2019 Roadtrip
Monday 7th January.
Soon after we bought the Plymouth I thought it would be nice to do a roadtrip with the boys each year to destinations that you would not normally visit. Like to Philip Island, Bathurst, Great Ocean Road and similar. We did Philip Island the first year – holiday house, Kustom Nationals at the racetrack – and we went back again the following year also. But nothing last year.
So this year we decided we’d go somewhere – probably the Great Ocean Road. As usual I’d left it too late to organize (December 2018) and accommodation would be scarce. Plan B was discussed – Mt Hotham, Buchan Caves, Lakes Entrance - which seemed like a good alternative. We booked some campsites and a couple of motels and we were ready to hit the road.
With the Plymouth packed up with tent, mattresses, bedding, chairs, eskies, BBQ, food and clothes, we left for Bright on Monday 7th January 2019. With the roof down we enjoyed the drive north east across Victoria to Bright – stopping at Rushworth for a photo at the abandoned service station (where a guy pulled up and asked if we were looking for fuel….), stopping at Murchison for a photo at Thornebridge - the seemingly abandoned double story mansion, then again at Benalla Macca’s and Woolies for some lunch and food/ice/beer. Then back on the freeway for a short drive to Glenrowan Service Centre for fuel. By now it was a hot day and sunburn was setting in, so we layered up for another coating of sunscreen.
It was a wonderful feeling cruising along knowing how far we had to go today, but also realizing what adventures ahead were waiting for us. As we got further away from home, it was going to be a long way back to Bendigo no matter which way you went. It added to the excitement of the unknown. People look at you with dismay as you cruise along with the roof down on a 38 degree day – they’re travelling in silence in their insulated SUV’s ,with their air cons on max, kids playing DVD’s or listening to music, and here we are in a dinosaur from the ‘60s travelling along with them.
Just after the fuel stop we left the freeway and headed east towards Milawa. A very picturesque drive through a valley with towering mountains beginning to appear on both sides all the way into Bright. Had never been to Bright that I can remember – all the times coming to Mt Buffalo as a kid with mum and dad we always turned off the Porepunkah and headed up the hill. And after checking in to the motel, having a swim to cool off and a rest, that’s just what we did. We fired up the Fury once again and set out for the summit of Mt Buffalo. So far today the car had performed faultlessly, but just now the alarm had set itself while driving and then when you turn something on – like an indicator or brake light – the alarm would go off. While your driving. Well that’s really annoying. We pulled over and I switched the siren off under the bonnet and realised the spare keys were in the boot and probably getting pushed by something the therefore setting the alarm, I moved the spare keys/alarm and that seemed to fix the issue. We followed the winding road out of Porepunkah and began the acsent, getting steeper and tighter wityh every kilometer. We stopped at Eurobin Falls and trekked the several hundred meters up to the lookout, passing people swimming in the rock pools and thinking if there is a next time, we’ll bring some shorts and a towel. With Tom running ahead and Nath complaing about how far it was, we reached the lookout for some photos. The walk back down was a bit easier, but not much. Back in the car – yes it was still there – I worry sometimes, we continued up the mountain, with tyres scraping on the bodywork occasioanally due to the tightness of the curves. I was doing a bit of reminiscing as the last time I did this it was wintertime and I was probably 12 years old and in the back of my mum and dad’s HR Holden. What a wonderful time. Good memories. But better memories doing it now
The road levelled out near the top and we took a left to the Mt Buffalo Chalet. My memory of a beautiful old building was not wrong as we came in close and parked in the carpark of the three storey structure. Looking freshly painted, with curtains blowing out from the open upstairs windows it looked very much like I remembered. However there also seemed to be something eerily not right. There were no other vehicles to be seen and no other people anywhere. We walked up the stairs to the locked front door and peered in. Everything was immaculate – walls, flooring, furniture – it appeared as if it was open and trading as an old fashioned hotel and accommodation. But it wasn’t. We walked around the immaculate gardens, with the flowering plants and the green manicured lawn. It was easy to envision a time back in 1906 when it first opened - there were ladies in their frilly long gowns, holding parasols to block out the sun from their fair skin, and gentlemen wearing suits, top hats and filling their pipes with locally grown tobacco from the valley floor below. But it wasn’t. Even though there must have been a caretaker onsite to have opened the windows, there was no sign of life. We were told later that the Chalet had been built in 1906 and the owners (Victoria Railways) had a 99 year lease on the building and land. That expired in 2005. The railway had then sold it to private investors who had been attempting to negotiate a suitable lease since then. Fights with Government, fights with greenies. So it sits here un-occupied, but well maintained and ready to open.
The lookout from here is spectacular, with views to the north and east across many mountain ranges, which in winter - like the perfectly manicured garden we were now standing in - would be covered in a deep blanket of white snow. We could have spent longer here, but I wanted to keep going up further to the top. I remember the frozen lake, the toboggan runs and the smaller chalets from when I was a child.
The alarm on the Fury was playing up again too, repeatedly setting itself while driving, then flashing the indicators front and rear while driving to show the alarm was going off. A little frustrating and more than a little worrying. We stopped and pulled the batteries out of the second remote control thinking perhaps there was some conflict between the two remotes being in close proximity, and while this seemed to fix it temporarily, it did not fix it permanently. Also a little disconcerting was the time it was taking us to get to the top. The sun was going down and in the twilight I was thinking to myself I don’t want to be driving down nearly 40 kilometres to the bottom in the dark, but it was looking like we probably will. This run was also a mission in preparation to see how the Fury performed going up a long mountain - tomorrow is Hotham – and equally how the brakes hold out going down a mountain. Two and a half ton car, drum brakes all round – I’ve been told you’ll get at least one good stop out of them, but maybe more than one is required. Hadn’t planned on doing the downhill in the dark. With an alarm that just won’t quit.
We passed Lake Catani on the left and stopped for a photo. There was a lone 4WD camping far away on the other side, with the sun setting and creating a yellow glow it looked awesome. A nice place to come back one day? Nathan commented how the mountain had suddenly flattened out – around every bend there was a new flat and green area. In the wintertime, Mt Buffalo is renowned for snow-play and tobogganing and these areas were exactly that. Only now covered in grass instead of snow. The first main area you come to is Dingo Dell with a Chalet that was closed, then a few k’s further on is Cresta Valley. The chalet that was once here is now gone. We were told later it had burnt down and the greenies were arguing it shouldn’t be re-built. It was a very lonely and rather desolate area. We seemed to have fixed the alarm to, as it was no longer setting itself. From the last area, the road wound up a little higher to a carpark, then turned into a dirt road to the top of the mountain – The Horn. I’d never done the walk to the top as it is closed off in the winter due to snow. We weren’t about to do it now either as the road was very corrugated and very dirt. We tried for 20 metres, then reversed up. Not going to see the top today either.
And so as the sun set behind the rocky outcrop at the top of Mt Buffalo, we turned the Plymouth around and began the 37 kilomtre trip back down the windy road to our Motel in Bright. We had been having such a fabulous time, we’d all forgotten about tea and now the hunger was starting to set in. Darkness set in before we even got back to the main Chalet turnoff and the yellow headlights were soon trying to light the way. High beam in the trees, low beam dipping USA style to the right. Must fix that one day with some Australian complianced left dipping headlights. On reflection, the journey back to the valley below in the dark was just as exciting as the trip up. I really haven’t driven this car in the dark much, I don’t know how the brakes perform, I didn’t know if it would overheat pulling up 40klms of steep windy roads. (It didn’t J). Everything we were doing was a new experience and very memorable.
It was almost 9.30 when we finally drove into Bright – only to discover pretty much all the takeaway food places were closed – including a couple of pubs that had finished serving meals at 8.30. Nathan and Tom both wanted pizza, I just wanted something. There was a great looking hamburger joint right alongside Woolies – closed. There was a Italian restaurant open, but there must have been 100 people inside sitting down. Obviously because that was the only place open. Woolies was open, so we found a large car park and went in for noodles, chips, chocolate cake (for Nath), hot cross buns (for Tom), and some knives and forks as we’d forgotten them. So it was a delicious meal of noodles and hot cross buns, not the start to our culninary journey we’d thought. I even made the mistake of buying some other weird brand of noodles because they looked good on the pack when in reality I should have stuck with the Indo Mie Mi trusted ones. Laying back on the bed, reflecting on the awesome day we’d just had and looking forward to an amazing trip tomorrow, I realised it was now 11.30 and probably time to get Nath and Tom off the free wi-fi and get some shut eye.
Tuesday.
