Sep 27, 202235 min read

Alice Springs Trip - 2022

Day 1 - Tuesday

Back on the road and I’m super keen. I’ve been preparing for what seems to be months, although in reality only about 6 weeks. I’ve started early as I want to be as organised as possible. We’ve got between 8 – 10 days on this trip and we have 5 coming with us. Our son is bringing along a mate who is also a keen car enthusiast, and he will be in my Mazda with our boy. My car is far more fuel efficient than any of their cars. They took my car last year for the same reason and it manages to fit them and everything in it quite well.

Up and preparing early, hoping not to forget anything. The first couple of hours of any trips I am always racing thoughts through my mind trying to think of what I have forgotten to pack or what have I forgotten to do. I have a list that I have been compiling for some time and I really think this has helped me so much. #mumlife

We have just under 500km today, so quite a relaxed day. Our day 2 is the more rushed day, needing to fit in 790 km. Then day 3 will be a slow day, only under 300km to reach. As this car event brings a lot of people from where we live also, we want to ensure we make our destination of Pimba relatively early, so we don’t miss out on a park in the roadhouse overnight stay. Last year it filled up and we have heard this year the event is bigger again. Between 9am and 10am is our cut off for leaving to make a good arrival time.

This morning is pretty much just locking things, packing last minute things that we couldn’t pack yesterday and a last clean of the house. The boys are ready to go. They are minus one as one bailed at the last minute, which is a little disappointing because all 3 had worked out how much money they need to save for this trip as a trio, but now it’s just the 2 of them so their expenses have risen unexpectantly. Sad it has happened this way, but I guess it teaches them to expect things like this. We have let them know we are here to help if need be.

By 9:03am, the house, sheds and gates are locked, everything that needs to be packed is packed, the alarm is on, and we are ready to roll. I’ve done a final list check, and everything is crossed off. I’m feeling less weight with this list. It’s amazing what all the organising earlier and checking off the list day by day does for the stress levels. We, for once, drive away from our home and I don’t spend the next few hours wondering what I’ve not done or not packed.

There always seems to be a lot of road works near where we live, so the first hour or so of our trip seems to last a week! From 60km/h to 100, then back to 60 and up again, it’s relentless. We grin and bear it until we hit Port Wakefield to stop for breakfast. We find a big area to pull up and check our weights before we head in for food.

The weights are great. We are under what our vehicle’s tow capacity is and under with the GCM, so we are happy. I actually was expecting to be over with my food packing. Although this morning I did do a little thinning out knowing that we are one mouth down. But still, I pack way too much quite often, in clothing and food mostly. Once we have finished weighing, we put the scales away and head into the store to find the boys sitting at a table eating already.

This stop is only about half an hour. We have full bellies, full fuel tanks, weights are great, and we are feeling stress free. I talk to the boys about heading off in front so they can sit on the state speed limit and not have to sit behind us the whole way. I ask them to meet us in Port Augusta and talk to them about safe driving, sticking to the speed limit and not stopping for anyone. They know if someone is in trouble to call authorities, but not to stop. There are dangers in traps that happen way too often, and we want them to arrive safely. And off they go.

Our next stop is under 200 kms and a relatively event free drive. The landscape is baron, and the traffic is beginning to thin out. There is still a little road works but far less in distance and not as dense, so we make it through them a lot quicker.

I love the drive into Port Augusta as the green energy production site always fascinates me. The big tower with massive shining light and all the panels are a reminder of how far man has come with infrastructure, but at the same time, the giant windmills before Port Augusta don’t do much for the landscape. Lovely mountains to look at, but on top are these enormous constant cycling windmills. But we need to look after our planet and if this is what must be done, we should embrace it.

We don’t take much to find the boys in my car, they’ve already filled up and are using their phones while parked behind the roadhouse. We pull up to the bowser, fill up and go in for a frozen drink. Once we have used the restrooms, taken the boys a frozen drink each, I have the drive talk to the next stop with them. Pimba is where we are stopping for the night, and I ask them to fill up while they wait for us and once, we have done the same we will go and park for the night and pay the fees.

We still have phone service most of the time. The group of us all are in a messenger chat that I created. It’s a great idea for me because there are things I needed to ask the boys or let them know they needed to bring, so instead of asking my son to pass on the message and hoping he remembers to, I can converse with them myself.

Since our last trip, the boys also have a UHF radio. Just in case there is no phone coverage, and they need to contact us or vice versa, we have that radio as a backup. It’s just a handheld unit in the boy’s car, and the tow vehicle has the inbuilt unit. When travelling remotely, it’s a necessity to have these, and sometimes also a good idea to get a satellite phone. We haven’t travelled far enough to need one of these yet, but that is certainly on the planning list for when our full time travel begins.

