Kombi Blog

We left Broken Hill as early as we could not really sure how far we would get, but Shirl travelled well and would could sit on 80km, despite a strong head wind.

Carolyn  & I took turns driving and sitting in the back watching movies with the kids or sleeping, the only stops we made were for fuel.

We reached Dubbo around 7pm which is normally around 3.5 hours from Lithgow, and decided to push on while shirl was running and we arrived home around 11.15pm.

Ian

From Coober Pedy Shirl really travelled well, despite buying new points I didn’t put them in because she was running so well. By 2pm we had reached Peterborough and decided to stay there the night.

In the morning (Friday 18th July - Day 28) Shirl started and ran well for the first hour and then started to play up and we ended up limping into Broken Hill. I have a friend in broken hill who is a mechanic and who use to own kombi’s - even had a samba at one point. I gave him a call and he was willing to look at Shirl.

I also had a look myself and found the choke on the right-hand carby was stuck open and the wire that runs to the coil had broken. I fixed those while Shirl ran better she could only get a maximum of 70km - which was enough to potter around town till my friend could check Shirl out.

We got to watch another awesome sunset

Watch the moon rise

And visit Bells Milk Bar - which is a must if you ever visit Broken Hill.

After dinner, my friend (Stephen) gave Shirl a real going over and fixed a few minor issues, like a loose vacum hose, adjusted the points and the timing, he also found that Shirl’s accelerator cable was stretched and a little dodgy.

After a few hours Shirl was running well but there was still a problem with the fuel delivery and maximum speed was only 85km - 90km which we decided was enough to get us home.

Ian

Well the trip home was quite an adventure. The Opal fuel has certainly caused a few issues with the Carby’s and they played most of the way home. At one point I could only get full throttle and shirl was screaming along at 110km.

As mentioned before we had some trouble about 60km outside of Marla SA http://maps.google.com.au/maps?f=q&h…,19.248047&z=6

The new points I picked up in Alice Springs broke!

I was rather stressed and I didn’t even think about replacing the points, we flagged down a car and asked them to send back a tow truck - in the end we only had to wait about 90 minutes before Shirl was picked up. At least we had an awesome sunset to watch as we waited for the tow truck.

At this point we were unsure of the problem, nothing we could do but wait till the morning. We were quite relieved to here that it was the points, no points in Marla so we put the old points back in and headed to Coober Pedy - a 220km trip down the road.

Once in Coober pedy we picked up three sets of points (just to be sure) and then looked around a little more - we really liked Coober Pedy.

Ian

The Mechanic in Marla told us that the cause of the breakdown were the points, unfortunatly he didn’t have any, but luckly I still had the old set I took out in Alice.  After a few phones calls we discovered that someone in Coober Pedy had some points in Stock so we decided to put the old ones in and head there.

By the time Shirl was ready it was almost lunch time and shirl made the 220km’s without any problems. As soon as I got to Coober Pedy I made sure to I got hold of the points, in fact I brought three sets just to be sure!

Seeing it was early afternoon we took some time to have another look around Coober Pedy (we really like the place) before heading to John’s Pizza for dinner - if you are ever in Coober Pedy be sure to have a meal at John’s.

Tonight we are all spending the night in the Kombi, kids up stairs and Carolyn and I down, this way we hope to get away early in the morning.

Here are some pictures of today

Mounds from Opal Minning

The Golf Course

The Coober Pedy Sign

We are on our way home
Ian

We did get up early today, but by the time we packed up, took back the hire car, got petrol and went to the bank it was almost 11am. Everything was going fine until we were about 60km outside of Marla SA or about 400km south of Alice Springs when the points failed. 

I put new points in while we were in Alice Springs and apparently they were faulty and the part that is moved by the cam on the distributor broke which meant that the points wouldn’t open. Again, thanks to NRMA we had a night paid for in Marla.  Shirl was put onto a trailor and we had  to wait till the morning before we found out about the points.

