Travelling by car across Australia: Crazy Russians…

Start 01 June 2012 — Finish 16 June 2012

Hard to believe, but Yep, we are travelling again… Driving again? Yep Where? That’s a good question Not sure if we know the exact answer ourselves

This is our travelling journal. We will try to post some photos and put notes every evening if there is a GSM coverage, thus have a look periodically and track our location

If you notice that we do not move for a long period of time — do not worry, there are plenty of reasons:
— there is no GSM coverage
— iPhone is dead/stolen/broken/etc.
— our web-site is screwed by my friend
— we became shy and do not want to be monitored :-p

So, keep an eye onto this post and we hope you will see something new and interesting.

Cheers,
Artem and Natalia

Australia — harsh, but beautiful

Our photos are here — NATALYVLAD.COM/PHOTO

Day 1 (1st of June) — Melbourne — Port Augusta — 1034 km.

It was 5th time when we drove this way… Nothing special really, but a good warm up before the real drive

Artem sang a song for all our readers / followers / Big Brothers & Sisters

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KmnbI6U-T8

See us tomorrow

Day 2 (2nd of June) — Port Augusta — Alice Springs — 1226 km.

Huh… It was a long drive but quite simple… Strait road, not a lot of traffic, no animals (excluding dead ones on a side of a road).

The weather was perfect.

Stopped by at Coober Pedy, just to have a lunch with pizza

Darren, probable this one you would like more.

Beautiful sunset in australian Red centre.

Day 3 (3rd of June) — Alice Springs — Palm Valley — Standley Chasm- 337 km.

Wow! It was exciting day!

We were warned that there was no way Captiva could go to the Palm Valley (Finke Gorge National Park).

This track is only for real 4×4 — like LC, Patrol or at least Pajero. But first of all these people don’t really know what Captiva is, and second of all they didn’t know that we are Russians…

Honestly, some roads between remote towns in Russia much harder than this track.

It is only 30km and during dry season it is nice to drive through.

We DID IT! Regardless and against!

Have to say that Captiva is not damaged and even not scratched. It is not so tough like Land Cruiser, but it did relatively good job today!

Palm Valley (Finke Gorge National Park) is very nice place which we really recommend to visit!

Watch us tomorrow

Day 4 (4nd of June) — Alice Springs – Mataranka 1070km.

Another long drive. Personally, I thought that nature would be different after passing Alice Springs.

Mataranka is even further north than Cairns, but all the plants around are very similar to the centre of Australia.

Only the difference is that here it is warmer It was +4 when we were leaving Alice Springs this morning.

On a way we visited the Davils Marbels. Plenty of big boulders are sitting one on top of another. Quite unusual.

It was not so easy to drive last couple of hundreds kilometres, there were plenty alive wild animals… Stupid creatures were trying to commit suicide every time we got closer to them. Really, one wallaby jumped across the road, but when we were almost next to him he decided to cross the road again! Goodness we were driving very slowly and I was able to break hard last second and rescued bloody small native Australian…

Now a little bit of sleep and go, Go, GO Crazy Russians! This is just a beginning.

Day 5 (5th of June) — Mataranka — Kununurra 627km.

Started the day at «Mataranka hot springs pool». Water was really warm there — ~35 degrees. Without any hurry we moved towards Kununurra — our next stop point.

The weather was nice — +28, dry, sunny. Dropped by at some lookouts on a way.

Since the beginning of our trip we have done 4300km… Not so easy we would say But not so terrible as some people think.

So far, we have listened 3 audio books, have seen plenty of new things, have made thousands photos, have sung dozens of songs, have crossed Australian continent diagonally

And this is not even the middle of our journey.

Next 2 days will be without GSM coverage, thus do not worry. You will be the first who will see us online on 8th of June. Don’t miss it

Day 6 (6th of June). Kununurra – Gibb River Road (Manning Gorge) — 490km.

