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Oz - Darwin to Brisbane

It has come to my attention

What have I done on my trip so far, that's scary?

I have swum with sharks.

I have scaled walls where if I fall, I'll either break something, die, or become a vegetable.

I have consciously walked past the resting place of one of Tasmanias deadliest snakes on a daily basis.

I have driven a 4x4 car in some dodgey areas.

I have hitch hiked, and been picked up by ex-gang members.

I have bungy jumped 135m.

I have walked into dense bush where you can only see about 5 meters a head of you.

I have gotten fully grown cows into the pens with no training.

There's probably some more stuff, but you know what, going back home scares me more than all of those. Funny eh?

I've been trying to figure out why, and I have some ideas.

1) Falling into the same rut that got me travelling in the first place.

2) The winter.

3) The dark that goes with the winter.

4) The inability to talk to strangers while being somber and not be considered strange.

5) The lack of snow.

6) Dead trees.

7) No small adventures.

8) Funny Aussie expressions.

9) Aussie/Kiwi happiness (I tried using it when I got back to my old job, and it was rejected like an unwanted baby).

There's some more I reckon. I just don't think I'm designed for Swedish society.

If I don't get into Uni, I've come up with the following ideas:

a) Move up north

b) Move to Örebro or Uppsala for the paintball scene

c) Go to Canada on a WHV

a and b both involve me studying anything extra to help me get into uni

Damn it. It's all just so fucked up.

Hmm...it's all coming to an end soon. I can't believe it. 3 years feels like 3 weeks. Damn-it.

Gah. I'm going to stop writing now. Later.

Back in it.

I'm in Brisbane now, doing some Couchsurfing, which is really nice.

I'm working again, and can you guess where? That's right! Schweppes!!! Driving a forklift and other work. Same work I did at Carlsberg in Sweden, which also made Schweppes. Random, eh?

Any who, I think I'll be here in Brissy till either Sunday or Monday and then make my way further down south.

Not long left now.

Fuck.

More than just a car

It happened, last week actually, Voa had a break down. It all happened in Mt. Surprise after driving for a fair while, and then having to use a drive-through a weed seed shower (shower heads on both sides and under the car which blast a you with heaps of water). After which Voa decided to have a bit of melt down. It lost a lot of power in the gas pedal, and the rear diff started to make some noise.

A few hundred kilometers down the road, in the town of Atherton, I take a right turn, and the car cuts out. Awesome.

I try very briefly to fix it, but call RACQ (roadside assistance) shortly after. A guy rocks up about 40 minutes later and pokes around the engine and gets running again, but guarantees me that it will occur again, and that I need to take it to a mechanic and what should be fixed.

Rock up to Cairns and park outside my friends share house for the night and try to drive away the next day to do some exploring. Nah. Voa wouldn't have it. Call RACQ again, but the mechanic tells me pretty much the same thing as the previous one and tells me that it would be pointless to get it running this way (which he believed to be quite doubtful in the first place).

Take it to a mechanic the next day and tell them what problems were described to me. He gives me a jolly smile and tells me he'll be in touch. Next day he tells me what his boys found and says that they needed to fix a bunch of gaskets first before they dared to drive it on the road. Tell them to fix it, and once they fixed it, they said that they had it running perfectly fine. Next was the rear diff. It was only a crappy bearing, which got replaced as well. Price of all this, about a third of all the money I put into her in the first place.

You may be thinking that it's a lot of money (which it is), but for me, it's the equivalent of granny with the dinosaur for a dog pumping it full of medicine trying to keep it alive and breaking all the laws of nature and life and death.

Dogs are affectionate and show you love. True.

However, with Voa, I have learned how car enthusiast see cars as being more than cars. Voa has not only been my car, it's my home, my way to meet people, and source of a lot of fun.

I was in a share house here in Cairns, and will be leaving tomorrow or Tuesday.

I'll be stopping off in Brisbane to work for a week (hopefully) to try to get back the money I spent on the car.

