MONDAY 22 August 2016

The rain has stopped and there are patches of blue sky. The weather report says some showers today followed by some more rain on Tuesday 7-15mm predicted. We hear that we had 7mm overnight, the caravan park is mud. We will pack up and see what we can find out about the road options.

At the service station we meet a chap in a 200 series landcrusier with big mud tyres - the vehicle is liberally decorated with soft ochre icing. He says he did 43k down the Birdsville Track. One caravan jack knifed across the track, another vehicle in the table drain and he was slipping and sliding all across the road. He returned and is now planning to drive to Windorah. We cancel any idea of heading South.

Three options left.

Head East and abandon the trip - NO.

Stay in Birdsville until the roads are dry and passable - If we have to.

Head West across the desert and just stop when we can't go any further - OK we have a plan.

We catch up with Alison and Bruce outside the Birdsville Pub - they are heading East And we are heading West.

Lets be completely transparent about this. Sue and Mal are both nervous as we head out towards big red. The road is well formed, not a track like in the desert, and already we are sliding around and there is a lot of water to negotiate.

There are wheel tracks on the wet road sop we are following some other stupid people.

At the bottom of big red we drop our tyre pressures and drive up. At the top Mal stalls just half a car length from the crest. Two families are already there - they had been travelling East and camped below the dunes and had not yet headed on to Birdsville.

We were the only car on the dune and then as they left we were there alone - having our cuppa and then slyly pulling out the max traxx to get us up that last 5 meters.

The people told us that there were two utes ahead of us heading West and they pointed to the clay pan between big red and the next dune - "They went that way between those bogs and that slush just where the mud is only a foot deep"

We slowly descended and engaged low range second gear, laughed hysterically out the window with a glazed look in Mal's eye and charged off to the fray of mud and washouts that awaited.

At the other-side we sort of pulled ourselves together and thought, well we did that, I think we can do this.

Off we went, not 27 dresses like the rom com titled movie, but 27 sand dunes. Mud holes half a meter deep, long water crossings and skirting lakes which had drowned the normal track. We slithered, we grunted, we struggled, we relaxed, we changed driving strategies as we found ones that worked better and by the time we came to Eyre Creek, we were hardened and ready for the long haul across the mud flats either side of the creek. The irony is that the creek is dry. Yep the creek bed is dry, however there is about 500meters either side of the creek which is the roughest and slipperiest section of the track. It was a bit after 3pm by this stage. We put Nosey into low range auto with traction control off - in we went, we bumped and banged, we squirmed and paddled, we held on to our hats and we rattled and banged our way right the way through.

We crested another sand dune to get away from the mud inundated river flats and found a flat area between some coolabah trees and said - five hours driving to do 60km - we have had enough for the day.

We set up camp on a sandy flat not far off the road. We had only passed a couple of vehicles in the whole day. A glorious sunset was reflected in the water inundated wheel tracks of the track. We sat by the fire. Ate baked potatoes and went to bed very happy - as the rain danced on the roof like a thousand fairies at a pop concert.