a year long trip around australia? sounds like a lot of fun but also like an interesting challenge. australia is a fantastic place, that’s for sure, but also wild and mostly remote. two thirds of the about 24 million inhabitants live in just five cities! the rest of the country is big enough to swallow europe several times over. a great place to get lost in (well, not entirely, we hope).
thorny (our kimberley karavan).
lucky we think we have all the necessary ingredients. the most important one: time – definitely since i will be on career break for the next year.
we also got a little house on wheels, our caravan (a.k.a. thorny). thorny has been desinged with exactly that kind of adventure in mind. it should be able to sustain itself and its inhabitants for a little while even off the grid. it’s got 220 watts worth of solar panels on the roof feeding into 240 ampere hours of agm batteries in the multiox. the main consuer is the 130 liter fridge, the lighting is all led.
for coooking we can either use the diesel powered ceramic cooktop inside the camper or the gas stove outside. there should be enough fuel for both for a few weeks.
there are two tanks with more than 200 liters of water on board, for drinking, cooking, washing, showering. did i mention there is diesel powered hot water, too?
snowflake (our land rover discovery).
most people laugh at us when we tell them we will be towing the van with our trusty and now slightly aging land rover discovery. the point most people would make is that the only vehicles tough enough to brave the aussie outback are the toyota land cruiser and the nissan patrol. there is some truth in this, mainly because these vehicles are so wide spread that the chances they can be repaired if they break down are better than for other makes.
well, we’ll stick with snowflake, mostly because we already own it. and becasue it has been a really good and reliable car so far and a really great and capabale tourer.
fingers crossed?
well, not quite. i’m always in favour of a bit of planning an preparation. thorny & snowflake are pretty good but we’ll be making a few changes to make the trip hopefully even more preasant, safe and reliable.
the most important is to do something about the mattress. kris complained that even after a few nights her body is bruised … not ideal. so we’ll have to do something about that, urgently, given how much time one spends in bed. not an easy job because due ot the way the walls beside the bed fold up.
the other thing thorny is lacking is a grey water tank. apart from the fact that i don’t like to just dump the waste water (even if it is mostly clean) it’s also a requirement for most national park to have such a tank. so we’ll install one.
the other thing we’ll install is a monitor system that will track water and electricity across all stores and consumers. i’m really looking forward to installing this, should be fun and significantly more useful than the current cobbled together collection of instruments.
a few more small enhancements will hopefully increase the yield form the solar panels. we’ll see if we have to add a separate mobile panel to supplement input.
we also have a few things in mind for snowflake. the disco already has a dual battery system but the most important safety feature we will install is the bull bar. when travelling through the outback it’s almost impossible to avoid contact with the native fauna. a bull bar reduces the probability that such a strike might end the trip (potentially in a less than desirable location).
we will also install a snokel, not so much because we are planning to drive through deep water (we’re not) but because the raised air intake keeps the air going into the engine somewhat cleaner and possibly a bit cooler too. eveyr little bit helps.
the last important modification is the addition of a gearbox oil cooler. thorny is not a light bit of kit, and the gearbox will be working hard, so we’ll try to help.
it’s a good thing i’ll have a little time on my hands to get this all done before we leave.