Be in Bello for my birthday and then just...yeah, take it from there.

I'm off!

Summary.

Am I a pissy guy? A pessimist? I sometimes think I am.

Anyway, here's the break down on the car and it all: rear diff is stuff, carburetor is stuffed, water pump is leaking, got the stereo working again by ripping it out - looking at it and putting it back. Dropped my laptop, so it now has dent, but still works. Was really pissed off and want to drop a nuke on something or destroy something with my own bare hands. Preferably play a good Xball game (paintball) where I can really channel my built up rage (yes, anger just doesn't cover it anymore).

I really wonder if there's some sort of supreme being that is just testing my limits. It's pretty common that the rule of 3 doesn't count for me, it's more like rule of...5-10. You know, how everything supposedly comes in three, well...yeah. Anyway.

OR I could take the more rational approach. The car is 34 years old, travelled a very long distance in a short period of time, and been through some strenuous environments. Basically, I could compare it to an 150 year old man running a marathon, while being whipped by a slave driver. Yeah, that's a good comparison, or? Oh, and he's carrying a big dude and all his gear.

Not too bad to do over...what, 11,000km? for such an old car. Took a real beating. Hopefully I'll be able to get her fixed for a decent price.

We shall see. Toodles.

Now...

...I met some friends from TAS, and we had a chat, they had to wait a week to see the mechanic. Awesome.

Oh, and when I left McDonalds, my stereo decided to die as well. Sweetness. It's all falling apart. All this crap makes me want to leave Oz. Trying to keep it on semi high note.

Bonus though, I figured out how to connect to the internet with my laptop via my phone. Sweeet.

Bugger.

I finally got off my ass and left Darwin.

I'm now in Cairns, it's raining outside, and dark. Not cool. Here's a run down of my trip down here.

I left Darwin pretty late, well, later than hoped (16.30) and while I was driving out, I saw that my engine was about to explode from overheating. Something that got my attention very quickly. I pull into a servo, and see what's up. Take a rag, pop the hood, and from a safe distance, unscrew the radiator cap. I knew what was going to happen, radiator fluid went everywhere it was fantastic! Like a ghetto water fountain going off in some sort weird celebration.

Quickly fill it up and hit the road (thinking that was the end of it).

I end up going to Litchfield National Park (NP) which was really nice. It had a bunch of pools where I could swim and cool off. Something I had been dying to do for a while while being up in Darwin. I stay there for two nights, and on the day I leave, I meet a Dutch guy who drove his motorbike from Holland, all the way to Australia, quite the accomplishment if you ask me. He was working with pearling in Darwin with someone who I also knew, random.

Next stop, Edith Falls. "Big" lake with a small water fall, filled with fresh water crocs. Swim there, and then leave. Nothing amazing (I think I've seen too much at this point).

I then make my long drive to Katherine, where I check out the Katherine Gorge and do a 19km return hike in 40 degrees heat. I, no joke, almost collapsed. It was really tough. And, really random, when I was walking, my right hand swelled up a little bit. I had trouble closing it, and my finger tips felt harder than my left hand. When I reached the water, and swam around a bit, it went back to normal, but swelled back up when I was back on the track. FUBAR. The gorge was ok, nothing mind blowing, but the water was great! It could of been a little bit cooler, but you can't have everything. There I met a French guy who had been growing up in Tunisia who helped me with getting my camera over the river to get some photos of Aboriginal art, which, sadly, was a bit disappointing.

When I got back to my car, I decide to fill it up with water, and see how much it sucked up. It took up about 4-5L. I was loosing fluids quick. I go to an auto parts store in Katherine and try to get the gasket I'm missing. It was all the way on the East Coast. I had it organised for it to be sent to Cairns where I would pick it up and have it fitted. Oh, it only cost 3.99 AUD, but since it wasn't in Cairns, like a days drive south, the freight would cost me only 20 AUD, about. Sweet.

