2017 The Lap

We've received some "birthing" photos of Q+ (certainly gave Melanie a huge fright when she received the email with that title!) Our progress with the trip planning has slowed - it will pick up when John gets his teeth into it. We continue to speak with people who have done this trip and gather information - it seems there is so much to learn and so much to see.

Well, we've had our final trip in Ranger to the Hatta-Kulkyne NP over the Easter holiday break.  She's been cleaned up: scoured to within an inch of her life; the hard top polished; rust cleaned off; canvas washed - and we're now camper-trailer free. We received a "birthing photo" of "Q" last week, so now we're really getting excited (I'd be even more excited if my name was included on the chassis!) Hopefully we'll get progress photos this coming week.

Tuesday, 28 March 2017 29 March 2017 - Decisions! Well, we've had weeks and weeks of research working out what upgrades need to be done to the car and we've made some big decisions.  On the recommendation of some members of the Toyota 4x4 Club and also SCS4x4, one of the Club's sponsors, we've booked the Prado in to "Fourby Fitouts" in Hallam to have a fridge slide and drawers fitted.  Thankfully they've fitted us in to their busy schedule and will do the work in a fortnight's time and SCS4x4 will do the electrical work next week.  We'll be able to head to Hatta Kulkyne NP for Easter with a working fridge-feeezer in the car - yippee! This trip to HKNP will probably be the last trip we'll do in Ranger - our camper trailer which has been (and still is) a fabulous unit.  We'll sell her when we get back from our Easter trip and hopefully off-set some of the AOR cost! We got news yesterday that our Q4 is on the production line...

Planning - 1 March 2017 Well, here we are in the midst of maps: an atlas; a road atlas; HEMA maps; "Explore Australia" book; "Rooftop" maps; "Camps Australia" book; "Australian Bush Cooking"; Kimberley & Pilbara; Kings Canyon; National, Marine and Regional Parks in WA; "Golden Outback"; "WA in Bloom"  - and more maps!  Do we have enough maps and literature to work out where we want to go on this trip?! We've decided to head off on John's dream, of doing "The Lap" this year but first of all there's so much to do:  the first thing was to buy a car that will take us safely around Australia - a Toyota Prado was the go; buy a van (more on that later!) as our current camper trailer has been a great fit for us for many years now, but I am so over lifting the bed (even though it's on gas struts), and lifting out storage boxes and unpacking boxes within boxes within boxes, setting it all up the...