I’d been watching the weather forecast for the last 10 days and it has consistently shown 70% possible showers for today and tomorrow, but being summer and aclimatised to Bendigo, I gave only a passing thought to the possibility of us getting wet. Those thoughts were very short lived when we woke up this morning and looked outside. Black clouds, very low and covering the tops of the nearby hills. It was still dry outside now, but by 8am the heavens opened up and it poured rain for nearly an hour. This was the first time the Plymouth had been wet since having owned it. Bound to happen sometime I suppose, but probably not ideal this morning with the planned trek up Mt Hotham and the potential for the car filling up with water. The clouds were moving fast and by the time we’d had breakfast – hot cross buns and some of the Greek salad I had bought last night to go with my noodles – the rain had passed and there was some blue sky appearing. We had the roof up and we were full of excitement as we pulled out of the Motel and onto the road heading for Woolies for some supplies for the next couple of days. We had no inclination that our day was about to take a turn for the worse. We pulled up outside Woolies, locked the Fury and headed in for some shopping. Back at the car a few minutes later I pushed the button on the alarm and nothing happened. The alarm was still set. Immobiliser on, no ignition or starter. That’s going to be an issue. I pulled the bonnet and disconnected the battery. Didn’t fix it. Found the spare remote – in pieces from last night – put it back together and tried disarming using that. Nup. A little feeling of despair was beginning to set in. It shouldn’t be this hard. Here we are - Nath and Tom sitting on the grass kerb, me sitting in the car trying to determine what has happened. The remotes aren’t disarming the alarm, pulling the battery is not re-setting the alarm. It seems we have a problem. We all sat there for a while absorbing what has happened and how it might affect our day. Not in a good way we were thinking.
As the ice was slowly melting in the esky and the beer was getting warm, I decided we should go for a walk to both of the service stations to see if they knew of an auto electrician in town. That seemed like a long shot – especially after asking the Indian guy in the United station when he replies “What?”. We tried the Shell and to my relief the guy said “Yeah, just a couple of k’s down the road heading out of town. Then you’ll need to turn right and head a k or so and he’ll be on your left.” What a relief I thought and what a nice guy compared to the other idiot across the road. It was around 11am now, the sun was shining, the grass was green, families with kids were playing on the banks and in the river, but it seemed we were walking to a meeting with our destiny. This holiday could take a real turn towards disappointment. Nathan commented as we went past the creek “how come Bendigo doesn’t have lawn down to the edge of our creek”? We walked, and walked – it was humid now and we were sweating and complaining about sweating. We found the road and turned right and kept walking. Of course the electrician was right down the far end. What a relief to find there was actually an auto electrician and the nice guy in the Shell servo was not lying to us for a joke.
Our initial discussion with the electrician was not good. He simply replied “Nah, can’t do it. I hate alarms. Eventualy they always stuff up, it’s just a matter of time. You should just rip the bloody thing out”. Yeah that’s ok, but not really going to happen now. He went on to say how much of a pickle we were in. He was booked solid for a couple of weeks with everyone wanting their jobs done today. He then thought for a little while and said I might be able to have a quick look at it over his lunch break as sometimes it’s only a wire or two to cut and the alarm is isolated. I bet that’s not the case I thought. I remember when I had the alarm installed I made sure the guys at Auto Addiction knew how paranoid I was and how no-one was ever going to steal this baby. Anyway, with that good news, we walked all the way back to the Fury still parked in the street near Woolies and now waited for our savior to arrive. To us it seemed like a long, long time, but eventually he pulled up and crawled under the dash near the ignition switch. He says “Well this’ll be easy – looks like just one wire. Which he promptly cut. He goes “try it now”. Which I did – and it started and just sat there idling. Well, we all thought, how satisfying is that sound? He had to cut and re-solder another wire as the indicators were flashing as the alarm thought things were being tampered with. But that was it. $150 later we thanked him so much then waved him on his way. Followed by a very relieved and happy us being on our way. Disaster avoided, situation back to normal, except about 3 hours late
The road out of Bright to Harrietville followed the river valley towards Mt Hotham. Very green, lots of flowers and a very beautiful drive. The Fury was lovin’ it. At the end of the valley you could see the mountain looming ahead and this is where we were going. There was no other way out of the valley except up. We stopped in Harrietville at the toilets, asked Tom and Nath if they wanted lunch – to which they replied Nah, let’s just keep going as we’re so late. I was trying to mentally prepare for the 40 kilometre steep winding road up to the top of Mt Hotham, but also thinking we might not make it to tonights campground at Victoria Falls which was way over the other side of Hotham before nightfall. Oh well, here goes – onwards and upwards. Out of Harrietville the road immediately changed from a sweeping flowing wide road into a steep very winding mountain road. Second gear sharp corners, front tyres scraping on guards, the sound of the engine pulling, the throb from the exhaust. Tree ferns, views, lookouts – it was sensational. Amazing feeling and still a huge relief to be back on the road. We let several other vehicles pass us as we were soaking up the atmosphere and they were obviously in a hurry, and saw some exotic vehicles coming down – Porches, two Lamborghini’s and several other sports cars. With all that had happened from this morning when we left the motel, we’d forgotten about the weather forecast for today. Showers, now an 80% chance. And looking up ahead there were some very ominous thick black clouds that kept hovering right above Mt Hotham. As we got higher, but still below the winter snowline, a misty rain began to fall and I breathed a sigh of relief as I turned on the wipers and they worked. The road was now wet – and probably slippery – but we were travelling slowly taking in this amazing scenery. Such a change from 38 degrees yesterday. Tom was apprehensive of the road and a little scared we were going to crash off the side. He seemed genuinely upset and would not look to the side and into the valley. With the roof and windows now up, we reached the snowline where the trees suddenly disappear and are replaced with small tea tree type bushes, and then small shrubs. The rain was getting heavier and there were some leaks beginning to appear from around the top of the windows, but there didn’t seem to be anything too serious. We stopped at a lookout and could see the road almost at the top of Hotham across the valley. We would be there shortly and the rain was getting steadily heavier. We had the wipers on constantly now, when suddenly hailstones started hitting us – bouncing of the bonnet, windscreen and hearing them pound the vinyl roof. They weren’t big, about the size of a pea, but extremely loud. And how big does a hailstone have to be before it punches a hole through a vinyl roof? Don’t know. Nathan took some video and it’s quite scary to listen to. There were no opportunities to stop under cover – there was no cover of any sort. We pulled over several times just to take it all in. Who would have thought this was next. And I guess that’s what made this roadtrip so exciting and memorable. It was being so far away from home – so far away from help – into the unkown – anything could happen – it already had. Very exciting.
You could tell we were very near the top when we rounded a bend and there was the entrance tunnel into Hotham Village. The hail had stopped and the rain was easing. Was that the sun breaking through the clouds? There were quite a lot of vehicles – mostly four wheel drives – but it seemed like nothing was open. There were no people, just us. We wandered around and I was thinking we needed to ask if there was accommodation available here for the night. It was now getting late, around 4.30 and there was no way we were going to our planned campsite. Luckily the tourist info building was open, although closing in 5 minutes, and after both Nath and Tom used the toilets, we just made it in as they were locking up. The assistant said there was nothing open at Hotham, but there was a place a few k’s down the road at Dinner Plain. After a few more photo opportunities, we jumped back in the Fury and made our way down to Dinner Plain. Her directions were accurate and we found the High Plains Hotel easily. The bar was open and the owner was helpful in getting us a room ($180) for the night and even allowed us to use their kitchen after we mentioned we had all our camping BBQ food - which we’d planned to use at our campsite. The room was good, Tom cooked us bacon, sausages, hamburgers and I had the last of the Greek salad from last night. After dinner we went walking outside and explored what there was to explore. It was dark, deserted and cold. Back in the pub and in front of the open fire, we bought a round of drinks just before the bar closed then retired to the room so the boys could use the wifi. It had been a big, big day and I think we all had a great nights’ sleep.
Wednesday.