Does anybody know what to do if you lose a registration plate number? Yep. We lost the front one. Are you wandering how we did it? Actually, it is easy… Just go to the Gibb River Road, cross number of creeks and rivers, be jumbled on a bloody hard corrugated road and you will answer the question. Honestly, I thought it would be the more pleasant road. And it is a dry season right now. Very difficult to imagine what is happening there during summer time when everything is flooded.

At Kununurra before we started our outback adventure people were very sceptic looking onto our Captiva and trying to believe that we truly want to go through the Gibb River Road. Come on! This is not a Russian swamp even not close. It means that we can do that! A little bit braveness with craziness should do a good job.

So, the first 200km of the Gibb River Road heading from Kununurra to Derby were a quite rough unsealed road. But then we met the first river. 150 meters of the road were under water and there were no any depth indicators. Hmm… By luck another car appeared on the other side of the river and started to cross it. Somewhere in the middle of the river registration plate of that car went under water… Hmm…

A guy who was driving Prado stopped by in front of us and we had a quick talk. He explained that there would be more of such rivers and some of them even deeper than this one. Holly s..t… Gosh bless us. We’re not going to return. If our destiny is to sink Captiva somewhere here – so, what we can do except following our predetermined future? Russian do not Retreat and do not Surrender!

Apparently, Captiva handled that river easily. Very easily. We even enjoyed water sparkles and splashes around our car when we drove through the river.

Next water hazard was just 20 km further and this time we didn’t wait for anybody, with smiles we just jumped into the water! HUH! It was nice. The windscreen was full of water. And then there would be more creeks and rivers and they were deeper, wider, longer. Captiva proved to be named tough 4 wheel drive!

Only, in the evening we noticed that there was no front registration plate number… S…t happens…
We were very surprised to see a lot of traffic on the road that day. There were plenty of times when we couldn’t overtake some very slow campervans for a long period of time due to the cars coming opposite direction one following another.

There were even road trains! All camp sites were full of tourists. Frankly, there were more people and cars on the Gibb River Road than on any other main highway at this area. Majority of the cars were decent 4×4 like Land Cruisers, Land Rovers, Patrols, Hilluxes, Pathfinders with a really high clearance and there were some tourist 4×4 trucks with 20-30 happy people inside.

There are 8 Gorges along the Gibb River Road and these gorges are the main tourist attractions. Some of them are located just along the road, but some of them are hidden and you should drive and then walk for a while to enjoy a beauty of these places.

We were able to visit only 2 Gorges this day. It is very difficult to explain how beautiful they are. These gorges are really gorgeous Awesome atmosphere is around them. We felt like we were back millions of years when dinosaurs walking around this area. Photos can’t express it as well. So, guys – go there, see it yourselves! It worth it!

Day 7 (7th of June) — Gibb River Road — Broome — 735km.

Waked up very early today. The first thing to see is the Manning Gorge. The walk from camp site is only 2km, but you should swim across a river with fresh water crocs. Not long, but anyway. Natalia decided to stay, I decided to go, she knows that crocs are more in danger if they wish to attack her husband

I was sitting without any sport challenges for a while, thus decided to have a trial run. Jumped into water, swam across and started to run. After 20min of running I overtook a guided group of tourists who were very surprised to see a running man just in shorts and sneakers at 7am in the middle of nothing

The way to the Manning Gorge was not very easy. There were plenty of rocks, hills and boulders which slowed me down. But after 25 minutes of running I reached the destination. Wow! It was astonishing! Even wilder than yesterday ones. I made couple of photos onto GoPro camera and run back.

Unfortunately, even on a way back there were no any attacking crocs when I was swimming across the river.
Next one was the Bell Gorge. This one was the most exciting Nature Creation which we have ever seen before. Nothing is comparable. Personally, I would stay there for a week or so to enjoy wildness and remoteness of this Gorge. Fascinating place…

There were not so much time remaining thus we had a couple of hours for one more Gorge and it was the Windjana. This one almost overlapped the Bell Gorge impression This place is famous for plenty of fresh water crocodiles which you can see from just meters distance in their natural environment. These guys are very shy and try to swim away if you come closer than 5-10 meters. But one of them was very brave or old and Natalia was able to come very close to it.