Today, we had hoped to arrive in Pimba before 4pm, and we have made it just after 3:30pm, so I’m happy. There are still a few parks available in the overnight stay area, phew… I’m at ease. We drive up to the fuel pumps, fill up with diesel and go in to pay. I avoid looking at the souvenir shelf for a while so we can go and set up our caravan and the boys’ swags, then we will come back for dinner. Read about Pimba Rest Area here.

I find the boys, make sure they’ve filled up so it’s one less thing we need to do tomorrow as that’s our rush day and if we can do small things today to save time, then that’s what we do. I’ve organised the breakfasts according to our drive days. Which means tomorrows breakfast is quick and simple pancakes, then the following day is the more involved, bacon and egg muffins with my homemade relish as we aren’t in a rush that day.

We get set up, the swags are up and put together, and we head into the roadhouse for dinner. We want to have a quiet relaxing night before our early and busy day ahead. Dinner arrived in no time after ordering, and it was amazing as usual. Delicious chicken schnitzel, and a generous size, plus the well-known Spuds chips and a salad, just as I remember with half a boiled egg!

The delicious food at Spuds Roadhouse at Pimba, SA

We all finish up, clear the table, and make our way back to our set up. We have paid our fees, which are amazingly priced, $5 per car per night, no power no water. There are brand new showers in a lovely new facility block which were not built last time we were here. The boys decide to have a quick shower while we organise things to make tomorrow’s pack up and departure quicker.

I get the pancakes and condiments organised and on the bench ready to go. I make my own pancake mix and it lasts for so long in a sealed container, and when we want to use it, we put it into a clean pancake shake bottle and just add water, and sometimes we add cooking chocolate chips also. Mr has the car left hitched to the van and the boys are parked up next to us. They only take out of the car what they need for the night.

Around 9pm, the kids are in their swags, I’ve finally been able to put down a new book I’ve been reading and Mr has finished playing on his tablet. Time to settle into bed and hopefully sleep well. Sadly, we set an alarm to get up at 6:30am, in hope that we get on the road before 8am. #pimbasouthaustralia

Day 2 - Wednesday

6:00am, of course I’m awake before our 6:30 alarm. It’s day 2, which means it’s our rush day. I decide to get out of bed and begin making coffee before breakfast. I give Mr his coffee in bed and call the kids to wake up and drink their coffee. They finish it in no time as it’s super cold out and it’s warmed them up a little.

I ask everyone if they want breakfast and nobody wants any food, so ill just have a banana and mandarin. This is helpful for a quick exit, so the pack up begins. Mr does his 'blue' jobs, I do my 'pink' jobs and delegate some smaller jobs to little Miss. I’ve got the defrosted pies and sausage rolls in the travel buddy oven for our lunch, ready to turn on an hour before arriving into Coober Pedy. The boys are packing up their swags, and they are pros at this now, it takes them no time at all.

I have the talk with the boys about our stops today, and I tell them I am happy for them to go ahead of us again, but I want them to meet us at these stops and to have filled up by the time we arrive. We have a couple of legs on today’s journey that have over 200kms, so I discuss resting when needing to and to share the driving. They both have their licenses and they both can drive my car. I tell them to drive safe as they head off out of the parking area.

We leave the roadhouse at 7:50am, 10 minutes ahead of schedule, I’m happy. We’ve got 4 fuel stops today, we don’t really need to fill up at each one as we have the long-range fuel tank now which carries a lot of diesel, but also costs a lot to fill. I worry about the boys in the smaller car with a smaller tank and I make sure they fill up at each stop. Plus, having them meet us at each stop gives us peace of mind that they are safe.

Our first stop is Glendambo. But before we reach the tiny town, we come across road works that are still repairing the roads after the recent floods. Back in February 2022, a huge rainfall of over 400mm was dumped in the outback, with authorities calling it a 'one in 200 year event'. A 250km stretch of highway between Glendambo and Coober Pedy was closed due to sections of the highway being washed away. And we see there is still plenty of water there now, months after the event.

Once we are past the roadwords, we get back to 100km/h and closer to Glendambo, our next stop.

Last time we were there, it wasn’t much to look at. Only a couple of little servos, no big roadhouses or anything exciting. But as we pull in, we locate the boys sitting in the car behind a tree out of the way and there’s a new servo in town. Looks great, and it is one of the AMPM ones owned by Frank Agostino, my old boss! Mr fills the car up, little Miss and I head over to the boys to see if they would like a drink and then we go into the store.

Once we have made our purchases and have used the rest rooms, we walk back to the boys in my car and hand them some iced coffees. I ask them to meet us at the next stop, which is Coober Pedy, and they agree. As this leg of the journey, our son isn’t driving, his mate is. I explain that this part of the trip is a 250km drive, which he has never done before. He is a good driver and I trust he will drive safely. Off they go and we get back into our car and off we go not too far behind them.