The next day dawned foggy and cold – was this winter? We packed up the car and I was silently thinking to myself I wonder what could possible go wrong today? Nothing did. Not for the rest of the roadtrip, but at this moment, who would know what was going to bite us. Out of Dinner Plain we turned right onto the Alpine Highway and began the descent towards Omeo and a re-fuelling stop. From the steep, winding road on the western ascent to Hotham, the road down to Omeo is the opposite. Apart from obviously going down instead of up, it was almost flat – very gradual, with no sharp corners, just what appeared to be a normal road. Only the occasional glimpse through the tree showed how high up we were. It was a really nice drive down – so much so that I missed the turnoff to Victoria falls by quite a bit. I had wanted to have a look at where we nearly stayed last night, but now we’ll never know. Omeo is a sleepy little town with a tiny IGA and a tiny service station. With a lot of inquisitive looks from locals, will filled up with food and fuel. Pretty much all the vehicles we’d seen since Mt Hotham had been 4 wheel drives, trucks and utes. To see a ’60’s American convertible in town and on these roads was probably a little unusual. Out of Omeo we headed down through Tongio, Swifts Creek and Ensay, all the while closely following the winding Tambo River to Bruthen where we turned left and began our journey towards Buchan. This road is very smooth, wide and flowing - another contrasting but thoroughly enjoyable drive. I can’t remember when we put the roof down, but it was a little warmer and Nath reckons we don’t look cool with it up and maybe we were getting a little sunburnt now. We turned left again and covered the last 30k’s into Buchan. We were camping in the Buchan Caves reserve and the last time I had been here was a bit like Mt Buffalo two days earlier. I was a little kid, maybe a bit older than Tom, but not by much. I remember bits about the caves and when we saw the entrance to the reserve, I remembered seeing or driving under that with mum and dad. We found our campsite and after negotiating several speed humps with audible scraping noises and with campers stopping what they were doing to look, we pulled up and started unloading our stuff. As we pulled out all our camping gear, I’m sure you could almost hear the other campers – in their caravans, big tents and annexes just saying who are these people and wtf? A little misty rain had begun to fall and putting up the brand new tent for the first time was a challenge. But only the first time, it will be easy from now on. We booked some tours of the caves for tomorrow, sat back on the deck chairs and relaxed. As there was no phone reception for me and Nathan had very poor reception on Telstra (and therefore no internet), we did some exploring to the spring-fed swimming pool and then up past Moon cave to the top of the hill. We crawled into Moon cave by the light of my phone for 5mtrs until we came to a padlocked iron gate, but it was very tight and most likely dangerous so we backed out quickly. Tom wanted to cook the BBQ again tonight – of which he did a great job. Might have a chef on our hands there. We explored the reserve after tea, from the cave entrances to the Glamping Tents at the rich end of the grounds. There were no-one in these glamping tents, but we did notice there was a large firepit with some warm coals – maybe from last night? - which attracted Tom’s attention. It was getting dark, so Tom did what Tom does and proceeded to get the fire going and we sat down for some fire-play. We also thought we could probably steal some power from the un-protected outlets as I’d been too stingy to purchase a powered site and the guys electrics were almost flat. We had a spare Genset battery for lighting which also had chargers, but it was much more exciting to use someone else’s power. As we climbed into bed that night – with Nath doing some complaining about no-way he’s sleeping on the mouldy bit of the mattress - I was thankful that everything was going so well, and we were having just the best time.
Thursday.
We were booked to do a tour of the Royal cave this morning, which we were all looking forward to. Both Nathan and Tom have never been inside a cave like these and I was looking forward to the experience again. I kind of remembered them from 50 years ago, but then again maybe I remember them being talked about, or remember photos. There was only one other family on the tour with us, which made it easy to ask questions and felt more personal. We all enjoyed the 45 minute tour and I think it was very much like I remembered, apparently the stalactites grow 1mm every 10 years, so in 50 years it hadn’t changed very much at all. We had another cave tour booked this arvo, so after lunch we walked up to the Fairy Cave. We explored around the back of the cave entrance and Nathan photographed some huge rolling hills he said woud make a great screen saver. Interesting to see if he does. Tom was climbing over the entrance building when I spotted a caramel coloured 1mtr long snake slithering past close by. Probably not going to kill us, but that certainly put a stop to us exploring the cave entrance and the surrounding area. The guide for this tour was the same girl from the first one, and it was another small group of people. This cave is in the same underground limestone river cavern as the Royal cave so they are very much the same – kind of like if you’ve seen one you’ve seen ‘em all. But it was still good doing both. After the tour , and on the way back to the campsite we decided to take a detour and walk the 2.5klms to Spring Creek Falls. About 100mtre in there was a choice where we could take the high well made track or the rougher track that led down towards the creek at the bottom of the valley. The kids wanted to take the easy top track and that made a lot more sense. So we took the rougher track down to the creek and then began to follow it upstream. It was kind of a track, but not really. With bees at one crossing frightening Nathan and almost stopping him from proceeding any further. We wound our way deeper an deeper into the dark forest, with no other living souls around for miles. We saw a lyrebird (I think it was..) but nothing much else. For most of the time it reminded me of the Blair Witch Project. We never did get to the falls, we stopped where the track branched into two and weret exactly sure which way to go. We played around splashing each other by throwing rocks into the watrer, then decided to head back to the campsite. Along the way I remembered when I was a kid, blowing through gum leaves between your thumbs to make weird sounds. I tried using some leaf I found, and was able to show Tom how to do it. We laughed as he made strange squealing and quacking duck-like sounds. We would faintly hear someone up on the top trak talking and we were wondering what they were thinking of these strange noises. There were no eucalyptus trees in this valley close to the river, but we found numerous different ones that worked. All this fun came to an abrubt halt when Tom picked up a leaf off a small plant just as I was about to say “Stinging Nettle!!!” Too late. Ouch, immediate pain and screaming. Even after washing his finger in the freezing river water, the pain remained for an hour or more and took the enjoyment off the little adventure up the creek. But in hindsight, it was just another part of the road-trip – an experience and something to remember. And by the time we were walking back through the campground, he was again looking for leaves to make these annoying sounds. The boys were getting a bit tired of BBQ food and both had been wanting something substantial – like a pub meal. So we did. We fired up the Fury and heading into town and were lucky enough that the only place open also happened to be the only pub. Parmas looked excellent, I had the hot one, Nathan had the BBQ one and tom had a massive bowl of nacho’s. Really massive with separate bowls of sauce, sour cream and guacamole. How substantial is that. We each had a coke and bitters – after puzzled looks from the young female bartender – and having to explain twice actually what coke and bitters is. She finally made three schooners for us. I don’t see how it can be so hard. Very few people are aware this is a drink. The parmas chips and salads were huge and delicious and topped off our stay in Buchan.
This was our last night camping here and after tea we again went up to the Glamping end of town and lit a fire in the firepit to play with. Earlier that day I had met – Gary – the man in the F truck who’d been interested in the Fury, but then only seemed interested in telling me about himself. As Nathan and Tom were charging Tom’s Nintendo later that night I went to the toilet and as I came out there was Gary and he was in a talkative mood. Must have held me up for over half an hour – long enough for both the boys to get worried and come looking for me. Gary’s now my best mate. As we crawled into bed – it had been a big day - Nath was still complaining about the mouldy bit, but I wasn’t listening.
Friday.
I was not looking forward to packing up the campsite, or any campsite really, because your holiday is usually over. But this time it was overshadowed by the excitement of hitting the road again towards the beach at Lakes Entrance. By 10 o’clock we’d (I’d) packed up all our stuff and stored it back into the Fury. With the car now lowered to 60mm off the ground again, we said our goodbyes to our campsite – and to Gary who was also leaving and pulled up in the F truck for a half hour chat. Until his kid started punching on the horn for him to hurry up…We scraped our way over the numerous speed humps leaving the reserve and drove away with roof down and the temperature rising. It was going to be a hot day. On Wednesday driving into the Buchan township or the first time Nathan shouted out “Hey did ya see that!” I said what? Apparently we’d passed what looked like a mechanics on the right with several old Japanese wrecks laying around outside. Nath had spyed a 240/260Z. As we left the township today we again went past the same yard before we’d realized and drove on a little further before we decided to turn around, go back and check it out. If there’s someone there with a shotgun, we’ll leave. Turned out there was only one bloke there who loved a chat. We got the tour. Inside he showed us his un-restored ’62 Plymouth and we got talking about left hand drive verses right hand drive, he showed us his MK1 Escort 2 door, his Datsun 260Z and a couple of his numerous bikes that he owned. Outside he showed us his son’s late ’70 Corona with an NA 13B. Then his Landcruiser wagon that had cut into a 4 door ute and fitted a 6.8ltr Silverado turbo engine, engineered airbag suspension so he could lower the truck enough to get trailers on to the towbar hitch. We saw a Series 1 RX7 in a very poor state, another 260Z in a worse state, A mid ‘80’s Mazda 626 with a 3.8ltr Commodore V6 under the bonnet – with a turbo charger and oil pump, pipes and associated stuff in the boot and to top it off a 20B triple rotor Cosmo that he’d bought as a parts car for his “good one” that he has parked somewhere else.
Shit, there was cool stuff everywhere. We took photos and talked about what a shame most of these cars were out in the open. And it rains in Buchan. We said our goodbyes and as we pulled away we reflected on how good that just was, and how happy we were that we’d turned around.
We followed the same road south out of Buchan as we’d came in, but when reaching the Bruthen- Nowa Nowa road, should have turned left instead of turning right. Left would have taken us the short way to Nowa Nowa then on the Princes Highway to Lakes Entrance. 45 minutes longer was the way we went back to Bruthen then down to the lakes. But hey it didn’t matter as we were not on a time schedule, we were just exploring. And by going this way we stopped at The Blueberry Fields and purchased some farm fresh blueberries and a couple of fresh blueberry muffins.
