Tweet
I know there was at least one other PPer at Robe over Easter. Feel free to add anything you wish. Thought I'd put this together for those who might want a bit of info esp. if you're new to the area/sand driving etc.
Having spent the first few days of Easter doing family visits in Adelaide etc we arrived at Robe late Friday night (10/04/09). We had tried to get maps from various places as we traveled there with no luck and even Salt Creek Service Station didn't know where any information centers were in the area "we don't go there - it's 90 Km's away" was the reply. On asking locals at Robe where camping with toilets was, we were told no where that they knew of but try The Gums or Long Gully.
So at 9:30 we arrived at the tracks with camper behind. Time to drop tyre pressures. Getting my brand new ARB deflator out and not really tried it properly I didn't quite take the valve all the way out on the Mickey T's (harder than my bridgestones on the camper for some reason) and took approx. 45mins. to air down. I knew there was something wrong and worked it out on the sixth tyre. Note: Do a proper trial of ALL new equipment before you need to use it with wife & kids in tow :roll: )
After checking out The Gums campground and finding it packed out we continued map-less through the inland 4WD track over mild dunes, past the Hermitage track. Domeschenz and turned left at the Bishop's Pate Track which brought us back out to the main (Nora Creina) road. By this point we had found an info board which had a basic map on it which we photographed on the digi so we had it ready at hand. We discovered we could have by-passed the last few hours and arrived straight at Long Gully campground with out and needlessly slow airing down or 4WDing. Nevermind.
We found Long Gully camp ground with quite a few campers but plenty of room to spare. It has a long drop toilet and about 4 acres of mown grass camping area. Fees were $5/night by the honesty box (however they're sure to check you've paid in the morning
) Gas cooking only (no campfires despite those who ignored the rules). Long Gully is a great base for 4WDing, easy to get out of for access to Robe for supplies and 50m away from the tracks and beach.
Broomstick Sandflag erecting
The first morning had us check out the nearest beach without really taking notice of the map which we noticed later says "EXTREMELY SOFT BEACH" Note: Read the map! We were at 18Psi and a little bogged, nothing a bit of digging didn't get us out of but yes, the beach slightly north of Little Dip beach esp. the northern end was soft.
We visited Robe and went to the visitors centre to pick up out 4WD pack for $1. They told us Errington's Beach had been completely closed due to the soft sand and high number of vehicles getting bogged there that day. Apparently the ranger had been through all the way to Beachport that morning. Funnily enough, there were NP staff at the entrance to little dip beach who had waved us straight through, and we saw no sign of anyone else stopping us.
Track to Little Dip Beach
Kids ready for action
The next day we played in the local dunes around little Dip beach and Errington's beach and a little north towards Robe, got a feel for what tyre pressures worked: we have new 265/70R17 Mickey T 4 Ribs and found 18 wasn't low enough for the soft stuff. 15Psi was much much better. Errington's Beach was indeed soft but fine if you stayed in the ruts of others on the high sand unlike this goose in a Pootrol (we saw a lot of Nissan's VERY bogged in stupid places BTW, others were bogged but not due to mindless diversions etc):
Nissan had been there for 3 hours before the ranger arrived just before us.
I'm a bit unsure of the order of the pics but a few more from around there:
Oh, What a Feeling
We met a couple who had decided to buy a 4WD 2 months ago and had had their GX for 6 weeks. They were hooked and planning to go up the Cape next year. Drove back with them.
There were a few about that day. No PP stickers though
We eventually got round to doing the southern section of the Nora Creina to Beachport Run on Tuesday when the crowds had left. Beautiful scenery and fun driving. We accidently ended up on some private property at one point but left as soon as we realised.
Almost!!
We did eventually get up every dune but one that we tried, some with a lot of difficulty.
Private Property
Lunch
The wife's doing
We did however get stuck on one beach where we had come down a steep dune (we simply couldn't get back up) and the other end of the beach was also very steep and rutted. We continually bellied out leaving no forward traction. Up till that point I was cursing all the rubbish on the beach but a nice post came in handy and we eventually (about the 10th go) got over.
On the last day we drove the northern section to Robe. We missed a turn off to the track on a VERY soft beach and became very badly bogged. Again debris helped a bit, tons of shoveling but we wouldn't have got off without the highlift. It took 1 1/2 hours to get out of this one and high tide was 1 hour away. It was getting a little nerve wracking. I put the tyres down to 10Psi for all this.
P.S. Super Cheap Auto car mats are not a good traction aid. Sandgrabbers may work better :roll:
All in all it was an absolute ball. Gave my wife some more trust in my recovery skills and she's not that scared of being bogged anymore.
Beachport Info centre was far better than Robe. Gave us a free 4WD pack which had far more useful info in it.
