A few notes before reading the email sent to me in 2003, a year after the incident occurred.
November 2002.
I am driving up the Strzelecki Track from Lyndhurst where I had just watched the total eclipse of the sun heading back “home” to Innamincka.
The track is graded into the ground so the edge of the dirt road has a lip of about a foot where you step up to the normal ground level. Going around a bend I see the lip on the outside disturbed and imprints of a vehicle in the desert dust where it has landed on its side then been rolled back onto its wheels and wheel tracks heading back onto the track.
A roll over where the car has drifted (not enough concentration) or not been able to steer through the corner (too much speed, skidded, not experienced not in 4wd) hit the lip and did a slow roll onto its side. A few kilometres down the road we find the car that had the rollover.
Feeling a little perverse (It wasn’t the first roll over I’d come across in the most recent few thousand kilometes of desert driving) I ignored his, and my snatch strap and did use my heavy chain. After getting their car started I hit the road to Innamincka leaving them to “come along behind”. But hey, I promised I’d come back for them.
Innamincka is a small remote community 522kms NE of Leigh Creek South whose post code it uses. Leigh Creek is on the bitumen and rail line. Everyone checks the post code “yeah, we can get stuff to you” and then have to be told to get a map and bloddy well look at it. The next response is “How do we get stuff up/from there?”
Dogga is an ex-shearer, running a motel in Thargomindah at the time. He is larger than life and he did promise me he would look after them. I did try to ignore the grin he gave me as he said it.
This letter was emailed to me a year after their trip and takes up from just before I came across them in the desert.
You helped my brother and I a year ago after I rolled my car on the Strzelecki Track. I thought I’d say thanks and in case you were wondering let you know what happened after that.
As you know after the crash we set out heading North up the track and everything was fine(ish) for about an hour. We pulled over and to our horror the car stalled. As you have probably guessed it wouldn’t start again either the key had absolutely no effect. After a quick inspection we saw that there was a hole in the battery. Luckily, at this point a car came down the track, so we hailed him and he nicely gave us a roll start.
The next time this happened we were just as lucky. We somehow managed to roll start the car on level ground. Remember the doors were jammed shut so only one of us could push. I don’t think we could repeat this if we attempted it a hundred tries. This was painfully demonstrated a couple of hours later when it happened again and we exhausted ourselves trying.
Having given up on roll starting the car we decided to conserve/regain our energy, so we grabbed a water bottle each and trudged about hundred metres or so into the dessert to sit under a (not very) shady tree. It was very quiet and would have been very relaxing if not for our situation. About half an hour later, just as I was considering the advantages of cannibalism, we heard a car.
Of course we hailed it and got a roll start. But this was no ordinary roll start. He wanted to use a steel chain opposed to our snatch strap. This was fine until he flawed (sic) it and almost whip lashed my head off (in response this I imagine he would say that I was a city fella). He was a good bloke and we were very happy for the assistance.
We found out that our whip lash friend was the bush Pharmacist called Andrew. He said that he was staying at Innamincka (the next town, some 5 hours away) and that if we hadn’t reached there by late afternoon he?d get a trailer, come back and get us. An offer we couldn’t refuse! We weren’t aware at that stage but Andrew’s extreme generosity was going to give us quite a lot of help in getting home.
We arrived at Innamincka and let Andrew know. I contacted the Insurance Company and they just could not understand that the closest accredited mechanic was too far away. Anyway, they decided that we were to leave the car and find another method of getting home. I know it is not the most remote place in Australia but is has got to be bloody close.
It took a day to work out how to get home. I thought we’d just hitch a lift with a Truckie but due to Public Liability Insurance they’d been told not to pick any one up. After numerous options were canvassed we decided our best bet was to wait a day for Andrew and get a lift with him to Thargomindah. From there we’d catch one of the mining company’s planes to Brisbane.
Dxxx and I spent the next day in Innamincka with the family at the home stay. They actually had us shoveling sand into their garden. They were fantastic people and if you are ever out that way again I recommend staying with them. We left with Andrew and completed the 6 hour trip to Thargomindah where we had to wait two days for the next plane. We stayed at a hotel run by an amazing bloke called Dogga – he was truly larger than life.
We caught the plan back to Brisbane luckily without incident and only a few days late.
Thanks again for your help!
Wxxx and Dxxx
Have a Pleasant (and safe) Sunday Afternoon.
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