CAMPSITE # 102 - The world is a very cruel place.

Our first night’s sleep away from Mungerannie was one of the worst night’s sleep on the entire trip, for both of us. Perhaps it was the traffic noise (in population 100, Marree) or the recent disconnection from our temporary home, either way we both woke up that morning knowing that it was going to be a very long day.

The tyre fixing process was fairly painless. Aside from the fact that the guy told Tom that he normally wouldn’t fix tyres this bad but considering he didn’t have any of our grossly oversized 33 inch tyres in his workshop, this would have to do for now. As we knew we were going to have new tyres fitted sometime within the next few days, we thought the best option for us was to leave the iffy spare on and sin bin the recently patched one for the time being.

We were heading south, towards Port Augusta where we had planned to then head west and make a beeline towards Western Australia. The drive was long and I barely even drove so no doubt Tom would tell you that ‘long’ was quite an understatement.

We stopped in to some caves to appreciate the aboriginal rock art...

As we reached Quorn, the town where you reach the fork in the road for the turn off to either Port Augusta or Adelaide, my phone rang. It was KFF.

Who is KFF? Well, picture one friend that you haven’t seen for over a year. A friend that you always have time for and one that you know that when you’re around this person, you know you’re bound to have an absolute whale of a time. That guy for us is Kyle Frank Ford.

Tom and I used to live with Kyle last year until he made us say our tearful goodbyes as he left us for another country, his country of origin, Canada.

We knew that KFF was in the country but from the information we had, he was to have left the country before we finished work at Mungerannie. But, as I was to be informed during my telephone conversation, KFF was in Adelaide.   Port Augusta was officially demoted to the backburner and we altered our route to pay Adelaide yet another very brief visit.

As passenger for about 90% of the 10 hour driving day, my duty was quite simple: to source the best value for money tyres in Adelaide and arrange for them to be replaced while we were there. After what felt like 52 telephone calls, we were locked in to have 4 wiz bang new Goodyear Wrangler DuraTrack 60 / 40 tyres installed for a cool $350each (ouccccch!!!) We were expecting it to be around that price and we were just desperate to book it in and get it over and done with. At that point we were driving around on 1 patched tyre with barely any tread and another rather awkwardly shaped unreliable ex-spare.

Our long journey was almost over, it was approaching 8pm and we were just over 100kms out of Adelaide. Our plan was to stay about 1 hours drive out of the city and then finish off the rest of the drive in the morning to meet up with Kyle. It was a good plan until that crisis that we had recently avoided the day beforehand came back to haunt us.

As we drove along the Princes highway at a very speedy 80km/hr, a massive rolling THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD echoed from the rear of the car. While Tom calmly pulled over onto a very narrow shoulder, I gasped with shock & fear and automatically thought the worst. We knew that spare was dodgy, what idiots have a spare that’s not even bloody circular? Whenever I saw pieces of tyre lying helplessly on the side of the road, I was always so confused how the driver could let their tyre get to that point. But, it was a lot easier than you think.

Changing the tyre was one of the scariest times for me on the trip to date. And I’m not just being a drama queen, it is a very serious thing. We tried to find the widest part of the shoulder and we tried to keep as far off the road as possible but it was still very tight. I hated the idea of Tom being out there changing a tyre as he faced road trains zooming by at 110km/hr. He made me sit in the car as he did it all himself and I just sat their helplessly watching and hoping to god that everything would be ok.

This was one of the ugliest moments of our entire trip. It was such a low point for us both. We were exhausted. It had been such a long day and we were both wanting to know what was it all for. There are times where it gets really hard. Why were we out here, living out the back of a truck driving aimlessly around the country without even knowing where we would sleep that night? Constantly exchanging money for overpriced diesel is hard. Living in fear everyday of your car exploding and costing an arm and a leg is really hard. It’s as though we have to fight to be free everyday, to live this nomadic life and be against the norm of everybody else.

That night, we could have just given up. If someone offered us a handful of cash and two tickets home, we probably would have taken them then and there. Obviously, we would have regretted it straight away. We clambered into bed that night and barely said a word to each other. There was no time for talk, it was time to sleep and to say goodnight to that cruel, cruel day.

Site : Port Wakefield Caravan Park
Rating : Negative 1000 thanks to the events of the day
Facilities : Had a slight trailor park feeling to it but the amenities where clean and tidy & we were just thankfully to not be driving any more. $17 for an unpowered site.