Today we planned to stay at Derby, but decided to go directly to Broome. It was 4:30pm when we made that decision And it took us 6 hours to drive to Broome where we didn’t have any accommodation booked. That was not a problem. Actually, we usually do not book anything in advance as our plans change very often like this time and we try to handle them on a go.

After 20 minutes of wandering around Broome we found accommodation and felt a sleep immediately.

We did it! We were there — Gibb River Road and its Gorges! Fantastic!

Day 8 (8th of June). Broome — Derby — 320km.

At first, we went to a police station and reported the issue with our registration plate. A woman at the police office said that there had been more than 10 people for the last couple of weeks with the same problem. I’m wondering how many plates are somewhere on the Gibb River Road — in its creeks and rivers

Then we visited the famous Cable beach. The Indian Ocean near Broome is different. We have never seen water more green-blue than here. Water wasn’t super warm but we went into for a couple of minutes.

After that we had a marvellous lunch at a sea food restaurant at the Port of Broome and after that visited some remarkable places.

We had a Pearl Farm tour booked at 3pm (Willie Creek Pearls, Pearl Farm). A way there took around 40 minutes. First of all, a very nice girl explained anatomy of oysters which produce pearls, explained how pearls are made and valuated. She showed us a pearl 2cm in diameter which would cost 8000 AUD! Then, after a short tea/coffee break we had 1 hour boat tour where we were shown how the Farm works, how oysters are managed, etc. It was a very interesting tour.

At the end of the day we drove to Derby. Good bye Broome, hope to see you again for a more decent exploration.

Day 9 (9th of June). Derby — Bungle Bungle — Kununurra — 1060km.

Waked up very early – 5am. Today we should come back to Kununurra, but we wanted to see one more Kimberley’s attraction –
the Bungle Bungle (World Heritage).

But before we left Derby we quickly visited its jetty and the Prison Tree.

We turned to the Bungle Bungle direction at 2pm. And mama mia, the road was even worse than when we went to the Palm Valley near Alice Springs.

30km/h was average speed. There were plenty of water crossings. It took us 2 hours to reach the destination. Honestly, we are already tired driving along such roads.

Anyway, from 4pm to 5pm we quickly run/walk around the Bungle Bungle, made number of photos and videos, enjoyed colourful sunset at this very unique place and drove back in a complete darkness.

A little bit of rest and next day our “race” will be continued.

Day 10 (10th of June). Kununurra — Jabiru — 830km.

This day we didn’t plan anything apart of driving to the Kakadu National Park, thus had a good long sleep and left a caravan park only around 10am.

After an hour driving on highway plenty of yellow indicators start lightening on a dashboard letting us know that all wheel control systems stopped working… Hmmm… ABS, ESP, AWD — nothing worked any more.

Hopefully, we had done all roads which required all-wheel drive, hadn’t we?

There were plenty of bushfires along the way. We saw not only smoke but a fire itself. And when we came to Jabiru (almost at 9pm) bushfire was all around the caravan park. We worried a little bit, but people at the park didn’t worry at all, thus we relaxed and had a rest.

Day 11 (11th of June). The Kakadu National Park — Jim Jim Falls.

All right today we proved our nickname «Crazy Russians». With malfunction wheels control systems we decided to go to Jim Jim Falls. A road to see these falls requires a decent 4×4 drive car. But we wanted to see this famous place! Who is gonna stop us?!

The first 45 kilometres were a normal unsealed road in a pretty good condition. But then… 10 kilometres with speed of 10km/hour. Very rough, one line road with plenty of hazards.

2 wheel drive Captiva handled these hazards not so easy as before. There were a lot of sandy parts which we overcame just on speed. Huh… We did it

Undoubtedly, it worth it! The Jim Jim Falls are very impressive! It took us more than half an hour to get to the falls as it was more hiking rather than walking. Plenty of boulders, rocks and other obstacles which you should climb, jump and almost crawl.

