We had aimed to be out of camp pretty early, but wasn’t able
to replicate the 7.15 exit like the day before.
8am wasn’t a bad effort however, and saw us get ahead of a lot of the
traffic. We drove the 130kms down to
Bramwell Junction in around 1.5 hours.
The lack of traffic, and dust, definitely assisted the trip.
Our camper was sitting there, excited to see us, and most
importantly, in one piece. Not a
scratch, dent, or missing any parts as a result of the OTL. Our decision to drop it off was never
questioned by us at any stage. A quick
hook up, check over, and the turn-around was complete.
We headed straight back up the Development Road, this time
with significantly more traffic. This is
a fairly wide, and at times, very smooth gravel road. The corrugations however build up over a
short period of time, and definitely get worse and worse throughout the
season. Of more impact to us at this
stage was the dust. When following
someone, the road can be difficult to see, and with the addition of oncoming
traffic, and their dust, it can become near impossible at times. Headlights are a mandatory requirement to
help other cars seeing you coming, and you them.
During the run, we were able to reflect again on the
adventure we had just been on. It
definitely felt like an achievement to drive the entire OTL, with young kids, and
we were extremely happy with our teamwork and organisation. We did feel like we worked our butts off, with
a big day of driving, then get into camp, setup, cook dinner, do maintenance on
Slim, get kids in bed, and try to fit in some socializing. This definitely added to the intensity.
The reality of Paul
and Maria’s car drowning was something that kept bringing it home that the OTL
can be a difficult, problematic journey.
It’s a little hard to describe, but the OTL can be a little
deceiving. The OTL’s legend definitely
precedes itself, but if all goes well, and you don’t run into any problems, it
would be easy to think that there was little challenge, and a bit of a walk in
the park. If something goes wrong,
obviously it’s a monster, and a horrendous track. Everyone would have a different variant
between these two extremes we’re sure.
We reached the Jardine ferry by 12noon. To our surprise, we met up with a half dozen
MySwag members queued up at the ferry.
They had left Nolan’s Brook quite late that morning, and had been caught
in the lunchtime ‘shutdown’ of the ferry from 12 – 1 (ISH). We caught up on a little of the news, (and
group politics) whilst waiting for the ferry to re-open.
The Jardine is quite a large, sandy, croc filled river near
the top of Cape York. In the past,
travellers had to brave this crossing, which would have been quite challenging,
and any recoveries would have been near impossible. The ferry was a welcome introduction, and we
had little trouble in paying the ferryman for our safe passage.
The final 50km run up to Bamaga and Seisa was uneventful,
except for passing another MySwag member, who was parked up on the side of the
road half-way up. Whilst travelling
earlier that day, all of a sudden the trailer let go, and self destructed. Apparently two of the ‘U-Bolts’ on the
trailer cracked, and broke apart. This
caused the suspension to fall apart, the wheels to fold, and the chassis and
guard to be smashed. All up, it was
lucky they were able to pull up safe, but the camper trailer was an instant
write-off. Another unfortunate casualty
of Cape York.
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| Tim's trailer after the OTL and just 30km from Seisa |
Rolling into Seisa Holiday Park, we said hello again to the
rest of the crew, and set up our much loved camper beside one of the beach
huts, which we were sharing with Mal and Roz.
The beach huts are a covered, sand floor hut with power and water. Very luxurious.
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| Seisa Holiday Park |
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| It was lot busier than this (thanks Google images) |
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