Leave Katherine, and start on the hardest part of the journey. Just getting to Cairns as quickly as possible. I had found a Finnish girl who was looking for a ride down south to Sydney, and I knew there was nothing between Katherine and Cairns.

On average, I was covering 750km a day. I ended up getting fuel from a small...uh...hmm...station? called Daly Waters, and the Pub there was pretty awesome! It just had a bunch of random things left over from people passing through, and it had a lot of character.

That night, I slept like a dream. It was cool in the car, and I didn't feel like I was turkey in an oven. Splendid! However, I did lose a filling and my right ear somehow got damaged from all the wind hitting it, so now it sounds a bit funny from the right side. Awesome.

Everything between Daly Waters and Normanton is nothing special. Ok, the last 140km to Normanton was pretty neat, because it felt like I was driving in the African Savana. I was hoping to just fly through Normanton, before refueling of course. Sadly, it was all closed. My engine was pretty hot too, so I had to just wait and let her cool down before making my next move. I see another backpacker rock up. A few minutes later, we start talking, and go to the pub where we enjoy a few cold beers, and I chow down a delicious barramundi (fish). He was from Germany, and a cupboard builder. The one occupation I have never encountered before. We have a few laughs, and then find a camping spot together. Oh, almost forgot, on my way up to Normanton, some sick bastard thought it would be funny to place a wild pig/boar on one of the road signs. It was very random, and funny in it's own way, but some how just wrong....yeah.

Next morning, make the last leg of my trip. Fill up the fuel, and radiator coolant (which has started to leak a lot faster).

During most of the driving, I was in a weird limbo zone in my mind, pondering a lot of random things, and just realising that I didn't remember the last 100km of the trip. A bit concerning. Well, this was the worst of all the days of driving. There are a lot of blank spots.

When I reached Atherton, the town reminds me of NZ in a many ways, the green foliage, the light drizzle, and rolling hills covered by clouds. I take a right turn, and Voa dies. OH! Forgot to mention that when entering Mt. Surprise, you have to put your car through a high pressure wash to rid it of any weed seeds (no, not marijuana seeds, just normal weeds), and after that Voa really started to suffer. She lost all of her umph, and the rear differential became even louder. This really bummed me out.

So there I am, sitting in the rain, side of the road, looking like an a$$hole. I call the Road Side Assistance, and see what the deal is. After some tinkering, the conclusion is that my points are out of whack, and need to be fixed. And maybe the water pump is buggered, and not the actual gasket. I thank the mechanic, and drive the last stretch to Cairns through some windy roads which really reminded me of NZ, bit time! It was great, without a doubt.

And so, here I am, sitting in air conditioned room of the Golden Arches writing this blog to you people.

Oh, another point. I try calling this Finnish lass, wanting to tell her there might be a set back, no reply. A minute later I get a text, saying she was sorry for missing my call, and that they were now two people, only wanting to go down to Townsville (3-4hrs drive) for work, and wonders if that's a problem. My reply: "Yes, that is a problem, only have space for one person, and you can hitch hike to Townsville in a day. And my car is broken down 2hrs outside of Cairns"

Her reply: ok tnx and good luck with your reliable car.

Which for me tells me she read my reply as: Congratulations, you can get f$%ked!

Yeah, didn't mean that, and so I sent a message explaining what I meant, and wishing her the best of luck.

I get really tired of people sometimes, really. Ok, fine, I take responsibility for writing that text, maybe wasn't clear enough in the first place. Hmm...

However, makes you wondering how people ask if more people can come when you clearly state in your ad that you can only take/fit ONE more person in your car. Yeeeeaaaah.

So, in conclusion:

I have lost a filling, my right ear is buggered, rear diff is stuffed, and the engine needs some work.

You can guess how I'm feeling (hint: not the greatest).

And, I might not be going to Asia, I might be going to the States instead or Canada to meet some people from my inter rail trip in Europe and maybe some people from Hungary and Mexico and if all goes well, maybe some people from NZ or Oz.

Later.