The drive is pretty boring, although the landscape is sensational. It’s lovely to see nothing, instead of the big smoke where it’s sometimes hard to locate some thing green! But everything out here looks the same most of the time. We stop a couple of times at lookouts to take some pretty cool pictures and walk around a bit and get back on the road. One hour before our eta, we turn on our travel buddy oven, which I loaded with pies and sausage rolls before we left Pimba this morning. Last time we used it, an hour was sufficient to heat food up.

Not too far out of Coober Pedy, the pies are still not warm. I’ve cranked the temperature right up, the timer was set for an hour, and I have extended it, but still no luck. Only 10kms out of the town, I am at a loss. We are going to have to buy food at the roadhouse, which I really didn’t want to do. I’m trying to keep expenses down where I can, and I know food in Coober Pedy isn’t all that cheap. Something Mr is going to have to look at fixing now. I don’t know if it’s the oven or the plug in the car. Sigh in defeat.

The boys are sitting in the car park across the road from the roadhouse. I let them know over the UHF that we are going to buy something quick for lunch. They haven’t yet eaten so they come in with us. Mr fills up while we go inside and find a booth to sit in. I go and pay for the fuel when he’s done, he parks the car next to the Mazda and comes into the shop also. We purchase quick and simple food and discuss the next leg of the day.

Our next stop is Marla, and it’s just over 230kms. The boys have switched drivers to avoid either of them getting dozy. They know how remote this next leg is and I warn them about safety and their surroundings again. I feel like I talk about this with them all the time, but I would rather repeat myself and drum it into them than to not warn them about the dangers while driving in remote parts of our amazing country.

I feel lethargic now as it’s a hard slog just driving for hours on end. It’s far easier for me as I don’t do the driving yet. We are going to book me into a towing course, but until then Mr doesn’t feel confident in me driving. I understand where he’s coming from, so I do all the organising of things like fuel stops, navigation, I play the car DJ and I’m the waitress. And then there’s all the writing and photography and media, so I don’t actually do nothing, but I don’t do the hard work. But Mr is really good at long distance driving and he enjoys it.

It feels like forever when we arrive in Marla. We are now discussing the on-board water situation as we aren’t too far from our next stop. Kulgera is our last stop and our destination for tonight and from memory we didn’t have access to water connections. Once we have filled up, we go in the store to pay for the fuel and ask if there is water available. The lady serving tells us there is water available down the street a little where we can pay to fill our tanks, and it is filtered already.

So, we head down with her directions and find the place easy enough, just near a dump point and a playground. We pull up and I grab a bunch of console coins. The tap with the connection we need to use appears to be out of order, so we look for different connections within our box of water bits and pieces. Nothing looks like the perfect fit, but Mr finds a connection that might just work. The machine doesn’t take coins, so we need a card.

After a few tries of paying, it continually tells us the transaction is cancelled so we give up. It feels like a waste of time, and we are getting nowhere fast. We leave and get back on the road. Now that it’s becoming dusk, I ask the boys to sit behind us as we will be driving when the kangaroos will start coming out and if anyone was to hit one, we prefer it would be our bull bar. So, they oblige, and we get back to the highway and head for our last stop.

I had hoped to arrive at Kulgera around 6pm today, but it doesn’t appear it will happen. This leg is 181kms and we are definitely going to be late. I wasn’t sure what time the pub stops taking orders for dinner but certainly wanted to make it in time. We can’t speed, it’s not worth the risk, so we just cruise along and make it when we make it.

Finally, through the SA/NT border, we have just 20kms to go. It looks like we will arrive on 7pm. It’s been a long day, we all want to just have a meal and rest. Only 2 swags will be up tonight as little Miss will sleep in the van with us, so it’s just the boys setting theirs up, and they’re good at it now.

Just before 7pm we arrive at the roadhouse. There seems to be quite a few vans on site, but still many spaces available. We park the car and head in to pay for a site. I still remember the last time we were here, exactly one year ago, and nothing has changed, except the owners. I remember seeing a post on social media where the new owners introduced themselves.

We were met by a scruffy looking man with dreadlocks. He was a friendly person and allowed us to look at the store merchandise before we pay for the site. The clothing in store was extremely limited this time. We all wanted to purchase a t-shirt but there was nothing available, which was disappointing as on all of our previous 4 or 5 visits there was always lots of merchandise.

Heading over to the counter, the gentleman makes friendly small talk. I ask for a site in the camping ground. Unpowered sites last year were $25 per night, and now this year is $40! Almost double for the same thing. We have stayed at places like this that charge only $5 per night. That’s a big letdown. But we must pay it, and I guess the new owners know this, so they’ve put prices up. Just seems greedy, and quite possibly going to turn people off stopping in.

I head out to the car, let Mr know we are all paid up and we make our way to the campground. It’s dark and hard to locate the sites but seeing asthough it doesn’t matter which site we park on we just find one away from most of the other caravans, so we don’t disturb them while we set up. Now I tell Mr how much the site cost us, and he is quite disappointed also.