We turned left onto the Princes Highway and after stopping at the impressive lookout over the lakes we cruised down across the bridge and into the main street of Lakes Entrance. It’s still a buzz – everytime you drive the Fury – people always stop and look. You kind of avoid looking at them, but you can feel them looking at you. Will never get sick of that. The motel was on this road at the other end of town and was easy to find. We pulled in, signed in and unloaded our stuff out of the backseat. Nath hopped on his phone with free wifi and Tom and me jumped in the pool. Both the boys had been hanging out for pizza from the first night in Bright, so I had no choice, tonight was gonna be the night. We spent several lazy hours walking across the bridge to the open ocean and sitting on the sand, watching people (girls), watching waves. Then walking down past the giant amusement park to check out where the pizza shop was, then back to the motel for a rest. At teatime we walked again back past the amusement park to the pizza shop and placed our order. We waited 40 minutes, then sat in the park to eat. Yep enjoyable. With some pizza left over for breakfast we walked back to the motel and checked them in the fridge, then walked back to the amusement park. We watched some people on a massive spinning ride – then Tom had a go on the trampolines. Back at the motel the boys took advantage of the free wifi while I fell asleep.
Saturday.
Before Christmas while sitting around the Clubhouse having a beer with Deano, I had mentioned we were doing a road-trip with the Fury and possibly returning through Gippsland. In a previous life he had been a delivery driver for pool chemical company and had spent some time in the Lakes region. He had stayed at the Metung Pub numerous times and reckons it’s “Best pub in the world.” Gonna have to check it out and get a photo. This morning we had to be out by 10 so we packed up and said good bye to Lakes Entrance. It was another hot day with the roof down, and it was only a short drive along the Princes Highway then a left turn following the green treed banks of the Tambo river towards Metung. Just one more beautiful drive to remember. We’d followed the Tambo several days earlier from just south of Omeo all the way to Bruthen before turning off to Buchan Caves. Metung was once an old fishing town nestled on Lake blah, but now a trendy port for million dollar boats and babes. Driving through the town it was obvious there was nowhere to close-by to park so we continued through the town to the boat ramp. We parked under a large pine tree (and I’m still vacuuming out pine needles lodged in crevasses…) and locked up the car. Just as we were about to walk away a guy came over and was admiring the car. He has a 68 Camaro and we chatted for over half an hour about the pro’s and con’s of changing his Camaro to right hand drive – I said no way – don’t do it. A lot of the uniqueness and excitement of driving an American classic is to drive it as it was built. Exciting every time. We walked back into town, past the market – that’s why the town is packed with cars and people – and we found the Metung Pub. We strolled out along the pier, past all kinds of boats – from smallish ski boats to huge ocean going luxury yachts. Back in the pub we ordered a bitters and coke each and got the usual weird look from the young female bartender. After explaining exactly what a bitters and coke was she reluctantly made three schooners and we sat down to take in the view. I took some pics and sent them to Dean. Hopefully we were sitting in the right pub and hadn’t wasted an explanation to a bartender. It was the right one.
We had a quick walk around the market on the off chance there was something there to buy for mum, but sadly the sun and the flies and the dust drove us away. We walked back along the shoreline boardwalk until it stopped, then found our way through a motel carpark and back to the Fury which luckily was still there. I put the steering lock on whenever we leave the car, but now without the alarm it is a little worrying. After a long drink of sparkling water, we piled into the hot vinyl front seat and headed back out of town the same way we’d came in. Then left onto the Princes Highway and we headed towards Bairnsdale.
As a kid I remember mum and dad taking me to Seaspray and Golden Beach on the Ninety Mile Beach and I’d planned on taking Nath and Tom there on the way through to Kellies today. I can remember back then as a 10 or 12 year old running on the beach with nothing but sand in both directions – no rocks, no headlands, just beach as far as you can see. I’m assuming it’s still the same. Just the other side of Bairsdale we’d been told there was a public (free) weighbridge so we were keeping an eye out for that to0 get an idea of what this big American weighs. Surprisingly, without us in the vehicle – but loaded with all our gear – it came in at 2340kgs. Probably need to check that because the standard dry weight out of the factory 1665kgs. Did we have 675kgs extra in luggage?
We followed the Prices highway through to Sale (where I should have filled up with fuel), then we turned left on to the Longford road heading towards Seasprat on the coast. Thought there’d be a fuel station in Longford – nup. Seaspray – nup. The Honeysuckles on the beach – nup. Although there was a honey – according to Nathan – in the fish and chip shop where we had lunch…… But no fuel. I had wanted to do the triangle along the Ninety Mile Beach up to Golden Beach, then back to Lonford and Sale. But now with ony a quarter of a tank of fuel, that was looking a bit shaky. We drove short distance with our fish and chips to a carpark on the beach and parked just as a guy on what looked liked a racing motorbike pulled up. He came over to us and was admiring the Fury. Then, as we seem to attract odd people, while rolling a joint he began telling us all about his 2018 MV Augusta 800cc triple one of 250 in the world one of 10 in Australia, titanium exhaust factory stickered – the only thing he wanted to change was the rear sprocket so he could crack the 300kph mark. Current top speed was 294. He lived here in The Honeysuckles in a house h’ed bought outright for reasons we didn’t want to know. We thought he was going to tell us when he suddenly said have a great trip – see ya later. As he sped off through the gears – probably up to the bikes maximum speed – we wondered for a second what his real story was. Another character to share part of the journey. There was still the issue of being a lttle short on fuel, so I decided not to push our luck and just head back to Sale the way we came and save the 40klms extra through Golden Beach. A little disappointing, but not the end of the workd- like it would be if we ran out of fuel. The cruise back to Sale is just a flat, pretty much straight road. We filled up at the first servo we saw and bought three Calipo’s. On the road again heading into the afternoon sun, we kicked back and let the miles roll beneqath us through Rosedale, Traralgon and into Morwell. We stopped once to be ripped off by a roadside fruit stand offering cherries, mangoes and strawberries. You’d think these would be at farm prices – but no – equal to or dearer than your local supermarket. You learn. But we did get to talk to a guy that apparently owns one of the 15 Dodge Chargers that were built for the newer Dukes of Hazzard movie. He brought it in from the States a year or so back and we spent some time listening to him. Then listening to another guy tell us about his trip today around Gippsland because he had nothing else to do.
We arrived at Kellies around 4 pm and all of us were exhausted. I was good to be out of the sun. We weren’t sure on what to have for tea, so it was decided Red Rooster would do. Nath had his normal bbq something, but Tom chose a cheese burger which he reckons was the best one he’s ever had. He’s most likely only ever had two. Someone – I think it was me – said it would be ok for Tom to watch a South Park episode. Kellie has them all, so he chose the very first one. It was still as bad as I remember, but Kellie and Tom were loving it. We watched several more episodes before I said enough is enough. We made our beds and hit the sack for the last time on our roadtrip.
Sunday.
Last day. Wow. What a fantastic time we’d had and like everything good, all over so quickly. There were a huge amount of memories, I hope the boy’s enjoyed this as much as I had. We were calling into Shanes today on the way past and we were packed up and ready to leave Kellies around 11am. It’s still another hour and a half to Berwick, then 20 mins down Clyde road, which seemed slow and clogged with heavy traffic, but probably normal. It was nice to relax Shane’s and checkout their new boat. We shared a beer, but any more and I’d be going to sleep. It was around 4 pm when I gathered the effort for the final leg along the Monash, through the tunnel, then Calder freeway home. Courage is needed driving the narrow lanes of the freeway – I’m sure they’re getting smaller, and the tunnel is no fun at all. Very narrow, dark and smelly. The freeway soon cleared out and we made one more stop at Macca’s at Calder park. We were mostly quiet for the remaining 2 hours home, maybe reminiscing, maybe nothing more to say or maybe just tired. I could only keep thinking what an amazing time we’d had. From the moment we’d left home a week earlier – the good stuff and the bad (alarm issue) but really there had been nothing else negative – if you discount Tom’s run-in with the stinging nettle, Nathan’s dislike for the mould on the mattress and getting held up talking at every fuel stop. We wee still half an hour out of Bendigo when dusk set in and I decided to go the long way through town to avoid animals on the road. As the last few miles rolled under us and the sun was disappearing below the horizon, we took a couple of photos of the sunset over the bonnet of the Fury – cruising along at 60mph with the road laid out in front of us. We were privileged. That photo said it all.
So many fond memories of a great time, from back when I was a kid and now doing it again with my kids. That was the wonderful thing about this road-trip. I’d like to believe Nathan and Tom will remember this for ever and hopefully someday in the future when I’m not around, re-count these memories to their kids. Or even better, perhaps do the same trip with their kids - remembering what it was like the first time they did it with their old man in the Fury.
