10th to 15th November 2009 - Drive Jason's car to the Gold Coast.

Jason (aka Jay) sent his car (aka OAN), to his Melbourne mechanic for a tune up and me, being a wonderful Dad, offered to drive it back to Jay's Gold Coast home, which he rents with his brother Luke and their mate Damian..

I left home in suburban Melbourne at 5am Tuesday (10th Nov) and drove via Seymour, Shepparton and then along the Newell hwy.
First stop was at Shepparton for some BP Ultimate, then I stopped at Maccas for breakky. All went well until I was just south of Jerilderie, when I was overcome with a very sudden urge. I think that the sausaage and egg mc muffin was going straight through me. I had to stop on a gravel road with a large tree. After my brief pitstop, I was feeling better, so I drove to Narrandera, where I was feeling very tired, so I had a 40 minute 'power nap'. These power naps do work, I left Narrandera and drove to Parkes for some more BP Ultimate. I arrived at Peak Hill at 3:59pm, I was so tempted to stay at Leighton's for the night and get Pauline's scones, but it would leave me with too many kms to drive on Wednesday, so I kept going to Gilgandra. I arrived at the Castlereagh Motel at approx 5:30pm, elapsed time was 12.75 hours, a bloody long time in the car. I had dinner at the motel, which was a chicken parma, very nice with a couple of chilled refreshers to cool me down.

Wednesday morning, I left the motel at 5:45am and sat behind a B double until the sun had risen, hopefully, eliminating the chance of running down some of our wildlife, that wanders onto the road. It must have worked because I didn't see any disruptive wildlife.
I pull into BP Narrabri and then into BP Goondiwindi for more BP Ultimate. It was 11am at Goondiwindi, as the Last Post was playing. As I was driving near Ipswich, a police car had just finished with a truckie, as I was passing him, he pulled out behind me and stayed behind for approx 5 kms, before he suddenly did a U turn and disappeared. No other incidences happened, I arrived at the boys' home at 4pm.
I was happy to get there, I then had 3 full days to relax.

On Thursday, while doing the odd job for the boys, I called into Broadwater TP and extended our stay for next year by 3 weeks to a total of 7 weeks (3rd Aug to 24th Sept).

On Saturday night, the boys took me out for dinner at the Emerald Lakes Golf Club, all of us had chicken parmas, I shouted, good ole Dad.
On Sunday, I caught the 8:05am Jetstar flight from Gold Coast to Tullamarine and then caught a bus to Mordialloc, where Marg came and picked me up.

It was great to see our boys, Marg and I miss them heaps.

In Summary:
Driving OAN wasn't the easiest car to drive, I missed my cruise control and air conditioning. It was unfortunate that the weather was in the mid 30s both days and I had to drive with all windows down. I made it with no real drama, so I was very happy.
I really missed not having our fiver with me, little things like having a toilet with you and being able to rest whenever you want too.

* Tuesday (Mordialloc to Gilgandra) - distance travelled was 968kms.
* Wednesday (Gilgandra to Gold Coast via Logan Motorway) - distance travelled was 849kms.
* Total distance travelled was 1,817kms.


At present, our next adventure is not until April, when we head back to the Gold Coast, via Perth.