Saturday April 21st Brindabela
John Manning Hill & The Great Fridge Disaster of 2006
The purpose of the trip was to recce the area for likely trips for Easter 2008. Wal and Adrian plotted out a course with as many closely spaced contour lines on the map as they could find.
The first hill has been conquered on a previous trip by Phil Dalton (Driving Adrian’s Patrol). Wal took the first run up and took 3 attempts to get past a difficult obstacle. It was a bouncy ride up to the top of the hill. Next up was Robert in his 60 series, which has the advantage of lockers front and rear. No sweat for Bob.
Greg took little Jimmy up for a typical Jimmy run, bouncing over the obstacles and up to the top easily. Robyn was letting Dave drive Tweety. Tweety took a little coaxing, and a few different lines, but she made it.
Adrian decided that 3rd was an interesting gear to use. Interesting until he failed to proceed over the obstacle halfway up the hill. A more sensible choice of gear ensured that he was not further embarrassed.
John’s last instructions from me were: “Engage ALL traction controls available and go”. He engaged Low range, but he forgot to engage his hubs. Amazing considering he made it nearly all the way to the top before he lost traction and sat there with the rear wheels spinning and no movement at all from the front.
This hill is now officially John Manning (2WD) Hill. No drama for the TEC (me).
Next hill that we were aiming to check out was the site of the infamous 2006 Flying Beer Fridge Disaster. Just as well Wal’s fridge was secure as he and Beryl bounced on the rocks several times before a road crew went up to see what all the fuss was about. Road building complete and revised strategies were put in place to limit the stress on the vehicles and the track, but not before Wal lost a rear mud flap.
All but two vehicles went through. Greg and Robyn recce’d an alternate route for those who may not feel the need to tackle the hill climb.
The rest of the trip was a simple roll back down the hill to camp for an early happy hour. Robyn promised that she would make a damper. She used a special mix: 1kg flour, 600ml full strength beer (which was quality checked extensively by Adrian), salt, sugar and some other secret ingredients. Robyn even brought along her own personal pastry chef to do all the messy parts.
The damper baked slowly in the camp oven while John Manning demonstrated how to relax in front of a fire. When finally cooked it was bloody marvelous. If you want the recipe I am sure Robyn will sell it to you for a modest price.
It was a fairly early bed time for most of us. There was a lot amount of noise in camp, as it is a very popular place with Canberra locals. There was also mention of the saw mill that was operating out of swag!
Sunday April 22nd
Soft Roader Park & Mushroom Rock
Sunday morning pack up ended up being a race against the rain. Greg, Robert & Wendy and John all decided that the trip home was the most attractive option. Wal & Beryl, David & Robyn and myself agreed that a short recce following Adrian & Sue was worth hanging around for.
Sue led off. When we pulled over to lock hubs we had to move aside to let two soft roaders overtake us on the track. Mmm… not sure this area was going to be all that challenging for us. As it turned out the tracks had been impeccably graded, and the quality and quantity of drainage work meant there were no speed humps to deal with.
Rob complained that she wanted more humps. “This is Soft-Roader Park” was the radio message from Tweety.
Sue set off to find a hill that would give Rob her thrills. The hills Sue found were bumpy enough and took us up high enough that we got clear radio reception with Greg, who was between Queenbeyan and Bungendore.
You could see the dishes of Tidbinbilla Deep Space Research centre, plus what looked like a very interesting track leading up to a communication tower. After following several dead ends it was decided to try and find Mushroom Rock instead. We ended up on a track that had recently been graded. It looked as if we were the first group of vehicles on this track since the grader. The track to Mushroom rock that we expected to use had been closed off due to erosion, but we found another route that came around the back. Dave was up the rocks faster than a mountain goat. Some great photo opportunities of the spectacular granite formations were taken advantage of.
After the find it was time to head back to camp to have lunch and hitch up for the long haul back to Sydney. A successful recce, and a great time.
Thanks to Wal & Adrian for organizing the weekend.
P.S: The rain on the way home was well arranged. It saved me at least $20 at Car Lovers.
Colin Hunt