Monday 7th January.
Soon after we bought the Plymouth I thought it would be nice to do a roadtrip with the boys each year to destinations that you would not normally visit. Like to Philip Island, Bathurst, Great Ocean Road and similar. We did Philip Island the first year – holiday house, Kustom Nationals at the racetrack – and we went back again the following year also. But nothing last year.
So this year we decided we’d go somewhere – probably the Great Ocean Road. As usual I’d left it too late to organize (December 2018) and accommodation would be scarce. Plan B was discussed – Mt Hotham, Buchan Caves, Lakes Entrance - which seemed like a good alternative. We booked some campsites and a couple of motels and we were ready to hit the road.
With the Plymouth packed up with tent, mattresses, bedding, chairs, eskies, BBQ, food and clothes, we left for Bright on Monday 7th January 2019. With the roof down we enjoyed the drive north east across Victoria to Bright – stopping at Rushworth for a photo at the abandoned service station (where a guy pulled up and asked if we were looking for fuel….), stopping at Murchison for a photo at Thornebridge - the seemingly abandoned double story mansion, then again at Benalla Macca’s and Woolies for some lunch and food/ice/beer. Then back on the freeway for a short drive to Glenrowan Service Centre for fuel. By now it was a hot day and sunburn was setting in, so we layered up for another coating of sunscreen.
It was a wonderful feeling cruising along knowing how far we had to go today, but also realizing what adventures ahead were waiting for us. As we got further away from home, it was going to be a long way back to Bendigo no matter which way you went. It added to the excitement of the unknown. People look at you with dismay as you cruise along with the roof down on a 38 degree day – they’re travelling in silence in their insulated SUV’s ,with their air cons on max, kids playing DVD’s or listening to music, and here we are in a dinosaur from the ‘60s travelling along with them.
Just after the fuel stop we left the freeway and headed east towards Milawa. A very picturesque drive through a valley with towering mountains beginning to appear on both sides all the way into Bright. Had never been to Bright that I can remember – all the times coming to Mt Buffalo as a kid with mum and dad we always turned off the Porepunkah and headed up the hill. And after checking in to the motel, having a swim to cool off and a rest, that’s just what we did. We fired up the Fury once again and set out for the summit of Mt Buffalo. So far today the car had performed faultlessly, but just now the alarm had set itself while driving and then when you turn something on – like an indicator or brake light – the alarm would go off. While your driving. Well that’s really annoying. We pulled over and I switched the siren off under the bonnet and realised the spare keys were in the boot and probably getting pushed by something the therefore setting the alarm, I moved the spare keys/alarm and that seemed to fix the issue. We followed the winding road out of Porepunkah and began the acsent, getting steeper and tighter wityh every kilometer. We stopped at Eurobin Falls and trekked the several hundred meters up to the lookout, passing people swimming in the rock pools and thinking if there is a next time, we’ll bring some shorts and a towel. With Tom running ahead and Nath complaing about how far it was, we reached the lookout for some photos. The walk back down was a bit easier, but not much. Back in the car – yes it was still there – I worry sometimes, we continued up the mountain, with tyres scraping on the bodywork occasioanally due to the tightness of the curves. I was doing a bit of reminiscing as the last time I did this it was wintertime and I was probably 12 years old and in the back of my mum and dad’s HR Holden. What a wonderful time. Good memories. But better memories doing it now
The road levelled out near the top and we took a left to the Mt Buffalo Chalet. My memory of a beautiful old building was not wrong as we came in close and parked in the carpark of the three storey structure. Looking freshly painted, with curtains blowing out from the open upstairs windows it looked very much like I remembered. However there also seemed to be something eerily not right. There were no other vehicles to be seen and no other people anywhere. We walked up the stairs to the locked front door and peered in. Everything was immaculate – walls, flooring, furniture – it appeared as if it was open and trading as an old fashioned hotel and accommodation. But it wasn’t. We walked around the immaculate gardens, with the flowering plants and the green manicured lawn. It was easy to envision a time back in 1906 when it first opened - there were ladies in their frilly long gowns, holding parasols to block out the sun from their fair skin, and gentlemen wearing suits, top hats and filling their pipes with locally grown tobacco from the valley floor below. But it wasn’t. Even though there must have been a caretaker onsite to have opened the windows, there was no sign of life. We were told later that the Chalet had been built in 1906 and the owners (Victoria Railways) had a 99 year lease on the building and land. That expired in 2005. The railway had then sold it to private investors who had been attempting to negotiate a suitable lease since then. Fights with Government, fights with greenies. So it sits here un-occupied, but well maintained and ready to open.
The lookout from here is spectacular, with views to the north and east across many mountain ranges, which in winter - like the perfectly manicured garden we were now standing in - would be covered in a deep blanket of white snow. We could have spent longer here, but I wanted to keep going up further to the top. I remember the frozen lake, the toboggan runs and the smaller chalets from when I was a child.
The alarm on the Fury was playing up again too, repeatedly setting itself while driving, then flashing the indicators front and rear while driving to show the alarm was going off. A little frustrating and more than a little worrying. We stopped and pulled the batteries out of the second remote control thinking perhaps there was some conflict between the two remotes being in close proximity, and while this seemed to fix it temporarily, it did not fix it permanently. Also a little disconcerting was the time it was taking us to get to the top. The sun was going down and in the twilight I was thinking to myself I don’t want to be driving down nearly 40 kilometres to the bottom in the dark, but it was looking like we probably will. This run was also a mission in preparation to see how the Fury performed going up a long mountain - tomorrow is Hotham – and equally how the brakes hold out going down a mountain. Two and a half ton car, drum brakes all round – I’ve been told you’ll get at least one good stop out of them, but maybe more than one is required. Hadn’t planned on doing the downhill in the dark. With an alarm that just won’t quit.
We passed Lake Catani on the left and stopped for a photo. There was a lone 4WD camping far away on the other side, with the sun setting and creating a yellow glow it looked awesome. A nice place to come back one day? Nathan commented how the mountain had suddenly flattened out – around every bend there was a new flat and green area. In the wintertime, Mt Buffalo is renowned for snow-play and tobogganing and these areas were exactly that. Only now covered in grass instead of snow. The first main area you come to is Dingo Dell with a Chalet that was closed, then a few k’s further on is Cresta Valley. The chalet that was once here is now gone. We were told later it had burnt down and the greenies were arguing it shouldn’t be re-built. It was a very lonely and rather desolate area. We seemed to have fixed the alarm to, as it was no longer setting itself. From the last area, the road wound up a little higher to a carpark, then turned into a dirt road to the top of the mountain – The Horn. I’d never done the walk to the top as it is closed off in the winter due to snow. We weren’t about to do it now either as the road was very corrugated and very dirt. We tried for 20 metres, then reversed up. Not going to see the top today either.
And so as the sun set behind the rocky outcrop at the top of Mt Buffalo, we turned the Plymouth around and began the 37 kilomtre trip back down the windy road to our Motel in Bright. We had been having such a fabulous time, we’d all forgotten about tea and now the hunger was starting to set in. Darkness set in before we even got back to the main Chalet turnoff and the yellow headlights were soon trying to light the way. High beam in the trees, low beam dipping USA style to the right. Must fix that one day with some Australian complianced left dipping headlights. On reflection, the journey back to the valley below in the dark was just as exciting as the trip up. I really haven’t driven this car in the dark much, I don’t know how the brakes perform, I didn’t know if it would overheat pulling up 40klms of steep windy roads. (It didn’t J). Everything we were doing was a new experience and very memorable.
It was almost 9.30 when we finally drove into Bright – only to discover pretty much all the takeaway food places were closed – including a couple of pubs that had finished serving meals at 8.30. Nathan and Tom both wanted pizza, I just wanted something. There was a great looking hamburger joint right alongside Woolies – closed. There was a Italian restaurant open, but there must have been 100 people inside sitting down. Obviously because that was the only place open. Woolies was open, so we found a large car park and went in for noodles, chips, chocolate cake (for Nath), hot cross buns (for Tom), and some knives and forks as we’d forgotten them. So it was a delicious meal of noodles and hot cross buns, not the start to our culninary journey we’d thought. I even made the mistake of buying some other weird brand of noodles because they looked good on the pack when in reality I should have stuck with the Indo Mie Mi trusted ones. Laying back on the bed, reflecting on the awesome day we’d just had and looking forward to an amazing trip tomorrow, I realised it was now 11.30 and probably time to get Nath and Tom off the free wi-fi and get some shut eye.
Tuesday.
