esCarpade 2016 - Day 8 - Drive home from Griffith

esCarpade 2016 was done and dusted, and all that remained was for Damian and Adam to make the 1300km journey home.  Having checked the almighty Google for road closures and finding nothing of significance, the boys hit the road.

How wrong they would be.

After leaving Lake Cargelligo, the boys encountered a very, very long floodway with some water coverage... 



Pressing on through, they arrived at a stopping point - road closed.

Damian spoke to a couple of locals, and got directions to where they needed to go to get across to the Newell Highway, only to find that road closed also.

With no wish to double back through the floodway, and having already driven an additional 30km or so, the boys did a quick calculation and figured that with the fuel remaining in the tank, and the two spare 10.5L jerry cans, they might just have enough to get to Cobar - just over 200km away.

Of course, this included nearly 100km of dirt road...

After using the jerry cans, the remaining 30km of dirt road finally gave way to bitumen.

The boys arrived in Cobar, and put 45.8L into a 47L fuel tank, plus refilled the jerry cans!!  Talk about a close call!!

Damian and Adam having a caffeinated beverage, while Damian copied off the dashcam footage of the floodway crossing...  (the dashcam records continuously, and overwrites files after around 8 hours of footage is taken)

Adam having a quick nap...

Hopefully not a sign of things to come...

Leaving Gilgandra, the rain started... and it got heavy!!  It didn't ease up until after the boys had crossed back into Queensland.

At the BP Goondiwindi...

And home safe and sound.

The 1300km drive home turned into just over 1500km with the unexpected detour to Cobar!!  The floodway crossing did make for an interesting dashcam video though.

Thanks to all the people who followed the blog this year - hopefully you had a small insight into the fun, the trials and tribulations and the good work done by all on esCarpade!

Stay tuned for an announcement on what is happening in 2017...  (Damian doesn't know yet!)

esCarpade 2016 - Day 7 - Deniliquin to Transmission Replacement to Griffith

Apologies for the lateness of this post.  Damian received some upsetting news about one of his Camp Quality young people on Saturday, and wasn't up to doing the blog post on Saturday evening.

Saturday morning arrived, and Booger Mobile was still broken.

At least it wasn't lonely at this hotel!!

Muddy!!

Damian and Adam with Booger Mobile...

The windscreen was a bit frosty in the morning...

Driving in first gear to breakfast at the breakneck speed of 17 km/hr!!

Breakfast venue...

One of the Craig's photobombing... this is the opposite Craig who provided Damian with the Booger Mobile splash photo from an earlier blog...

Following one of the locals (Dave) who was helping to find a transmission for Booger Mobile to the local's house (Grant).

This vehicle was an option, but wasn't suitable...

This vehicle might have been an option...  Dave looking for transmissions...

Moving it into position...

Turns out this vehicle didn't have the correct transmission either...

Meanwhile, Damian removed Booger Mobile's bash plate.

Still smiling!!

This transmission is the right type...

Grant on the forklift...

Adam's job was to clean the transmission...

He did a good job!!

Not so much on his hand though!!

Another local, Tony, turned up to see what was happening... while Grant and Damian commenced removing the old transmission.

And it's out.

Damian removing the kickdown cable to use with the replaced transmission.

Up it goes...

Feeding in the filler tube...

Pan off for inspection and a minor service (replace filter).

Filter back in...

Finishing touches...

Cleaning the bash plate before reattachment.

Down for a test... it started, but no selection of gears!!  Damian suggested that the selector mechanism had just popped off (it's a press-on fitting), as this had happened previously.  That was the issue.  The gear selections weren't quite right...

Damian goes up on the hoist so that gear selections can be made above while Grant made adjustments below.  Perfect!!

Installing the kickdown cable...

After a test drive and some more kickdown cable adjustments, Booger Mobile was back on the road!!

Leaving Deniliquin to head towards Griffith for the final dinner.  The grand parade into Griffith had already happened before Damian and Adam had left Deni.

Stop at the Jerilderie roadhouse for a code yellow and some refreshments.

Tanks for the memories!

Rivers still very high... 

Arrived in Griffith, and ready for dinner!

Adam and Bill have a selfie...

The total raised in 2016 was an amazing $1,184,165!!

Damian left his camera unattended, and Donna and Carmel thought a selfie was in order!

Damian with Chris from Clowns having their traditional selfie...

The 2016 esCarpade had been a week of highs and lows, but Booger Mobile had performed fabulously well (up until the transmission gave out).

Will Booger Mobile be back in 2017?  Time will tell…