Around Oz the First Time - Chapter 40 - Bungle Bungles to Mary Pools (almost)

Today was a day when the best laid plans of mice and men go thrown right out the widow, and it was thrown far and early.

It had been our first time of multiple night free camping, not in a commercial park and no attached power, meaning we were relying on reserves topped up by the solar during the day. Knowing we were going to be in this situation we decided to park out of the shade to take full advantage of the life-giving sun. The day previous we had wandered the Bungle Bungles and left the van with only the fridge to maintain, yet on our return the check of the available power showed only 48%. How could this be, we have not seen a cloud for days and we purposely parked in the heat.

With computers and phones to power up for today we miserly used the inverter before retiring last night, but during the night the reserves went below the “safe” minimum and the power had shut down. This occurred around about midnight, meaning neither my C-Pap machine or the fridge were working. The latter I could remedy, I simply connected the van to the car and it ran fine but the C-Pap and beeping alarm of the now deficient battery storage managed to allow for only broken sleep.

On waking I immediately rang the van retailer for assistance, he ran me through all sorts of protocols – nothing seemed to work. He arranged for the head office solar expert to ring me, which he did promptly but he was of no help either, the only “solution” was to get to a point where a Redarc supplier might be able to work out what was going on. Hmmm we are in the Kimberly, at least 6 hours from Broome, that ain’t going to happen any time soon I suspect.

Alternative, kick the generator into gear and power up the van. Excellent, only problem the generator has no sump oil in it. Thankfully a quick wander around the camp site reveals one of the campers we were talking to at length last night has some and is willing to offer the required amount to me. Forbsy, who I had dug out of bed as soon as I had arisen this morning, is there to assist and we soon have it going and providing power to the van.

In the meantime Robyn and I have to head off to the Purnululu Aboriginal School at Frog Hollow for the meeting we had arranged for the students and Kirsten. It is not far from Warnun, we will duck in there and replace the oil we have used and fill up as well.

Forbsy has been having issues with his van as well, the water pumps are not working meaning eh has no water. Thankfully we are carrying 40 litres of emergency supplies on the back of the van, along with 20 litres of diesel and a jerry can of petrol for the generator. These insurance policies have nearly all be claimed upon now, a bit of forward thinking has meant what may have been a catastrophe has been averted.

The next issue of the day is that Zoe, the acting Principal at the school has not sent us the directions to the site. We cannot find it in our GPS but we are pretty sure we can get close and perhaps she can guide us in. We have aimed for an 8.30am meeting as that is the time for their morning “meeting” (assembly is similar) and we have given ourselves a reasonable buffer of time.

We drive into the community, the phones don’t work, good start. There are buildings everywhere, mostly looking like homes, we don’t just want to wander up to one and disturb them. We pass a large Brahman Bull, grazing on the dry grass and the obligatory stray looking dogs and notice a large volume of park play equipment not too far away and head in that general direction. Finally, we see some kids in Purnululu uniforms playing basketball and suspect that might be where we need to go. Thankfully we are right, I am sure the police might have been called if we wandered aimlessly around the community for much longer.

We ask the students for directions to the office and we are shown to a door at the end of the basketball court, many hoops are being sunk by the, what I suspect are primary school age children. They are having fun.

Zoe is glad to see us and then remembers she was supposed to send us directions and starts apologising profusely, no matter we are there. Immediately she gives us a tour of the school, but much more informatively a background to the story of the community.

Here the community is been given a help up not a help out. They are self-contained and self-governing. The community is not dry, but if anyone gets into difficulty with the demon drink they are asked to leave, sort themselves out and then may return. The community are presently fighting a native title case for some of their home. They have already won two cases easily, as they were not contested, but the third, which I believe from talking to one of the directors of the community, a modest but obviously either educated or worldly gentleman, the 20 years it has taken so far to determine the last of the cases is all around a dispute over who’s family does the land belong.

The other family has a less tenuous hold, and according to him their stories are the same as ours but it has been placed in the too had basket and taken 20 years to get to the present status. Recently the entire court, judge and all, descended on the community, as part of the decision-making process. Zoe was very quick to add the judge was very impressed with the school and the students, clapping along to songs and even trying to sing along. Court cases invariably need to see the faces of the people to whom their decisions apply, I applaud the system for taking this on.