I’d been watching the weather forecast for the last 10 days and it has consistently shown 70% possible showers for today and tomorrow, but being summer and aclimatised to Bendigo, I gave only a passing thought to the possibility of us getting wet. Those thoughts were very short lived when we woke up this morning and looked outside. Black clouds, very low and covering the tops of the nearby hills. It was still dry outside now, but by 8am the heavens opened up and it poured rain for nearly an hour. This was the first time the Plymouth had been wet since having owned it. Bound to happen sometime I suppose, but probably not ideal this morning with the planned trek up Mt Hotham and the potential for the car filling up with water. The clouds were moving fast and by the time we’d had breakfast – hot cross buns and some of the Greek salad I had bought last night to go with my noodles – the rain had passed and there was some blue sky appearing. We had the roof up and we were full of excitement as we pulled out of the Motel and onto the road heading for Woolies for some supplies for the next couple of days. We had no inclination that our day was about to take a turn for the worse. We pulled up outside Woolies, locked the Fury and headed in for some shopping. Back at the car a few minutes later I pushed the button on the alarm and nothing happened. The alarm was still set. Immobiliser on, no ignition or starter. That’s going to be an issue. I pulled the bonnet and disconnected the battery. Didn’t fix it. Found the spare remote – in pieces from last night – put it back together and tried disarming using that. Nup. A little feeling of despair was beginning to set in. It shouldn’t be this hard. Here we are - Nath and Tom sitting on the grass kerb, me sitting in the car trying to determine what has happened. The remotes aren’t disarming the alarm, pulling the battery is not re-setting the alarm. It seems we have a problem. We all sat there for a while absorbing what has happened and how it might affect our day. Not in a good way we were thinking.
As the ice was slowly melting in the esky and the beer was getting warm, I decided we should go for a walk to both of the service stations to see if they knew of an auto electrician in town. That seemed like a long shot – especially after asking the Indian guy in the United station when he replies “What?”. We tried the Shell and to my relief the guy said “Yeah, just a couple of k’s down the road heading out of town. Then you’ll need to turn right and head a k or so and he’ll be on your left.” What a relief I thought and what a nice guy compared to the other idiot across the road. It was around 11am now, the sun was shining, the grass was green, families with kids were playing on the banks and in the river, but it seemed we were walking to a meeting with our destiny. This holiday could take a real turn towards disappointment. Nathan commented as we went past the creek “how come Bendigo doesn’t have lawn down to the edge of our creek”? We walked, and walked – it was humid now and we were sweating and complaining about sweating. We found the road and turned right and kept walking. Of course the electrician was right down the far end. What a relief to find there was actually an auto electrician and the nice guy in the Shell servo was not lying to us for a joke.
Our initial discussion with the electrician was not good. He simply replied “Nah, can’t do it. I hate alarms. Eventualy they always stuff up, it’s just a matter of time. You should just rip the bloody thing out”. Yeah that’s ok, but not really going to happen now. He went on to say how much of a pickle we were in. He was booked solid for a couple of weeks with everyone wanting their jobs done today. He then thought for a little while and said I might be able to have a quick look at it over his lunch break as sometimes it’s only a wire or two to cut and the alarm is isolated. I bet that’s not the case I thought. I remember when I had the alarm installed I made sure the guys at Auto Addiction knew how paranoid I was and how no-one was ever going to steal this baby. Anyway, with that good news, we walked all the way back to the Fury still parked in the street near Woolies and now waited for our savior to arrive. To us it seemed like a long, long time, but eventually he pulled up and crawled under the dash near the ignition switch. He says “Well this’ll be easy – looks like just one wire. Which he promptly cut. He goes “try it now”. Which I did – and it started and just sat there idling. Well, we all thought, how satisfying is that sound? He had to cut and re-solder another wire as the indicators were flashing as the alarm thought things were being tampered with. But that was it. $150 later we thanked him so much then waved him on his way. Followed by a very relieved and happy us being on our way. Disaster avoided, situation back to normal, except about 3 hours late
The road out of Bright to Harrietville followed the river valley towards Mt Hotham. Very green, lots of flowers and a very beautiful drive. The Fury was lovin’ it. At the end of the valley you could see the mountain looming ahead and this is where we were going. There was no other way out of the valley except up. We stopped in Harrietville at the toilets, asked Tom and Nath if they wanted lunch – to which they replied Nah, let’s just keep going as we’re so late. I was trying to mentally prepare for the 40 kilometre steep winding road up to the top of Mt Hotham, but also thinking we might not make it to tonights campground at Victoria Falls which was way over the other side of Hotham before nightfall. Oh well, here goes – onwards and upwards. Out of Harrietville the road immediately changed from a sweeping flowing wide road into a steep very winding mountain road. Second gear sharp corners, front tyres scraping on guards, the sound of the engine pulling, the throb from the exhaust. Tree ferns, views, lookouts – it was sensational. Amazing feeling and still a huge relief to be back on the road. We let several other vehicles pass us as we were soaking up the atmosphere and they were obviously in a hurry, and saw some exotic vehicles coming down – Porches, two Lamborghini’s and several other sports cars. With all that had happened from this morning when we left the motel, we’d forgotten about the weather forecast for today. Showers, now an 80% chance. And looking up ahead there were some very ominous thick black clouds that kept hovering right above Mt Hotham. As we got higher, but still below the winter snowline, a misty rain began to fall and I breathed a sigh of relief as I turned on the wipers and they worked. The road was now wet – and probably slippery – but we were travelling slowly taking in this amazing scenery. Such a change from 38 degrees yesterday. Tom was apprehensive of the road and a little scared we were going to crash off the side. He seemed genuinely upset and would not look to the side and into the valley. With the roof and windows now up, we reached the snowline where the trees suddenly disappear and are replaced with small tea tree type bushes, and then small shrubs. The rain was getting heavier and there were some leaks beginning to appear from around the top of the windows, but there didn’t seem to be anything too serious. We stopped at a lookout and could see the road almost at the top of Hotham across the valley. We would be there shortly and the rain was getting steadily heavier. We had the wipers on constantly now, when suddenly hailstones started hitting us – bouncing of the bonnet, windscreen and hearing them pound the vinyl roof. They weren’t big, about the size of a pea, but extremely loud. And how big does a hailstone have to be before it punches a hole through a vinyl roof? Don’t know. Nathan took some video and it’s quite scary to listen to. There were no opportunities to stop under cover – there was no cover of any sort. We pulled over several times just to take it all in. Who would have thought this was next. And I guess that’s what made this roadtrip so exciting and memorable. It was being so far away from home – so far away from help – into the unkown – anything could happen – it already had. Very exciting.
You could tell we were very near the top when we rounded a bend and there was the entrance tunnel into Hotham Village. The hail had stopped and the rain was easing. Was that the sun breaking through the clouds? There were quite a lot of vehicles – mostly four wheel drives – but it seemed like nothing was open. There were no people, just us. We wandered around and I was thinking we needed to ask if there was accommodation available here for the night. It was now getting late, around 4.30 and there was no way we were going to our planned campsite. Luckily the tourist info building was open, although closing in 5 minutes, and after both Nath and Tom used the toilets, we just made it in as they were locking up. The assistant said there was nothing open at Hotham, but there was a place a few k’s down the road at Dinner Plain. After a few more photo opportunities, we jumped back in the Fury and made our way down to Dinner Plain. Her directions were accurate and we found the High Plains Hotel easily. The bar was open and the owner was helpful in getting us a room ($180) for the night and even allowed us to use their kitchen after we mentioned we had all our camping BBQ food - which we’d planned to use at our campsite. The room was good, Tom cooked us bacon, sausages, hamburgers and I had the last of the Greek salad from last night. After dinner we went walking outside and explored what there was to explore. It was dark, deserted and cold. Back in the pub and in front of the open fire, we bought a round of drinks just before the bar closed then retired to the room so the boys could use the wifi. It had been a big, big day and I think we all had a great nights’ sleep.
Wednesday.