We have had a great time, it has been a real adventure and a special time as a family - tonight we are all sleeping in the kombi so we can get up and leave early in the morning. It’s also a test to see if we can cope with sleeping in the Kombi together because we going to have to do it so we can make it to Darwin via Mt Isa next year.

This may be the last time I get internet access before we get home so I will leave you with a few photo’s

Ian

Pictures from the Desert Park

We woke early today to put Shirl in at the VW dealer and seeing that we were up we decided to visit the Desert Park in Alice Springs. This turned out to be really quite enjoyable and it took a lot longer to see everything than we expected, it was well worth the visit. I haven’t downloaded the photo’s from the camera yet, but when I do I’ll post a few.

After the Desert Park we came back to the camp ground for a late lunch and to wait to here about Shirl. Around 4pm we got the call that she was ready to be picked up! We were so happy we went out to the movies one last time.

Tomorrow we pack up and start heading home the same way we came. Mt Isa and the other places will have to wait for another trip. First stop tomorrow - Coober Pedy.

Ian

Seeing that today was Sunday we thought we would Attend the morning service at Alice Springs Baptist Church. Following the service we decided to head out to see a bit more of the West McDonald Ranges and we drove out to Glen Helen Gorge which we liked very much, it had a permanent water hole, camping ground and even a restaurant. We thought this would make a great place to stay one day.

After Glen Helen Gorge we then stopped in on Ormiston Gorge, another pretty spot with a permanent water hole. Orministin Gorge had great views with spectacular cliffs that were turning a beautiful shades of browns and reds with the sun hitting them.

Alice Springs and the West McDonald Ranges are a great place to see and we haven’t minded spending the few extra days here, in fact we have quite enjoyed them.

Ian

Alice Springs – Day 22

Alice Springs is a great place to break down for there is so much to do and see. One of the reasons it was so hard to find accommodation or rent a car here is because of the Camel Cup which as been running annually now for 31 years. Seeing that the Camel Cup was on and that a few of the Camels we rode earlier would be running we just had to go.

The Camel Cup turned out to be a great day with a carnival atmosphere, stalls and food stands. It was a great event and a really unique and fun day that was totally unexpected. We are really starting to like Camels and they don’t taste to bad either – seriously they taste good. They not only ride them here in Alice Springs they eat them too.

Ian

Alice Springs – Day 21

This morning we were woken by NRMA with the news that they had found us a car and had booked it for us for five days – a brand new Ford Falcon, it had to picked up at 10am.

We also had to move sites today as well, lucky for us that someone cancelled just as we were asking about extending our stay in Alice – this was areal answer to prayer. Getting the car and moving sites took up all of the morning and a little of the afternoon. Our new site was larger again and undercover, plus we had our own sink with hot & cold water. After we had settled in we decided to take our new form of transportation out for a spin and we hit the shops, the Ford goes a lot faster that the Kombi.

To our great delight we discovered that Alice Springs had a Gloia Jeans Café, so we made sure to visit that. The girls did some clothes shopping and we stocked up a little on food seeing that we were going to be in Alice Springs a few days longer than we expected. Since we had a great time at the movies yesterday we decided to see another – this time it was ‘Meet Dave’ with Eddie Murphy.

Ian

Alice Springs – Day 20

Today we focused mostly on the kombi. I tested everything I could think of and changed almost all of the electric’s (plugs, points, coil, etc) but it didn’t make any difference. There was no way we could drive onto to Tennent Creek the way Shirl was so in the end we decided to call NRMA. They arrived in around 30 minutes and suspected that it was a fuel problem most likely caused by Opal fuel. The kombi had to be looked at by a mechanic, the only problem was the earliest we could get into see a mechanic was Monday, some where a two week wait. So we are spending a bit longer in Alice

Seeing that the kids had been so good throughout the day we decided we would take them to Hungry Jacks for dinner and to the Movies to see ‘Get Smart’, which was quite funny. It was a good way to end a stressful day.

Ian