Back to why we were here, arranging a teleconference with Kirsten and the students. My chip in my computer wont work, so Zoe gets me onto the school guest Wifi, which does work, but very intermittently. Its windy and the satellite connection can be a bit iffy at times. After much trailing, I get Kirsten on the screen, but the connection is too bad for any sort of communication back and forth. Zoe ahs a solution, she will join the Zoom meeting using her staff Wifi, which is much more stable and that gives her Kirsten on her laptop to wander around and talk to the children.

Kirsten initially gets the same tour we did, then as we start to head in and out of classrooms Zoe gets the students to say G’day and asks if they have questions. They all know Kirsten and are thrilled to be talking to her. Unfortunately, the one student who asked the question is not present today, she is in Tasmania with her brother trying out a school for better tertiary based education.

Here the Purnululu model is more centred around the younger ones, it gives them a reason to be at school. Zoe is very proud of the fact that many of her students are now heading into “mainstream” education, once they have found their niche. Its’s very much Kirsten’s story, drifting along with the crowd in primary school, her first days in high school set her on the path she presently travels. It started with the principal, a man with a dream to open the eyes of the students that past by to the endless possibilities.

Kirsten’s first day, I will never forget the description she has of it. Home all excited because Mr Cawsey (the Principal) had said to the Year 7 students about to start their high school journey at Davidson High School, “there are a myriad of opportunities available to you at this school. All we ask is you try them all”. No qualification, no boundaries, just try them all, and try them all she did until on an excursion she visited the Imax Centre and saw visions from the Hubble telescope, and she was hooked on the stars. From then on her path was set from a shy primary school student to astrophysicist, working with the likes of Brian Cox, her hero, and Karl Krysinski among others, using herself as a conduit between the sciences and the masses and in the mean time looking to inspire students, particularly girls in them.

Zoe O’Hara and the staff at Purnululu seem to have the same vision, coupled with the community, rather than thrusting, what we might term convention, upon them, allowing the community, particularly its young to be as much as they can. Perhaps more time should be spent by those wanting to “help”, listening to those like Zoe and the elders of Purnululu, who look to help them up rather than help them out. Simply throwing money at the issues of our indigenous is not the answer, especially to those with a less than vested interest in the solution rather than the turnover of money.

We have to head off but not before every student in the school has said G’day to Kirsten along with a few of the parents wandering in and out as part of the community spirit of the School. In time they will have a Skype session with Kirsten and have the students with prepared questions of the stars. Zoe gives us a staff shirt as a memento, which she will water while doing the virtual visits.

Zoe notices my lights are in the depressed position again and notes here husband is a mechanic for the local mine and is on his two weeks off stint and could have a quick look at them. We are grateful and he goes to work on them, giving us tips on the best solution while he remedies the present issue. He is done, we are off bidding a hearty goodbye to the people of Frog Hollow.

Because we have been doing the running around in the Bungle Bungles, we feel we need to top up before the next leg, plus we would like to replace the transmission oil given to us by our fellow camper. Warnum is another 30km back down the road in the opposite direction to the camp, and we drive into the local roadhouse and top up the tank at 189.9 cents per litre. I drive out, then get reminded of our real reason for the detour and drive back in, parking this time while Robyn goes in search of the oil. They seem to have type of oil imaginable but the one we want, so we head back to the Smiths Creek Camp empty handed.

Messaging ahead, we are back in the camp, ready to hook back up and set off. This will take a good half hour, as there are generators to cool and the usual pre-trip chores to deal with. The others are ready, but concede with the time it will take us they might luncheon now, fill up in Halls Creek and we will make Marys Pools easily in the daylight time remaining. I take the pol can back to the camper who graciously wont accept any cash for the oil we have used. I suggest to him the money is to have a beer on me, so he accepts it.

They are here for a tour of the Bungle Bungles which includes a bus trip, morning tea, guided walks in the gorges and dinner. They won this, in a raffle at some stage and are intending to enjoy it to its fullest. They are travelling with some friends who have gone into the park today for their own exploratory visit. Speaking to them last night at length we unloaded all the tips we could, particularly in relation to the Echidna Gorge. The guided tour sounds like a hoot.