We all get out the cars and decide to lock up and make our way to the pub for dinner. There seems to be a few diners inside, and I see most already have their meals. Hopefully then it wont take too long to receive ours once we have ordered. The consensus is chicken schnitzel. I go to the bar to order but seems to be nobody in a hurry to take orders. After a fairly lengthy wait, finally someone comes out to serve me.

Once ordered, I sit back at the table the group has chosen and we talk while we wait for the meals. The pub doesn’t do jugs of soft drink, so we had to purchase a bottle from the shop next door and share it. They also don’t have scotch, so Mr had to go and order something else. This pub has gone downhill. Our experience here has just not been as good as every other visit.

We wait what seems to be an eternity for our food, and only 3 meals come out. The boys wait another 10 minutes for their food and the gravy is wrong. So, we let the waitress know and she seems confused. She leaves after telling us she will bring the correct gravy. I notice mine is lumpy and most certainly not a pepper gravy which 4 of us ordered. It appears to have been frozen, defrosted and not paid much attention to detail. Finally, their gravy is brought out and is in the same condition. None of us really enjoyed the food, the salad seemed to be a blended mix of capsicum, cucumber, and onion on a bed of lettuce, the schnitzel was over cooked, and the chips weren’t the same good quality chips as we have come to expect from this roadhouse.

The food at Kulgera Roadhouse was a big let down

On the way back to the site, we all seem to agree that this roadhouse won’t be a stopover anymore. It really has gone south since the new owners have taken over. Sad though, as we have always liked to stay here, but I’m not going to pay $40 just to park our rig on a piece of dirt with no power and water. And not to mention the service isn’t what this place used to be, the quality of food has gone out the window and the prices have hit sky high.

Not before 9pm, we are about as set up as we plan to be tonight. We sit on our camp chairs and chat for a while. Then the rain comes. Slowly it drizzles, giving us enough time to get a tarp over the swags and camp chairs. It rains harder throughout the night and by morning we have puddles. The tarps the boys’ swags are on have water pooling to the side, so I have to be super careful when directing the water away from the swags.

Day 3 - Thursday

By 9:30am, we are back on the road. I’ve made everyone a coffee, the cars are full of fuel, and we are all set. Today is a short day with only around 280 kms to travel until we arrive in Alice Springs. I’ve let the boys go ahead once again as they want to get to Alice and see the cars around the streets. They know we can’t check in until usually lunch time, but they aren’t fussed at all.

Not too far out of Alice Springs, everyone’s phones begin to make noise with notifications as we have just come into service. Amongst my notifications I see one that says the boys have arrived within the zone of the park we will be staying in. I message them on our group chat and let them know I have received a message from the park saying they can collect the check in packs.

When we are only 5 kms away from the park, I call my son and ask him to meet us in the car by the office and we will follow him into our site. We haven’t stayed on this side of the park previously, so this side is new to us. As we pull up, we see the Mazda and follow behind. We arrive at the sites and wow, they’re huge! One site would have well and truly done us.

The boys are keen to get away and watch the car scrutineering, so they hurry to unpack and get away. I can’t say I have ever seen swags get set up this quick, not to mention the massive gazebo we brought also. Off they go while the rest of us set up the van etc.

By late afternoon I have organised dinner. We have BBQ a couple of times over the weekend. I pre-cooked the food at home and packed it into my own vacuum sealed BBQ packs. I do this for a few reasons. It saves time cooking while on holiday, it saves gas in our bottles, everything fits so much better in our freezer when not in the bulky plastic packaging that meat products come in and it saves on filling up tiny bins at our destination. At home we have 14kw of solar on our roof, so I cook in my electric frypan and essentially costs nothing to cook while the sun is out and once our Tesla PowerWall is full.

The perfect way to save space, time and gas when caravanning & camping

We have a nice relaxing night once dinner and the few scarce dishes are done. Nothing too exciting as a bit of rain keeps everyone inside. Hopefully the rain won’t last and spoil the weekend. Racing events usually are cancelled when the tracks are wet as it is too dangerous. So we will see.

Day 4 – Friday

Today the actual racing begins. The Top Fuelers will be out and so will the Door Slammers. I’ve wanted to the see Top Fuelers for a while, and a couple in our group also haven’t seen them. The gates don’t open until 12pm so we aren’t in a rush. Nobody wanted breakfast so that’s one less thing to worry about.

We take our time in setting up outdoor furniture and doing a quick clean before setting off for the racing. I don’t plan on being there all that long, as I was more in this adventure for the road trip and not so much the car event. However, the boys are definitely the opposite. Our boy has his own car that he enters into events and plans to bring it to this show next year.

By the time we arrive at the racing, the current qualifying round isn’t far from over, so we stay for around an hour before we head off to grab some lunch and look around the town. I remember a lot from last year, but still some of it is unfamiliar to me. We find a lot of the locals seem to just hang around in groups near the shops. Some make a lot of noise and yell at each other which is a little intimidating. I tell little Miss not to stare as we shuffle on.