The next day dawned foggy and cold – was this winter? We packed up the car and I was silently thinking to myself I wonder what could possible go wrong today? Nothing did. Not for the rest of the roadtrip, but at this moment, who would know what was going to bite us. Out of Dinner Plain we turned right onto the Alpine Highway and began the descent towards Omeo and a re-fuelling stop. From the steep, winding road on the western ascent to Hotham, the road down to Omeo is the opposite. Apart from obviously going down instead of up, it was almost flat – very gradual, with no sharp corners, just what appeared to be a normal road. Only the occasional glimpse through the tree showed how high up we were. It was a really nice drive down – so much so that I missed the turnoff to Victoria falls by quite a bit. I had wanted to have a look at where we nearly stayed last night, but now we’ll never know. Omeo is a sleepy little town with a tiny IGA and a tiny service station. With a lot of inquisitive looks from locals, will filled up with food and fuel. Pretty much all the vehicles we’d seen since Mt Hotham had been 4 wheel drives, trucks and utes. To see a ’60’s American convertible in town and on these roads was probably a little unusual. Out of Omeo we headed down through Tongio, Swifts Creek and Ensay, all the while closely following the winding Tambo River to Bruthen where we turned left and began our journey towards Buchan. This road is very smooth, wide and flowing - another contrasting but thoroughly enjoyable drive. I can’t remember when we put the roof down, but it was a little warmer and Nath reckons we don’t look cool with it up and maybe we were getting a little sunburnt now. We turned left again and covered the last 30k’s into Buchan. We were camping in the Buchan Caves reserve and the last time I had been here was a bit like Mt Buffalo two days earlier. I was a little kid, maybe a bit older than Tom, but not by much. I remember bits about the caves and when we saw the entrance to the reserve, I remembered seeing or driving under that with mum and dad. We found our campsite and after negotiating several speed humps with audible scraping noises and with campers stopping what they were doing to look, we pulled up and started unloading our stuff. As we pulled out all our camping gear, I’m sure you could almost hear the other campers – in their caravans, big tents and annexes just saying who are these people and wtf? A little misty rain had begun to fall and putting up the brand new tent for the first time was a challenge. But only the first time, it will be easy from now on. We booked some tours of the caves for tomorrow, sat back on the deck chairs and relaxed. As there was no phone reception for me and Nathan had very poor reception on Telstra (and therefore no internet), we did some exploring to the spring-fed swimming pool and then up past Moon cave to the top of the hill. We crawled into Moon cave by the light of my phone for 5mtrs until we came to a padlocked iron gate, but it was very tight and most likely dangerous so we backed out quickly. Tom wanted to cook the BBQ again tonight – of which he did a great job. Might have a chef on our hands there. We explored the reserve after tea, from the cave entrances to the Glamping Tents at the rich end of the grounds. There were no-one in these glamping tents, but we did notice there was a large firepit with some warm coals – maybe from last night? - which attracted Tom’s attention. It was getting dark, so Tom did what Tom does and proceeded to get the fire going and we sat down for some fire-play. We also thought we could probably steal some power from the un-protected outlets as I’d been too stingy to purchase a powered site and the guys electrics were almost flat. We had a spare Genset battery for lighting which also had chargers, but it was much more exciting to use someone else’s power. As we climbed into bed that night – with Nath doing some complaining about no-way he’s sleeping on the mouldy bit of the mattress - I was thankful that everything was going so well, and we were having just the best time.
Thursday.
We were booked to do a tour of the Royal cave this morning, which we were all looking forward to. Both Nathan and Tom have never been inside a cave like these and I was looking forward to the experience again. I kind of remembered them from 50 years ago, but then again maybe I remember them being talked about, or remember photos. There was only one other family on the tour with us, which made it easy to ask questions and felt more personal. We all enjoyed the 45 minute tour and I think it was very much like I remembered, apparently the stalactites grow 1mm every 10 years, so in 50 years it hadn’t changed very much at all. We had another cave tour booked this arvo, so after lunch we walked up to the Fairy Cave. We explored around the back of the cave entrance and Nathan photographed some huge rolling hills he said woud make a great screen saver. Interesting to see if he does. Tom was climbing over the entrance building when I spotted a caramel coloured 1mtr long snake slithering past close by. Probably not going to kill us, but that certainly put a stop to us exploring the cave entrance and the surrounding area. The guide for this tour was the same girl from the first one, and it was another small group of people. This cave is in the same underground limestone river cavern as the Royal cave so they are very much the same – kind of like if you’ve seen one you’ve seen ‘em all. But it was still good doing both. After the tour , and on the way back to the campsite we decided to take a detour and walk the 2.5klms to Spring Creek Falls. About 100mtre in there was a choice where we could take the high well made track or the rougher track that led down towards the creek at the bottom of the valley. The kids wanted to take the easy top track and that made a lot more sense. So we took the rougher track down to the creek and then began to follow it upstream. It was kind of a track, but not really. With bees at one crossing frightening Nathan and almost stopping him from proceeding any further. We wound our way deeper an deeper into the dark forest, with no other living souls around for miles. We saw a lyrebird (I think it was..) but nothing much else. For most of the time it reminded me of the Blair Witch Project. We never did get to the falls, we stopped where the track branched into two and weret exactly sure which way to go. We played around splashing each other by throwing rocks into the watrer, then decided to head back to the campsite. Along the way I remembered when I was a kid, blowing through gum leaves between your thumbs to make weird sounds. I tried using some leaf I found, and was able to show Tom how to do it. We laughed as he made strange squealing and quacking duck-like sounds. We would faintly hear someone up on the top trak talking and we were wondering what they were thinking of these strange noises. There were no eucalyptus trees in this valley close to the river, but we found numerous different ones that worked. All this fun came to an abrubt halt when Tom picked up a leaf off a small plant just as I was about to say “Stinging Nettle!!!” Too late. Ouch, immediate pain and screaming. Even after washing his finger in the freezing river water, the pain remained for an hour or more and took the enjoyment off the little adventure up the creek. But in hindsight, it was just another part of the road-trip – an experience and something to remember. And by the time we were walking back through the campground, he was again looking for leaves to make these annoying sounds. The boys were getting a bit tired of BBQ food and both had been wanting something substantial – like a pub meal. So we did. We fired up the Fury and heading into town and were lucky enough that the only place open also happened to be the only pub. Parmas looked excellent, I had the hot one, Nathan had the BBQ one and tom had a massive bowl of nacho’s. Really massive with separate bowls of sauce, sour cream and guacamole. How substantial is that. We each had a coke and bitters – after puzzled looks from the young female bartender – and having to explain twice actually what coke and bitters is. She finally made three schooners for us. I don’t see how it can be so hard. Very few people are aware this is a drink. The parmas chips and salads were huge and delicious and topped off our stay in Buchan.
This was our last night camping here and after tea we again went up to the Glamping end of town and lit a fire in the firepit to play with. Earlier that day I had met – Gary – the man in the F truck who’d been interested in the Fury, but then only seemed interested in telling me about himself. As Nathan and Tom were charging Tom’s Nintendo later that night I went to the toilet and as I came out there was Gary and he was in a talkative mood. Must have held me up for over half an hour – long enough for both the boys to get worried and come looking for me. Gary’s now my best mate. As we crawled into bed – it had been a big day - Nath was still complaining about the mouldy bit, but I wasn’t listening.
Friday.
I was not looking forward to packing up the campsite, or any campsite really, because your holiday is usually over. But this time it was overshadowed by the excitement of hitting the road again towards the beach at Lakes Entrance. By 10 o’clock we’d (I’d) packed up all our stuff and stored it back into the Fury. With the car now lowered to 60mm off the ground again, we said our goodbyes to our campsite – and to Gary who was also leaving and pulled up in the F truck for a half hour chat. Until his kid started punching on the horn for him to hurry up…We scraped our way over the numerous speed humps leaving the reserve and drove away with roof down and the temperature rising. It was going to be a hot day. On Wednesday driving into the Buchan township or the first time Nathan shouted out “Hey did ya see that!” I said what? Apparently we’d passed what looked like a mechanics on the right with several old Japanese wrecks laying around outside. Nath had spyed a 240/260Z. As we left the township today we again went past the same yard before we’d realized and drove on a little further before we decided to turn around, go back and check it out. If there’s someone there with a shotgun, we’ll leave. Turned out there was only one bloke there who loved a chat. We got the tour. Inside he showed us his un-restored ’62 Plymouth and we got talking about left hand drive verses right hand drive, he showed us his MK1 Escort 2 door, his Datsun 260Z and a couple of his numerous bikes that he owned. Outside he showed us his son’s late ’70 Corona with an NA 13B. Then his Landcruiser wagon that had cut into a 4 door ute and fitted a 6.8ltr Silverado turbo engine, engineered airbag suspension so he could lower the truck enough to get trailers on to the towbar hitch. We saw a Series 1 RX7 in a very poor state, another 260Z in a worse state, A mid ‘80’s Mazda 626 with a 3.8ltr Commodore V6 under the bonnet – with a turbo charger and oil pump, pipes and associated stuff in the boot and to top it off a 20B triple rotor Cosmo that he’d bought as a parts car for his “good one” that he has parked somewhere else.
Shit, there was cool stuff everywhere. We took photos and talked about what a shame most of these cars were out in the open. And it rains in Buchan. We said our goodbyes and as we pulled away we reflected on how good that just was, and how happy we were that we’d turned around.
We followed the same road south out of Buchan as we’d came in, but when reaching the Bruthen- Nowa Nowa road, should have turned left instead of turning right. Left would have taken us the short way to Nowa Nowa then on the Princes Highway to Lakes Entrance. 45 minutes longer was the way we went back to Bruthen then down to the lakes. But hey it didn’t matter as we were not on a time schedule, we were just exploring. And by going this way we stopped at The Blueberry Fields and purchased some farm fresh blueberries and a couple of fresh blueberry muffins.
