling time to and from, and around $20k in cost, it's harder to do that.
Missing De Lacourt
We waited 5.5 hours of a 7.5-hour driving day, and we didn't make the De Lacourt River camp. Woz stopped on an open plain at around 4.15, with no shade in sight. I always look for scenic camp spots if there's one available, and I really wanted a wash. I hadn't carried enough water for Kaelan and me to shower, so our setup relied on creeks and rivers.
I sent the drone up and saw a lovely little creek with reasonable swimming holes only a few hundred metres away. After a bit of bush bashing, Kaelan and I found a camp spot right next to it. We had a good wash and a lie in the water after sitting around in the heat all day.
Elodie and Alistair in the Fuso and Bryce and Mark in the 200 Series didn't make it into camp until 8.30 pm.
Dinner was veggies, rice, two eggs and some fresh garlic. The steepest climb on the day's statistics isn't accurate. The climb was definitely steeper than 7.5 degrees.
Next episode: super soft sandy creek crossings, steep exits, 20 MAXTRAX in use, and winches out on multiple vehicles.
