Robes, Volcanic lakes and catastrophic failures.

It's Friday afternoon and i've been looking forward to this night all week, not just because its Friday, because its not just any old Friday, It's Mik's birthday and she has planned an expedition for the weekend. So as i pull up in the driveway i am mentally preparing myself for the mission to get changed and get on the road. The troopy ws loaded up before we knew nd we were on the roa an sipping on bottles of V to get amped for the 4 hr drive ahead. As we leave Adelaide Heather spots a fight about to develop between a couple of outer suburb bogan women, She was correct the fight escalated into hair pulling and punch just as the light went green ( much to our voyeuristic disappointment.) The drive was fun Heff and i were holed up in the back, which resulted in typical childish back seat shenanigans, (ie i wrapped her in a doona and tied it up so she couldn't move. you know the usual stuff you do).

Eventually after a few driver changes and some retarded dancing to limp biscuit we arrived at our accommodation at around 10pm.

Messed up my room time to enjoy a hard earned juice.

We went to sleep after the stupid amount of V we drank wore off. And dreamt bout the glorious day of exploring to come. Once awake we clambered aboard the Bright yellow, off road bus of dreams and set destination for the beach and cliffs around Robe.

Adventure Man stride (Adventure Strides also pictured)

I'm stuck in a rutt and i want out!

After we soaked up this amazing view and scenery we headed off towards Mt Gambier to check out the Blue Lake and Sunken Garden. We had a nice vibe in the car, the trip was refueling our love for the road and each other. Many silly jokes and conversations, we were exploring again.
All this love and happiness was underpinned by a sinister suspicion i had,
Thinking to myself that there may be something going wrong with the brakes. I pulled over to check them but there weren't any signs of problem to my tyre kicking inspection. So we continued on.....
bout 5 klms later i was convinced i was feeling something so i puled over again,

It was just low on Brake Fluid

So we topped it up and i apparently took some imaginary notes on the situation.

With that problem well behind us i jumped back behind the helm and continued a merry journey towards the magical fabled blue lake of Mt Gambier.
About 5kms more down the road we approached a small settlement of houses and the speed limit dropped from 110 to 80, as i gently applied pressure to the brakes my foot was not granted the usual resistance expected of a correctly functioning brake pedal, it seems the pedal was just going straight to the floor, several pumps on the pedal did nothing to alleviate the problem that was now escalating becausue we were not slowing down. I felt slightly concerned by this because brakes are kind of fundamental to the whole driving experience.
The troopy weighs around 3 tonne and as such has a fair amount of momentum when traveling at speed, this is quite an issue when you are faced with no brakes to slow this momentum, luckily i have driven a car before and was aware that the compression braking in the bumblebitch slows the beast fairly well, i spotted a rest area and aimed to stop in there. Backing down through the gears slowed the burly bitch up and we eventually came to a stop.
At this point it was decided we should probably address the situation and see what this hic-cup was.

Removing the wheel, and the brake caliper came off with it, Landing with a thud on the ground

Brakefluid was everywhere, Nelson and i got to work licking it up.

The Brake line on the Calliper had failed somehow and spewed Brake fluid everywhere, some say that this is how both of the Calliper bolts came loose and the caliper detached itself, other speculated that Nelson had sabotaged the Brakes in an attempt to make my daily work commute more exciting.

Either way somthing had to be done to restore 75% of the braking power to the beehicle, we needed to block the Brake line, the first attempt failed, an aluminum roof rack bracket was not sufficient to stem the flow, Too much surface area.
We nutted it out with my dad on the phone and a friendly passer by who listened to us as we told him how we'd fix it, no doubtingly impressed he gave us some wet wipes and a spare wheel stud and continued on his fishing adventure. With New found determination and confidence we folded over the brake line kinking it and held it in place with zip ties until we could make our way to a servo and get a hose clamp. During this time the industrious girls used their charm and good looks to flag down a car heading for the nearest servo to get some brake fluid, they arrived triumphantly with said fluid and we completed our Bush Mechanic esq "repair".

Unphased by our new driving style that involved turning the steering wheel to the left, each time the brake was applied to counter-act the now right side heavy braking bias. We continued to Mt Gambier proud of our accomplishment and ability to maintain cool composure Nelso and I indulged ourselves in a had earned high five.

Go team wanker!

Weeeee Gambier and it was deliciously worth it.

Multi-Layered Awesome.

Pumphouse on the Lake

Gorgeous Mikki and her halo.

Lovers

This is how it looked through my new sunglasses that i haven't mentioned until now.

These re my new sunnies, much different to my old ones..... kinda.

Next Stop garden hole, it's right in the heart of Mt Gambier so we went there.

Bumble bee stopped for a drink at the pub while we had a look at the garden.

We all like a pretty hole don't we.

Can you see all the other members of the wolfpack?

If we had seen this cat earlier we may have had some warning about the bad luck with the brakes.

We made our way back to Robe, made an offering of our hopes and dreams to the universe in the form of burning handwritten notes on the beach, a little weird but it was quite a nice thing to do.

Some drink and sleep followed this amazing day, and we awoke in the morning to a brand new day, The sun was shinning and it was beautiful. We drove to the Naracoorte to check out the caves, the animal museum i thought was a bit lame, with fluffy animals that looked like kangaroos with koalas heads, weird but apparently some time in the past these Koalaroos roamed. After the museum of anamatronic abominations we continued to the Self guided cave tour.

The caves were very quiet and peaceful and i enjoyed fiddling around trying to get some photos. The above images were probably the result of that. After the caves we had a sammich each and hit the road, swapping drivers until we got home. When we got home we watched some Tv shows and went to bed.

I drove the troopy to work today and managed to track down the spares during my lunch break, though i had to inform the old guy working at the wreckers how to remove the brake line from the calliper. After work today i got home and fixed the troopy, took it for a test lap and all is again well in the Plight of the Bumblebee.

We were all winners this weekend, and as triumphant as i look in this image, i'm also filled with sadness that this may well be one of my last adventures with my best friends, i think i'm going to have a strong crack at my new job here in Adelaide and unfortunately that doesn't afford me the freedoms of a nomad that i have come to enjoy. All good things must come to an end, All that goes up must come down and no matter how much enlightenment and wisdom you think you've collected, turns out the "man" still offers financial security when you need it.
Love ya'll
Craig