hi guys
got back from my trip to North west of Western Australia on fri. Had an awesome time and saw lots!! It was predominantly based around Francois Peron NP in Shark Bay, Kennedy Ranges, and Mt Augustus (WA's version of Ayers Rock). The route we took was Perth to Shark Bay with a few stops in between. From Shark Bay we took the North West Coastal Hwy towards Carnaravon and then turned into station roads to get to Gascoyne Junction. From GJ we headed to the Kennedy Ranges and then to Mt Augustus. From Mt Aug we cut across on gravel roads to Meekathara and took the Great Northern Hwy back to Perth.
all in all, we covered just under 4000kms and the rig has now done 9000kms.
Shark Bay:
I was quite disappointed with Shark Bay but it was peak season and there were caravans everywhere. Also it's been a while since ive been to that part of the bush and the regulation that has come into effect is a plain put off - you cant camp in a lot of places, no camp fires allowed etc. It's really over regulated in some respects.
Kennedy Ranges & Mt Augustus.
Kennedy Ranges and Mt Augustus were a pleasant surprise and we had an awesome time there. Again, i was quite surprised at the amount of traffic in the Ranges - it's quite isolated there and the recent rains that the area has had lead to a number of road closures but there when we got thre, the campsite was full of caravans. I think we were the only tents there.
The entire trip was a mix of camping and station stays. We spent around 11 nights in our tent and 3 nights at various station accomodations. I must say in all 3 cases, the station accomodation made the local motel/town caravan parks look like dumps.
Pajero/Montero:
the Paj performed flawlessly during the entire trip. We spent around 12 days of our trip on gravel roads, some of which were badly corrugated and most of which were extremely dusty. I was very pleased with the performance of the Paj in terms of its ride and handling. My previous experience has been with Patrols and comparatively, for this sort of touring, the Pajero is definately a notch above the Patrol in terms of comfort, ride, and handling. The Bilstein/Lovell suspension combo worked beautifully and there was almost no fade after 100's of kms on corrugated gravel roads. Having said that, one of the Polyair bags has punctured and i dont know where/when as i forgot to check the airbag pressures until 3/4 into the trip. Had the bag pumped to 25psi and each evening it would be below 5psi. It didnt seem to affect the handling of Paj and i'm taking it to the suspension place on Wed to get them checked, but based on this, would be hesitant to install airbags in the future and might even hv these removed.
i can go further into what we took and how we stored it if anyone wants to know, but i'm presuming that most ppl have their routines set.
A couple of gripes though - i found the dust sealing on the Paj somewhat wanting. We had a fine layer of dust coating just about every surface of the rig and especially around the B Columns where the dust seemed to be getting in from the door edges. I was also a little disappointed at the paint on the Paj - it seems to pickup scratches quite easily. Either that, or being a darker colour, they are more obvious to me than they would have been on a lighter colour vehicle.
Having said all that, all in all, it was a fantastic trip to a beautiful part of the world, and i really couldnt have asked for a better vehicle to take us there and back. So without further ado, here are some pics (i've split the pics into 2 threads as each thread only allows 10 imges)
These are the sea cliffs coming into Kalbarri. Some beautiful formations. This one's called the The Bridge
This is the Murchison River close to its mouth. Again, this is from Kalbarri. You can raft this river, take overnight treks at the bottom and also do overnight horse rides around the Murchison River.
This is Francois Peron NP in Shark Bay. Not a lot of pics here, but one of our campsite which was about 7-8m from the sea. Alas, no campfires were allowed.
Here we turned off the blacktop and onto gravel roads. Road conditions varied a fair bit. We spent around 12 days on gravel surface before returning to blacktop.
At Gascoyne Junction and heading to the Kennedy Ranges.
Kennedy Ranges.
cheers
Jeelan
got back from my trip to North west of Western Australia on fri. Had an awesome time and saw lots!! It was predominantly based around Francois Peron NP in Shark Bay, Kennedy Ranges, and Mt Augustus (WA's version of Ayers Rock). The route we took was Perth to Shark Bay with a few stops in between. From Shark Bay we took the North West Coastal Hwy towards Carnaravon and then turned into station roads to get to Gascoyne Junction. From GJ we headed to the Kennedy Ranges and then to Mt Augustus. From Mt Aug we cut across on gravel roads to Meekathara and took the Great Northern Hwy back to Perth.
all in all, we covered just under 4000kms and the rig has now done 9000kms.
Shark Bay:
I was quite disappointed with Shark Bay but it was peak season and there were caravans everywhere. Also it's been a while since ive been to that part of the bush and the regulation that has come into effect is a plain put off - you cant camp in a lot of places, no camp fires allowed etc. It's really over regulated in some respects.
Kennedy Ranges & Mt Augustus.
Kennedy Ranges and Mt Augustus were a pleasant surprise and we had an awesome time there. Again, i was quite surprised at the amount of traffic in the Ranges - it's quite isolated there and the recent rains that the area has had lead to a number of road closures but there when we got thre, the campsite was full of caravans. I think we were the only tents there.
The entire trip was a mix of camping and station stays. We spent around 11 nights in our tent and 3 nights at various station accomodations. I must say in all 3 cases, the station accomodation made the local motel/town caravan parks look like dumps.
Pajero/Montero:
the Paj performed flawlessly during the entire trip. We spent around 12 days of our trip on gravel roads, some of which were badly corrugated and most of which were extremely dusty. I was very pleased with the performance of the Paj in terms of its ride and handling. My previous experience has been with Patrols and comparatively, for this sort of touring, the Pajero is definately a notch above the Patrol in terms of comfort, ride, and handling. The Bilstein/Lovell suspension combo worked beautifully and there was almost no fade after 100's of kms on corrugated gravel roads. Having said that, one of the Polyair bags has punctured and i dont know where/when as i forgot to check the airbag pressures until 3/4 into the trip. Had the bag pumped to 25psi and each evening it would be below 5psi. It didnt seem to affect the handling of Paj and i'm taking it to the suspension place on Wed to get them checked, but based on this, would be hesitant to install airbags in the future and might even hv these removed.
i can go further into what we took and how we stored it if anyone wants to know, but i'm presuming that most ppl have their routines set.
A couple of gripes though - i found the dust sealing on the Paj somewhat wanting. We had a fine layer of dust coating just about every surface of the rig and especially around the B Columns where the dust seemed to be getting in from the door edges. I was also a little disappointed at the paint on the Paj - it seems to pickup scratches quite easily. Either that, or being a darker colour, they are more obvious to me than they would have been on a lighter colour vehicle.
Having said all that, all in all, it was a fantastic trip to a beautiful part of the world, and i really couldnt have asked for a better vehicle to take us there and back. So without further ado, here are some pics (i've split the pics into 2 threads as each thread only allows 10 imges)
These are the sea cliffs coming into Kalbarri. Some beautiful formations. This one's called the The Bridge
This is the Murchison River close to its mouth. Again, this is from Kalbarri. You can raft this river, take overnight treks at the bottom and also do overnight horse rides around the Murchison River.
This is Francois Peron NP in Shark Bay. Not a lot of pics here, but one of our campsite which was about 7-8m from the sea. Alas, no campfires were allowed.
Here we turned off the blacktop and onto gravel roads. Road conditions varied a fair bit. We spent around 12 days on gravel surface before returning to blacktop.
At Gascoyne Junction and heading to the Kennedy Ranges.
Kennedy Ranges.
cheers
Jeelan