Seeing asthough my shoes got a little wet in the rain and are not the weatherproof type of leather shoe, I decided to pop into K-Mart to grab a cheap pair that will keep my feet far dryer than the pair I brought with me. As I have small feet, I am lucky enough to find a pair in the kids section going out on clearance for $8. Bargain. We purchase and head back to the caravan.

Since leaving home, I have found that everyday there seems to be far more dust. I brought with me this year my mini blower and mini vac that we purchased for the caravan not so long ago. They are a great idea as they are relatively compact, have the same batteries so I only need to bring the one charger which also is small and they do a really good job.

This year we didn’t manage to secure an ensuite so we thought it might be a good idea to book ahead while we are here. We set off for a short drive around the park as we want to find a good, end of road site which will have little traffic passing us. There are a few we liked, so we make our way to the office with our list in hand.

We talk to one of the girls behind the desk. She tells us that we are only guaranteed the sites we are currently on and we are unable to book any others. She said the reason is because the park managers want to give the people on their sites the first opportunity to have them again next year. We asked why this opportunity wasn’t given to us last year but she had no answer. We leave without booking anything as we want to discuss with the rest of the group.

By now, it’s not far off dinner time. I begin preparing the veggies and get tonight’s meat pack out, plus the leftovers from last night. Because we had one person bail on us, we have extra food each night so we will probably end up with 4 nights of BBQ packs rather than 3. The group doesn’t mind what we eat though, so they are more than happy just to eat what we have with us.

After the clean up, everyone is just relaxing and doing their own thing around the site. We notice a couple of the friendly colourful birds we saw here last tyear. They come right up close to us so I grab a piece of bread and hold it out. Before we know it, this little bird and his entire family have landed looking for their last meal of the day. We must have gone through about 4 pieces of bread feeding these little guys, but it's such a novelty the way they sit on your hand or arm feeding from you. Some even land on your head!

Come nighttime, the group gathers for a relaxing time playing Monopoly. I forever lose in Monopoly, while Mr usually is the last man standing. I do think some people intentionally go bankrupt as the game can sometimes go on for quite some time. In this instance, it’s over and done relatively quickly, with Mr winning, of course! And then we decide to get the Uno cards out for a quick round to end the evening.

I take this chance to discuss with the group booking sites for next year’s event. I explained to them what the staff member told us and the deciding factor is that the sites we are currently on are bigger. The group next year will be bigger again, there will be an extra tow vehicle with another caravan and potentially a car towing an event car. The toilet and shower blocks are only 2 sites from our current sites, and everyone agrees we are better off where we are. So, we will book them tomorrow, but we will add an extra night so as not to miss the first day of the ‘extended’ event list.

Day 5 – Saturday

Today is looking a little busier for us. We have a bunch of shows, racing events, the burnouts and street parade in the evening to attend. We start at the Show ‘N’ Shine events at Blatherskite Park. There is also the 4WD course, remote control car racing, grass driving events, mullet fest and more. It’s a big open area with all of this entertainment, so we aren’t crammed against lots of other visitors. Once we have looked around at everything, we visit the food stalls, sit and have lunch before heading off to the drag racing.

Mr suggests we only stay for a short while at this particular event as we still need to head back to the caravan to book our sites for next year and prepare for the street parade. The parade goes up and down through streets of Alice Springs on the track end. Last year we missed out on getting a good spot to set up our deck chairs, so this year we are super keen on being early and securing somewhere by the road and under a tree for shade. I also have planned to make up a cheese and meat platter for the parade, so I need the time to prepare it.

The street parade is due to start at 5pm, and we made it to a great spot by the road at 4:15pm. We don’t mind sitting a little while before it starts. It’s nice to sit with the group and talk as it’s not something we get to do too often with everyone’s busy schedules. We certainly make the most of it at any chance. Everybody digs into the platter while waiting, and we even have people to the side of us checking it out too! It must look appetising!

Easy and tasty roadside meat and cheese platter

There are 1000 cars, bikes and other vehicles entering this event this year. We manage to sit a while watching them go past us, revving their engines and just simply showing off and enjoying the atmosphere. The weather is perfect this time, no rain, not too hot and barely any wind. Since I met Mr 28 years ago, he has always been a car enthusiast and the kids have also followed in his footsteps.

As soon as the parade appears to be finished, it’s back to the van for us to deal with the leftover food, although not much is left! Now we are off to the burnout event. It takes place in the large open space where it is windy a lot of the time and gets very cold at night, so we prepare. Beanies, jackets, and gloves are thrown into the car, and we are off.

