We took the wrong turn at the end of the street and were on our way into the Rio Tinto Mine Site. Workers where flashing their lights at us to tell us that we were going the wrong way. Once we could find a safe place to turn around we were on our way in the right direction. The workers must have been thinking what are these people doing bringing a caravan into the site!!!.
Our first stop for the day was Nanutarra Roadhouse to get petrol and have our pies that Michael had put in the engine bay. Craig from Wickham had told us about this little trick and they were super yummy on a cold day.
It took us 7.5 hours to get to Warroora Station as we decided to enter via the southern entrance which we found out at the gate was not suitable for caravans. So we had to travel back another 35 klms to the northern enterance. This means we could have taken a shortcut ealier and saved ourselves alot of time. We were just happy to be getting out of the car shortly.
We turned onto the dirt road into Warroora Station and about 2 klms down the road, the van didn't feel right. We look in the revision mirrors and heaps of smoke was coming out of the back of the caravan. We quickly stopped and I went straight for the fire extinguisher and then we realised what had happened. The leaf spring on the rear axel had collapsed and the caravan was leaning on the wheel. I thought we were going to have to get the van towed away but lucky for me I have a handy husband who had it all under control.
Michael got under the van while I was having a heartache and noticed that the u bolts and bracket had snapped off. We drove down to the caretakers to tell them what had happened and the rude man started questioned us about tyre pressures and speed, as if we had no idea what we were doing. I could see the steam coming out of Michael's ears, as this was the last thing we wanted to hear. I tried difusing the situation by saying we had driven on much more corrigated roads including the Gibb River. The man then shut up and got the picture, no one was in the mood!!!
After a few phone calls we had arranged for an engineer in Exmouth which was 1.5 hours away to leave some new u bolts and a bracket out. So we set off for Exmouth at 4.30pm. We collected the u bolts, had a quick dinner and got back to the van at 9.00pm. Michael was keen to fix the van so we set the car up so we could use the headlights as it was pitch black and I got on the net, which I had to stand on a hill to get service and we fixed the suspension until 11.30pm in the rain. That night we slept in the van on the side of the road. It felt like the longest day ever!!!
In the morning we left at 7am and hoped that everything was fixed. It was a very slow drive out of the station. Everything is fixed and Michael can now add Mechanic to his left of qualifications!! I'm very proud of him.
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