Finally, in a position to troop off, we stop by the rubbish bins and unload the garbage, head up the short road to the highway and turn right, heading towards Halls Creek and then on to Marys Pools.

About 20km into our trip Silver Leader observes he is having electrical issues with the Jeep. Within 5km we are stopped on the side of the road, the Jeep dead, save the windscreen wipers slowly going from side to side, unable to be turned off and his rear windows down. It is dead in the water. The obligatory investigation reveals nothing easily seen, like a belt or a dislodged wire etc, but this is in vain. Robyn notes she has signal on my phone if she stands in a particular spot along the three parked vehicles, so Silver Leader calls his local service department in Port Macquarie.

The call is a comedy, firstly the reception is not even close to acceptable and the service manager cuts us off. Into my Cruiser after a debate about should we unhook or not, the latter wins out, and we head off towards town looking for a place to turn around as we know there is reception 20 kilometres bac at the camp. Over the first hill and Robyn yells “stop, we have reception – 4 bars”. I manoeuvre into a space and Silver Leader calls again. This time the line is much better but the receptionist is confused and wants to transfer us to a tow truck, Silver Leader quips something in a foreign language which translates to “so you want us to wait for 54 hours, that’s the time it take according to Google Maps (and that’s’ without a stop)”. Apparently Silver Leader has the name of the mechanic he “trusts” wrong and this has confused her.

We finally get onto Garry or Barry or Trevor or whomever Silver Leader trusts and we talk through the issues. The mechanic, like us, believes the battery has died, he goes through a few options to get us going again, I chuck a U-turn and we head back to the stricken Jeep. At this point I would love to remind Silver Leader of the Toyota advertisement about the toughness of the west, and how other 4WD vehicles are really only toys, but I do not have the heart.

Back at the breakdown site, we put into motion a couple of the options given to us by Garry (the mechanics real name), including Forbsy getting his backup battery out of his Cruiser and using it to charge up the flat one. Garry suggests, if we give this 10 – 15 minutes the stricken battery might take enough charge to start the Jeep.

It doesn’t.

We bring my Cruiser up nose to nose with the Jeep and try to jump start it, this has to be done, if the manufacturer’s instructions Are to be believed, through special points in the engine bay, rather than straight onto the battery itself which is situated under the driver’s seat.

This has the same success as the last effort.

Time is getting away, and one thing we really do not want to be doing is driving in the twilight or darkness if we can help it. We decide to start heading into Halls Creek, looking to suss out a mechanic or tow truck as we drive in, either get a battery (but that won’t help we don’t have the tools to remove the present one, and it might not work anyway), entice a mechanic to the site (and again that does not auger well), or simply have the Jeep towed into town. The latter option is agreed as the best. Once in range we talk to the local tow truck operator, who just happens to be the local Toyota Dealer (having just purchased the business) and he will be waiting for us when we arrive.

Silver Leader will then travel with him back to the breakdown, about 80 kilometres back, we will find a local caravan park, stow our van and return to the site to retrieve Silver Leader’s van and set it up in the caravan park for the evening.

As we are driving to Halls Creek, Silver Leader calls his insurance company to ascertain the protocols for the free towing section of his vehicle insurance. So far, he has been quoted $1,100 to tow the van and the Jeep to town or $330 less for the Jeep only, so it is fairly important all the ducks are in a row. His call does not end well. The insurance company, Allianz” apparently offered free breakdown and towing cover in the first year of the insurance coverage (as a loss leader inducement I suspect), and although premiums have not changed and his insurance is up to date, he is not covered. The staff are unable to adequately explain how the coverage “lapsed” but it has, and he suggests they have lost a customer once renewal is required.

Entering into Halls Creek, I am taken back in time to holidays in Condobolin in the summers of my youth. Dry, dusty, grassless and kids running around. The Toyota dealership is very easily found of the second street in the town, the tow truck driver is there and waiting as promised. Silver Leader is deposited, and we are left to find a suitable park for the night. There is only one option, a couple of blocks away, there is the Halls Creek Caravan Park. We drive in, the reception shop is amazing, catering for everything from curios to simple food provisions, televisions and jewellery, Robyn pays for our site and the receptionist walks her out and says take your pick, pointing at the vast area housing only a few vans.

