Cape York - Friday 2/9/11

7am get up, big crossing today.  It was overcast, we don’t need rain as well.  Good old cereal & coffee this morning, then packed up the campers, shifted everything up off the floor of the car & out of the side boxes (including unbolting the HF radio box from under the passengers seat).  Craig & Jim went about preparing the cars for the crossing, squirting wire connections etc., with lanolin, water bra on, snatch strap attached to bull bar & winch cable ready in the pocket on the water bra.  They took this crossing very seriously.  They also did some track building to help get the cars down the entry & up the exit.

9.30am it was time to cross – Craig first with Jim guiding him.  Then they’ll put our water bra onto Jim’s car and get his snatch & winch cable organised and Craig will guide him across.  Talk about anxious (me that is) & Craig was concerned, yet excited.  All went well with both descents, river crossing good – no water in the cab, just in drivers side box for us, but Jim had water in his doors & all side boxes.  Parked both cars at the bottom of the exit, the boys did some more track building.  Craig up first, gave it some berries up the hill, jumped up over the step – wheels in the air, things crashing & banging (I hope my eggs in the camper would survive), he made it up. (sorry the crossing is in 3 videos, I couldn't upload the complete one for some reason, maybe to big).

 Now for Jim, he didn’t quite give it the same amout of berries as Craig and got hung up on the step, had to winch himself out (they had already setup the tree protector and extension strap before starting, just in case).  No damage to our truck or camper (eggs survived!), Jim bashed his driver’s side box, bent the driver’s side tie down on the camper & scrapped the fuel tank.

That little effort to cross the Pascoe River this morning has taken about 1 ½ hours to get both cars across.

10klms to reach the junction with the main road to Chili Beach & Portland Roads.  Left turn at the junction, heading east now, we had 23klms to the Chili Beach turnoff, then 5klms to our camp spot.  Arrived about 2.30pm, filled in our camping permits at the self registration, then found a nice spot for the night out of the gale force winds.  Craig & Jim went over the cars and checked everything, fixed a couple of things and spent a fair bit of time discussing car things.  I fell over a bollard and scrapped my shin – that hurt a lot.  Got the fire going, Craig was making his lamb shanks for everyone for dinner tonight.  While they were cooking we all took the opportunity to have a shower.

Didn’t sleep well, shin was hurting & wind changed direction, so the tent was flapping around.