We turned left onto the Princes Highway and after stopping at the impressive lookout over the lakes we cruised down across the bridge and into the main street of Lakes Entrance. It’s still a buzz – everytime you drive the Fury – people always stop and look. You kind of avoid looking at them, but you can feel them looking at you. Will never get sick of that. The motel was on this road at the other end of town and was easy to find. We pulled in, signed in and unloaded our stuff out of the backseat. Nath hopped on his phone with free wifi and Tom and me jumped in the pool. Both the boys had been hanging out for pizza from the first night in Bright, so I had no choice, tonight was gonna be the night. We spent several lazy hours walking across the bridge to the open ocean and sitting on the sand, watching people (girls), watching waves. Then walking down past the giant amusement park to check out where the pizza shop was, then back to the motel for a rest. At teatime we walked again back past the amusement park to the pizza shop and placed our order. We waited 40 minutes, then sat in the park to eat. Yep enjoyable. With some pizza left over for breakfast we walked back to the motel and checked them in the fridge, then walked back to the amusement park. We watched some people on a massive spinning ride – then Tom had a go on the trampolines. Back at the motel the boys took advantage of the free wifi while I fell asleep.
Saturday.
Before Christmas while sitting around the Clubhouse having a beer with Deano, I had mentioned we were doing a road-trip with the Fury and possibly returning through Gippsland. In a previous life he had been a delivery driver for pool chemical company and had spent some time in the Lakes region. He had stayed at the Metung Pub numerous times and reckons it’s “Best pub in the world.” Gonna have to check it out and get a photo. This morning we had to be out by 10 so we packed up and said good bye to Lakes Entrance. It was another hot day with the roof down, and it was only a short drive along the Princes Highway then a left turn following the green treed banks of the Tambo river towards Metung. Just one more beautiful drive to remember. We’d followed the Tambo several days earlier from just south of Omeo all the way to Bruthen before turning off to Buchan Caves. Metung was once an old fishing town nestled on Lake blah, but now a trendy port for million dollar boats and babes. Driving through the town it was obvious there was nowhere to close-by to park so we continued through the town to the boat ramp. We parked under a large pine tree (and I’m still vacuuming out pine needles lodged in crevasses…) and locked up the car. Just as we were about to walk away a guy came over and was admiring the car. He has a 68 Camaro and we chatted for over half an hour about the pro’s and con’s of changing his Camaro to right hand drive – I said no way – don’t do it. A lot of the uniqueness and excitement of driving an American classic is to drive it as it was built. Exciting every time. We walked back into town, past the market – that’s why the town is packed with cars and people – and we found the Metung Pub. We strolled out along the pier, past all kinds of boats – from smallish ski boats to huge ocean going luxury yachts. Back in the pub we ordered a bitters and coke each and got the usual weird look from the young female bartender. After explaining exactly what a bitters and coke was she reluctantly made three schooners and we sat down to take in the view. I took some pics and sent them to Dean. Hopefully we were sitting in the right pub and hadn’t wasted an explanation to a bartender. It was the right one.
We had a quick walk around the market on the off chance there was something there to buy for mum, but sadly the sun and the flies and the dust drove us away. We walked back along the shoreline boardwalk until it stopped, then found our way through a motel carpark and back to the Fury which luckily was still there. I put the steering lock on whenever we leave the car, but now without the alarm it is a little worrying. After a long drink of sparkling water, we piled into the hot vinyl front seat and headed back out of town the same way we’d came in. Then left onto the Princes Highway and we headed towards Bairnsdale.
As a kid I remember mum and dad taking me to Seaspray and Golden Beach on the Ninety Mile Beach and I’d planned on taking Nath and Tom there on the way through to Kellies today. I can remember back then as a 10 or 12 year old running on the beach with nothing but sand in both directions – no rocks, no headlands, just beach as far as you can see. I’m assuming it’s still the same. Just the other side of Bairsdale we’d been told there was a public (free) weighbridge so we were keeping an eye out for that to0 get an idea of what this big American weighs. Surprisingly, without us in the vehicle – but loaded with all our gear – it came in at 2340kgs. Probably need to check that because the standard dry weight out of the factory 1665kgs. Did we have 675kgs extra in luggage?
We followed the Prices highway through to Sale (where I should have filled up with fuel), then we turned left on to the Longford road heading towards Seasprat on the coast. Thought there’d be a fuel station in Longford – nup. Seaspray – nup. The Honeysuckles on the beach – nup. Although there was a honey – according to Nathan – in the fish and chip shop where we had lunch…… But no fuel. I had wanted to do the triangle along the Ninety Mile Beach up to Golden Beach, then back to Lonford and Sale. But now with ony a quarter of a tank of fuel, that was looking a bit shaky. We drove short distance with our fish and chips to a carpark on the beach and parked just as a guy on what looked liked a racing motorbike pulled up. He came over to us and was admiring the Fury. Then, as we seem to attract odd people, while rolling a joint he began telling us all about his 2018 MV Augusta 800cc triple one of 250 in the world one of 10 in Australia, titanium exhaust factory stickered – the only thing he wanted to change was the rear sprocket so he could crack the 300kph mark. Current top speed was 294. He lived here in The Honeysuckles in a house h’ed bought outright for reasons we didn’t want to know. We thought he was going to tell us when he suddenly said have a great trip – see ya later. As he sped off through the gears – probably up to the bikes maximum speed – we wondered for a second what his real story was. Another character to share part of the journey. There was still the issue of being a lttle short on fuel, so I decided not to push our luck and just head back to Sale the way we came and save the 40klms extra through Golden Beach. A little disappointing, but not the end of the workd- like it would be if we ran out of fuel. The cruise back to Sale is just a flat, pretty much straight road. We filled up at the first servo we saw and bought three Calipo’s. On the road again heading into the afternoon sun, we kicked back and let the miles roll beneqath us through Rosedale, Traralgon and into Morwell. We stopped once to be ripped off by a roadside fruit stand offering cherries, mangoes and strawberries. You’d think these would be at farm prices – but no – equal to or dearer than your local supermarket. You learn. But we did get to talk to a guy that apparently owns one of the 15 Dodge Chargers that were built for the newer Dukes of Hazzard movie. He brought it in from the States a year or so back and we spent some time listening to him. Then listening to another guy tell us about his trip today around Gippsland because he had nothing else to do.
We arrived at Kellies around 4 pm and all of us were exhausted. I was good to be out of the sun. We weren’t sure on what to have for tea, so it was decided Red Rooster would do. Nath had his normal bbq something, but Tom chose a cheese burger which he reckons was the best one he’s ever had. He’s most likely only ever had two. Someone – I think it was me – said it would be ok for Tom to watch a South Park episode. Kellie has them all, so he chose the very first one. It was still as bad as I remember, but Kellie and Tom were loving it. We watched several more episodes before I said enough is enough. We made our beds and hit the sack for the last time on our roadtrip.
Sunday.
Last day. Wow. What a fantastic time we’d had and like everything good, all over so quickly. There were a huge amount of memories, I hope the boy’s enjoyed this as much as I had. We were calling into Shanes today on the way past and we were packed up and ready to leave Kellies around 11am. It’s still another hour and a half to Berwick, then 20 mins down Clyde road, which seemed slow and clogged with heavy traffic, but probably normal. It was nice to relax Shane’s and checkout their new boat. We shared a beer, but any more and I’d be going to sleep. It was around 4 pm when I gathered the effort for the final leg along the Monash, through the tunnel, then Calder freeway home. Courage is needed driving the narrow lanes of the freeway – I’m sure they’re getting smaller, and the tunnel is no fun at all. Very narrow, dark and smelly. The freeway soon cleared out and we made one more stop at Macca’s at Calder park. We were mostly quiet for the remaining 2 hours home, maybe reminiscing, maybe nothing more to say or maybe just tired. I could only keep thinking what an amazing time we’d had. From the moment we’d left home a week earlier – the good stuff and the bad (alarm issue) but really there had been nothing else negative – if you discount Tom’s run-in with the stinging nettle, Nathan’s dislike for the mould on the mattress and getting held up talking at every fuel stop. We wee still half an hour out of Bendigo when dusk set in and I decided to go the long way through town to avoid animals on the road. As the last few miles rolled under us and the sun was disappearing below the horizon, we took a couple of photos of the sunset over the bonnet of the Fury – cruising along at 60mph with the road laid out in front of us. We were privileged. That photo said it all.
So many fond memories of a great time, from back when I was a kid and now doing it again with my kids. That was the wonderful thing about this road-trip. I’d like to believe Nathan and Tom will remember this for ever and hopefully someday in the future when I’m not around, re-count these memories to their kids. Or even better, perhaps do the same trip with their kids - remembering what it was like the first time they did it with their old man in the Fury.