There seems to be a lot of cars having mechanical failures in the middle of their turn on the pad this year. Each time one leaks fluids, stops running or catches on fire, the pad crew spend some time with the spill kit, the tow truck or the fire crew dealing with the mishap. And this all adds to the time spent in the cold. Lucky this is the qualifying round and not the finals, as there would have been some unhappy entrants who have travelled thousands of kilometers to be here.

Come 10:30pm, we have had enough of shivering and decide it’s time to go. We drive out the park and set the GPS to Maccas for hot coffee. Not much traffic is about and it’s a short drive. Such an amazing invention, the heater! And add to it, the seat warmer that Mr has in this car. We are all warm again in no time.

Day 6 – Sunday

Today is Father’s Day and we only plan to see the 4WD course which wasn’t running while we were there yesterday and then the last of the burnouts. So I don’t wake the group up early as the public gates to the events don’t open until 12pm. The kids have all organised their own gifts for Mr this year, even those who aren’t his kids!

Around 10am, everyone is up and gives Mr his cards and presents. Little Miss has a bag of chocolate and sweet treats for him, our son won a merchandise pack for himself and Mr, and then our son’s mate bought him a bottle of scotch. Pretty good day! And to have all the gang together on Father’s Day at this kind of event is just amazing. Glad it’s a yearly ritual. Mr really enjoys it, we all do.

The kids all cook pancakes using my famous simple pancake recipe which requires them to add water only. I keep this already made up at home so if we feel like pancakes at last minute, we always have these as a go-to. Once they are done, little Miss uses the last of the mix to make a love heart shaped pancake just for Mr. We all add lashings of maple syrup, strawberry jam or whipped cream. Quick and easy breakfast is always the best for holidays.

Delicious pancakes that the kids made for Father's Day

I let the boys head off early so they can secure themselves a good position at the final burnout event. I finish doing the dishes, clean up and start to pack up a few things that we won’t need to use before we begin our journey home tomorrow. An early start is on the cards so we can make it home in 2 days, as everyone would prefer to have the extra day at home before they all head back to work and school.

Day 7 Monday

Not so wide awake early this morning. The alarm went off at 6:15am and I snoozed it. We didn’t have a super late night, but I just can’t wake up early. It comes to 6:30am and Mr’s alarm goes off and now it’s time to get up and start moving. All the kids are still asleep, and seeing asthough they aren’t feeling too well, I let them sleep as long as possible.

Little Miss is up earlier than I expected, and she is raring to go. I think she is missing her bed at home. We get the coffee and hot chocolate made and wake the boys. It’s a little cold this morning so the boys quickly rug up into jumpers once they are out of their swags and come over for their morning drinks.

Mr is out of the shower quickly and is getting into the blue jobs. It feels like there is so much to do and sometimes feels a little overwhelming. I get as much done as I possibly can while I wait for a few things to be done with and brought into the van. There is an order that we work to as things need to fit into specific places as to avoid damages in the van and fitting well.

I'm just on my last few clean up jobs by 8:30am and once they are done, we begin our journey home. It always seems somber when we finish our holiday. We have all had a great time and soon enough it will come to an end. We have more ideas that we can use when working towards our big lap and, being in the van outside of our normal daily lives just gives us more enthusiasm to work harder to achieve what we need in order to set off on our new life on the road.

We stop in at the local servo and fill up. I go in to pay and suggest we grab a pie for breakfast. So Mr and I head towards the hot food section of the shop and see a bunch of pies in the warmer. They looked quite old and not so appetising, and the price was awful. $7.50 for one standard sized pie. $6.30 for one standard size sausage roll. No way! There’s no way we can justify that amount for a pie or sausage roll. We walk out of the shop and go back to the car and rummage through our road snacks bag instead. Lucky I have baked banana bread and muffins.

My famous banana bread is the perfect snack for road trips!

I tell the boys that today they can go ahead of us again, but to meet us at the petrol stops. The first one is to be Kulgera where we just get out to stretch our legs. It’s 275km away and it’s early. I always worry about them, but I’m a parent and I will always worry about my family. For some reason though, the boys stay behind us all the way to Kulgera.

We arrive at Kulgera but don’t need to fill up. The boys pull up beside us and begin looking for the No-Doze tablets I purchased when I thought it was going to be just our son driving the whole way as his mate isn’t allowed to have more than one passenger. I ask him why he needs them and he tells me he was coughing most of the night and didn’t seem to get much sleep. I am a little concerned about this and I ask his mate if he wants to drive. He also tells me he’s not doing too well so I offer to drive. I tell my son he can have a sleep in the tow car while I drive the Mazda, but he gratefully declines. So I make sure he feels comfortable pulling over if he feels too tired.

We set off and they go ahead of us. The next stop is Marla and it is approx. 180km away. Mr sees a sign advising us there is a fruit quarantine bin near Marla and all fruit must be disposed of. I tell him we have mandarins, apples, potatoes and onions. So I ask him to pull up at his next opportunity so I can get the mandarins out of the caravan and we can eat them instead of throwing them away. The entire way to Marla we eat mandarins, which neither of us mind at all!