It’s a dry and dusty in this park, but we have little option. We find a spot which has adjacent vacancies for the others, we set the van and we close up, jump back in the Cruiser and head back to the breakdown site. Without the van on the back I am able to operate at full speed limit (and a bit more). The road is wide and clear on the side allowing us to see the cattle grazing close to the edge. At one point a cow meanders across the road in front of us, making us slow to a crawl as it meanders to the other side.

We get to the breakdown site and the Jeep is loaded and the tow truck driver ready to head back to town for a birthday barbeque to celebrate his special day. He notes though that there is another breakdown about 5 kilometres out of town he might have to deal with as well. He heads off, I back the Cruiser up to Silver Leader’s van and change the tow ball to a ball apparatus rather than the coupling I use for the Scorpion and attach the van. His set up is very similar to mine except for the reversing camera which uses a different socket, so I won’t be able to use it when we site the van in town.

The sun is setting now and I snap a couple of quick shots into the west to capture yet another. Forbsy initially keeps up, but as the darkness takes over, he falls back to be able to use his driving lights without blinding me. Thankfully the work done by the mine mechanic this morning allows for reasonable use of the spot lights, meaning the kangaroos, the cattle and whatever else on the roads now are better seen, I wont say easily because at one section, Silver Leader, sitting in the passenger seat beside me, calls kangaroo and I cannot see them because their light skin blends into the line marking of the road, but they hop off before we get close.

Every time we see a potential danger, we radio back to Forbsy who for a while suggests we are dreaming as the animals are nowhere to be seen. Then all of a sudden, we get a “saw that one”. A little later we get, “I have seen two and a half” in reference to a very small pone we saw at one stage. All of a sudden there are two large kangaroos haring across in front of me, not wanting to take too much evasive action with van on the back, with which I have little experience, I simply brake. Thankfully, the kangaroos are quick, and other than my wits, of which I am completely scared out of, all is OK.

Having been across the same bit of road works now three times I tell Forbsy of a “speed hump” which has developed at one place and to be mindful. He suggests they should go to El Questro for better tuition as he hits it.

Finally, we get into the van park and site the Silver Leader van. Now, its 6.30pm, what to do about dinner. The receptionist at the park suggests the hotel across the road has a half decent bistro, so we decide to give it a go, not much else can go wrong today can it? There is welding going on in the park as someone appears to be trying to fix something whilst we are walking to the gate. It looks like there are a number of permanent vans here, and a little business is happening out the back of one.

Out the gate, turn right and head towards an advertising hoarding. OK where is the hotel? We walk up the road and discern, its behind the fence, OK but where is the entrance, good question. Suddenly a very large electronic gate opens for a car to enter, we follow it, what have we done, locked ourselves into something we wont be able to get out of. There are people at least and we accost them to ask for directions. They laugh, through there, pointing at a break in the buildings, “the back bar is pumping”.

Through the gap, past the pool and there is an outside bar with about 4 patrons. The barmaid is most helpful, suggesting there is another bar through a few doors, or we can order and eat here by the pool. Forbsy and Silver Leader explore, I order some drinks for Robyn and I. The menu looks impressive, but will the repast come up to the imagery the menu casts.

Robyn orders the Slat & Pepper Prawn Salad and I order the Peppered Kangaroo Fillet – game I know, but someone has to do it. The others come back and suggest here might be the best place to eat. We sit by the pool pondering our day, we have made it half way on the intended leg, but we are still in one piece and dinner is being cooked by someone else and the bar is open.

Dinner arrives, and instantly and apprehensions as to the quality of the food is dispelled. The kangaroo, which if not cooked properly can be very tough, but this melts on your mouth, and other than she suggests there are not enough prawns on the salad, Robyn is impressed. Forbsy has ordered the Chilly Ribs and hoes into them with vigour while Silver Leader and Rosalie have gone the Chicken Schwarma and are having an equally perfect dining experience.

We have heard a lot of poor reflections of Halls Creek, and the first impressions of the town are a dust bowl in the middle of a desert, filled with unruly indigenous residents, out to steal whatever they can as soon as they can, but sitting in the bar of this Hotel, knowing our vans are secure for the night, you get the feeling that the pendulum of life, which today has swung disconcertingly for a time in the direction of mayhem, might be heading back towards the better times.

Hopefully tomorrow will bring a quick fix to the Jeep issues and we will be on our way.