We spent an hour near the falls Jim Jim. Swimming, photo shooting and just having fun.

I was quite relaxed driving a way back. Full of pleasant memories and impressions I forgot to speed up before one very sandy road part and UPS! we stuck! Wheels started to slip and dig down…

All right… We started to prepare for a long rescue operation, but in a couple on minutes a car with a very nice guys stopped in front of us and offered a help. Oh, Thank you Guys! In a minute we were pulled out. Thank you, Michael, for the rope!

In 30 minutes we were in the caravan park in Cooinda and still hope that it was our last 4 wheel drive adventure, wasn’t it?

Day 12 (12th of June). The Kakadu National Park — Darwin. 379km.

It was a long day. The Yellow water cruise started at 6:45AM, thus we got up around 5:30am. It was a very nice boat trip. At the beginning we enjoyed a beatiful sunraise. There were plenty of birds and crocodiles around the wetland area we were cruising through.

After this trip we went to Darwin. On a way there we washed our car. Then went to the Crocodile Farm and Zoo. Huh! There were around 12000 reptiles at this place! We were lucky to come just before a big feeding session. Keepers gave them dead birds on a stick with a rope. Crocs jumped out of water to catch birds. Sometimes they missed and we heard hard claps… These creatures create tremedous preassue between their jaws.

Then we met a wonderful sunset near Darwin city.

Evantually, we have found a little bit of time to create a short video about the Gibb River Road:

Day 13 (13th of June). Darwin — Mataranka. 480km.

Today is Natalia’s birthday! Thus the program is a little bit different. The main point — we don’t drive a lot today

In the morning we visited an orchid garden-nursery. If I’m not mistaken there are more than 2500 different kinds of these flowers. The garden is not big, but full of plants. Natalia has made half of thousand of photos and we moved to the Adelaide River to see jumping crocs.

Yesterday at the Crocodylus Park they also jumped, but we wanted to see these gigantic monsters in their natural environment and these guys are trained better to jump out of water

The trip was very interesting. I thought that there would be couple of jumps, but apparently there were more than 20. The river is really full of reptiles. I wouldn’t recommend to swim there only if you wish to beat a world record and need some motivation.

Tim has asked about crocs meat. When we were visiting the Uluru / Ayers Rock last year we ate crocs meat there. We wouldn’t say that this is something very tasty. Something between fish and meat. Personally, I don’t really want to eat such nice guys regardless they would eat us with pleasure.

Day 14 (14th of June). Mataranka — Alice Springs. 1071km.

10,000km behind us… 2300km ahead. 2 days to be at home almost there.

Huh. Our brain memory card if full. Nothing is able to be memorised any more Thus, simply drive, look around and listen to audio-books

Surprisingly wheels control systems start working again, hope not temporarily.

Today we just quickly stopped by in the «UFO capital of Australia» and made couple of photos.

Tomorrow it will be a very long drive, therefore we need a good sleep. Good night, our dear readers Watch us tomorrow

Day 15 (15th of June). Alice Springs — Port Augusta. 1220km.

As I mentioned previously, there is no memory to write in thus, we simply heading back home, as usual listening to audio-books (this time we listened to biographies of different famous people like Henry Ford, Bill Gates, Jack Welch, Donald Trump, etc.), sorting photos and videos (you can’t even imagine how many of them we have made ) and looking forward to having a normal bed with warm covers and soft pillows

Day 16 (16th of June). Port Augusta — Melbourne. 1030km.

Heeehaaa! We are back! 12068 km in 16 days. Who would argue that there is anybody more crazy than we are?!

Timka (our cat) purred the whole night. But it was a pleasure to hear that. We missed him very much as well.
We will post photos and videos soon, thus keep an eye onto out web-site. Feel free to share any photos/videos/posts from our web-site with your friends

The End (of our big journey around 4 Australian states), a new one is coming soon.

Yours Natalia and Artem