By now, little Miss is hungry so while Mr fills up with diesel at Marla, she and I head into the shop to order coffees and hot chips. While we are waiting for the order, we make a dash to the toilets before we forget and leave the town. The order awaits us once we are done, we find the cleanest table, and wipe it down ourselves and wait for Mr to come in. I make my way over to the boys in the Mazda and ask if they want to come in for some lunch. They decline, so I have the usual ‘next leg’ talk with them and off they go.

Our last stop for today is Coober Pedy. This is pretty much our ‘go-to’ stop when we are travelling home from Alice Springs in just 2 days. It’s the most halfway point with a caravan park that feels relatively secure. Most of us have heard about the trouble that happens in Coober Pedy from time to time, so a roadside stop over is not something we would even contemplate entertaining. It’s not worth the risk and I personally wouldn’t be able to sleep knowing we could be in some danger.

Finishing our food, we clear the table off, put the rubbish in the bin and get back to the car. We do our usual walk around the car and caravan before we get in and move on. We are on our last drive for the day earlier today than we were last year as we are set to arrive in Coober Pedy before dusk, whereas last year we were driving in the dark. We had the boys sit behind us last year to avoid any potential kangaroos hitting the Mazda which would do far more damage than it would to our tow vehicle which has the bull bar.

Just after 5:00pm we arrive at Coober Pedy and see the boys in the car park of the caravan park we are booked into. We pull up beside them and say hi and I proceed to the office to check in and receive our paperwork and site numbers. Management of the park wouldn’t allow us to have 2 cars on one site, so we had to book 2 because we were not going to leave one car outside of the park overnight. I didn’t feel comfortable doing this.

Read our review on Coober Pedy Big 4 Caravan Park here

We drive into the park and quite easily find our sites. They are certainly roomy and quite easily fit 2 cars, a caravan and 2 swags on with loads of spare room. Perhaps the park could look at accommodating guests with 2 cars. I certainly would pay a little extra for another boom gate code. We unhitch the caravan and drive down to the local restaurant for dinner. The place is packed but we manage to find an empty booth which sits the group. I haven’t ever seen this many people in here before, and most of them seem to be wearing the shirts from the car event we have just come from also.

I order for Mr, little Miss and I, while the boys order their own. We all order one after the other and head back to the table. 20 minutes later, mine and Mr’s food comes out followed by little Miss’s food 5 minutes later. The boys wait patiently for theirs, and the last person at our table to order receives his 10 minutes later but still not our son’s food. He waits another 15 minutes, 2 of us have finished our food and still no meal for our son. This is ridiculous.

I grab his receipt and go to the counter to find out what the heck is going on. People who ordered after him have had their pizzas and schnitzels come out. I speak to a staff member with ‘Alexander’ on his name badge and ask him where the meal is. He says, ‘I can’t control my staff’ when I reply with ‘the last person at our table to order has had his food come out and 3 of us are finished ours now’. He looks annoyed and makes me feel like I am bothering him, he turns to the kitchen staff and 3 people gather around him. Clearly they have missed the order in the kitchen, but still more than happy to charge my son over $50 for his meal. The rude man comes back and says, ‘the meal is coming out now’. So I tell him this is not good enough. This is ridiculous.

I head back to our table, and we still wait. I keep my eyes on Alexander to make him aware we are still waiting and we are disgusted with the service. A good 5 minutes later, a different, but very pleasant staff member brings the food out. He apologises immensely and offers my son a free beer of his choice on the house, to which my son replied with ‘I’m on my P’s and I’m driving’. The man then offers us a free jug of drink. He takes our almost empty jug away and comes back with a souvenir type beer can and a full jug of coke. He is sincere in his apologies and wishes us a nice evening. He certainly has far better customer service skills than the first rude person did. Some people just shouldn’t be employed where they are to deal with the public.

We finish our food and make our way to the petrol station to fill up so we don’t need to do it in the morning. It’s far easier to fill up without the caravan on the back. And because tomorrow is our biggest drive day we want to save time where possible. I notice on the bottom of the dinner receipt is a fuel voucher also which will save us 5c per litre off fuel. And it worked out to be $2.43 that we saved. I was pretty happy with that.

When we are finished, we drive back to the caravan park and unload the chairs etc on the bed while the kids set up a table and chairs to play Uno. A nice relaxing night in preparation for a big drive day. I want the boys especially to get plenty of rest as they are still feeling a little under the weather with a lot of coughing and voice sounding very scratchy. Mr has done all the driving this trip. I have offered but he prefers to do it himself as he isn’t quite confident in me driving while towing our bigger van. The smaller vans we also have, he says are ok though. But we don’t use those ones on our road trips. They are pretty much for the kids when they want to use them.