Sorry about the number of pics. Here's some vids:
Dune
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nEdpWjJVJk
Wife on Dune
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFv2_A3N4hY
"I think Daddy's still bogged"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV23_koFhkk
Having spent the first few days of Easter doing family visits in Adelaide etc we arrived at Robe late Friday night (10/04/09). We had tried to get maps from various places as we traveled there with no luck and even Salt Creek Service Station didn't know where any information centers were in the area "we don't go there - it's 90 Km's away" was the reply. On asking locals at Robe where camping with toilets was, we were told no where that they knew of but try The Gums or Long Gully.
So at 9:30 we arrived at the tracks with camper behind. Time to drop tyre pressures. Getting my brand new ARB deflator out and not really tried it properly I didn't quite take the valve all the way out on the Mickey T's (harder than my bridgestones on the camper for some reason) and took approx. 45mins. to air down. I knew there was something wrong and worked it out on the sixth tyre. Note: Do a proper trial of ALL new equipment before you need to use it with wife & kids in tow :roll: )
After checking out The Gums campground and finding it packed out we continued map-less through the inland 4WD track over mild dunes, past the Hermitage track. Domeschenz and turned left at the Bishop's Pate Track which brought us back out to the main (Nora Creina) road. By this point we had found an info board which had a basic map on it which we photographed on the digi so we had it ready at hand. We discovered we could have by-passed the last few hours and arrived straight at Long Gully campground with out and needlessly slow airing down or 4WDing. Nevermind.
We found Long Gully camp ground with quite a few campers but plenty of room to spare. It has a long drop toilet and about 4 acres of mown grass camping area. Fees were $5/night by the honesty box (however they're sure to check you've paid in the morning
) Gas cooking only (no campfires despite those who ignored the rules). Long Gully is a great base for 4WDing, easy to get out of for access to Robe for supplies and 50m away from the tracks and beach.Broomstick Sandflag erecting
The first morning had us check out the nearest beach without really taking notice of the map which we noticed later says "EXTREMELY SOFT BEACH" Note: Read the map! We were at 18Psi and a little bogged, nothing a bit of digging didn't get us out of but yes, the beach slightly north of Little Dip beach esp. the northern end was soft.
We visited Robe and went to the visitors centre to pick up out 4WD pack for $1. They told us Errington's Beach had been completely closed due to the soft sand and high number of vehicles getting bogged there that day. Apparently the ranger had been through all the way to Beachport that morning. Funnily enough, there were NP staff at the entrance to little dip beach who had waved us straight through, and we saw no sign of anyone else stopping us.
Track to Little Dip Beach
Kids ready for action
The next day we played in the local dunes around little Dip beach and Errington's beach and a little north towards Robe, got a feel for what tyre pressures worked: we have new 265/70R17 Mickey T 4 Ribs and found 18 wasn't low enough for the soft stuff. 15Psi was much much better. Errington's Beach was indeed soft but fine if you stayed in the ruts of others on the high sand unlike this goose in a Pootrol (we saw a lot of Nissan's VERY bogged in stupid places BTW, others were bogged but not due to mindless diversions etc):
Nissan had been there for 3 hours before the ranger arrived just before us.
I'm a bit unsure of the order of the pics but a few more from around there:
Oh, What a Feeling
We met a couple who had decided to buy a 4WD 2 months ago and had had their GX for 6 weeks. They were hooked and planning to go up the Cape next year. Drove back with them.
There were a few about that day. No PP stickers though
We eventually got round to doing the southern section of the Nora Creina to Beachport Run on Tuesday when the crowds had left. Beautiful scenery and fun driving. We accidently ended up on some private property at one point but left as soon as we realised.
Almost!!
We did eventually get up every dune but one that we tried, some with a lot of difficulty.
Private Property
Lunch
The wife's doing
We did however get stuck on one beach where we had come down a steep dune (we simply couldn't get back up) and the other end of the beach was also very steep and rutted. We continually bellied out leaving no forward traction. Up till that point I was cursing all the rubbish on the beach but a nice post came in handy and we eventually (about the 10th go) got over.
On the last day we drove the northern section to Robe. We missed a turn off to the track on a VERY soft beach and became very badly bogged. Again debris helped a bit, tons of shoveling but we wouldn't have got off without the highlift. It took 1 1/2 hours to get out of this one and high tide was 1 hour away. It was getting a little nerve wracking. I put the tyres down to 10Psi for all this.
P.S. Super Cheap Auto car mats are not a good traction aid. Sandgrabbers may work better :roll:
All in all it was an absolute ball. Gave my wife some more trust in my recovery skills and she's not that scared of being bogged anymore.
Beachport Info centre was far better than Robe. Gave us a free 4WD pack which had far more useful info in it.
Sorry about the number of pics. Here's some vids:
Dune
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nEdpWjJVJk
Wife on Dune
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFv2_A3N4hY
"I think Daddy's still bogged"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV23_koFhkk
ops:
Comment