Day 8 Tuesday

Our final day. There’s always the somber feeling of going back to the daily grind when we head home, but there’s the other side where our pets need us and it’s always nice to go home. When we are ready to start our lap, there will be the kids in our home looking after the pets and the house, so that’s one less thing to worry about, knowing they will be in their home and happy. Mr won’t be going back to the daily grind, which changes my world also. I am used to having the house alone to myself every weekday, which is good as there’s no disruption to my daily duties, but when Mr is no longer working, it is going to be difficult for me to get used to.

It's 6:15am when my alarm wakes me, but I snooze it until Mr’s alarm starts singing away also. At 6:45am I manage to drag myself out of bed and put the kettle on. I’m not making any effort to be quiet this morning as we need to be on our way as soon as we can to get home before dusk.

I wake the kids up with coffee and hot chocolate and get them moving. Our son’s mate is always first up and packing up his swag. Next up and about is our son and the hardest to wake up nearly every morning is little Miss. I’m sure she stays up late each night or is just being a lazy teenager!

I have the talk with the boys. Making sure they have their UHF on, and to call if they have any trouble or need to pull over. I remind them not to speed and not to stop, but to call police if someone is in trouble. I make them aware that we still will be out of service for a good majority of this leg. And I tell them to pull over if drowsy. I remind them to use the No-Dose I purchased and if they are feeling unwell to let us know and I will take over. Once we have done a radio check, I let them go.

At 8:20am we are on the road. The traffic seems quite light this morning, except for a few other travellers heading our way also. The caravan park had a lot of guests. Each time we have stayed at Coober Pedy there’s never been more than 8-10 caravans in the entire park, but this time, almost each site had a caravan in it. A good lot of them were coming from the same event as us, as they were in the restaurant last night also.

An uneventful drive to Glendambo. A few caravanners parked up at rest stops off the highway in groups. We pull up to Ingomar rest stop so Mr can get himself a drink from the caravan fridge. I always take the opportunity to get some more photos of the landscape surrounding us. We do our caravan walk around checks and carry on.

Glendambo isn’t all that far from the rest stop and we don’t need to fuel up, but I want to check on the boys. Mr and I decided that we will all meet at Pimba after this stop and we will rest while we have lunch together. Then we will allow the boys to head home on their own. It will only be 179km to Port Augusta and then from Port Augusta to home is just under 300km. I know they will be fine and at least they can start unpacking and let our son’s mate head home if he wishes to. He stays at our place quite often and is always welcome as he is part of the family, but he may just want to be at his own home after our 8-day journey.

Between Glendambo and Pimba we come across quite a few other caravanners. Possibly all heading back from the same place that we have been. The highway is long and mostly straight which makes it relatively stress free to overtake those who are travelling a little slower than us. And made even easier when they call over the UHF that its safe to overtake. It seems to be putting quite a lot of trust in a stranger, but obviously we only do it if we feel that it is ok to do so.

Finally stopping at Pimba, we locate the boys in my car and park near them. I ask if they’re still going ok. They tell me yes, and they also seem to be less flu-like which is good. We head inside and order our meals. Of course the boys have the schnitzel, Mr has a burger and little Miss and I share a bag of hot chips.

We all seem to be coming to the end of enjoying the last leg of the holiday. The driving is long, tedious, and boring, but we know it needs to be done. I’ve always told my kids to take their devices from their faces for a few minutes and look at the beauty of our country. They don’t often get to see nothing but horizons every way they turn, so it’s nice for them to take it in. Although we live in the country with plenty of open space, it still is a big difference from seeing nothing but the wild plants, native trees, the sometimes-rugged terrain and rolling hills.

Our lunch stop lasts around half an hour and I begin my next leg talk with the boys. I tell them there are 2 more stops. Port Augusta which is 179km and Port Wakefield which is around 190km. I then tell them they are free to head off on their own, and not to worry about waiting for us now if they don’t want to. I think they were pretty happy with that. And again, off they go. I can still watch them on our tracking app when we have service, just to make sure they are doing ok.

We arrive in Port Augusta around 4pm and decide to get frappes from Maccas. Mr pulls up on the side of the road in the parking area while little Miss and I jump out and go inside. It seems like forever to receive our order. Once the drinks are made, we go back to the car and Mr gets us to the servo for our final fuel stop.

Diesel is far cheaper here than it has been all week. $2.06c/l is expensive, but for nowadays it seems quite cheap. $213 it cost me this time but it’s the last one so I grin and bear it. I clean the windscreen before we set off into the, almost, sunset.

For our last 210 or so kms, it’s again, pretty uneventful. I check every so often that the boys are still moving, I take in the last opportunity to embrace the beautiful surrounds out my window and sit back and reflect upon our holiday. Another year, another great 8 days spent with the kids and the group, I’ve had a really nice time. I come back with a few hints on things that could make some aspects of caravanning a little easier, I come back with more ideas for writing, but most of all, I come back from a wonderful family time away with more memories and everyone’s good health.