Because it's in such atrocious condition and there is another perfectly good road that does the same thing. Although this isn't obvious to non locals. Last heard the people at Mt Dare were thinking of closing it themselves, as it causes a few car breakages.Why?
No problems Kevin, I must have imagined it.
This was a little different to a "rough road", certainly when I was there. For the majority of it I was at idle in 1st gear. In the (8,900 kms) of last trip through the desert country it's the only road I would baulk at travelling again (maybe one other short but avoidable track in Cameron Corner area). The people at Mt Dare often close roads in the area afaik. Not only to protect the roads, but because they also have to go out and help people when they brake down. They were the ones who told me this road is best avoided (a little late of course).
Yeah, actually I just did mainly because I was wondering how we could view the same road so differently lol. The advice was that this particular road has been getting regular maintenance for a couple of years now, and as a result is in good condition (local rainfalls have a large bearing on this apparently). It was maintained a few weeks ago and as a verbatim quote "it's nothing like the road it was a few years back".
So maybe it depends when you're there, but when I was there I would go as far as to say it is up there with the worst roads I have ever driven.
A phone call (08 8670 7835) to the Mt Dare hotel will give you a sure answer
After travelling for the last 17 years around the country with various modes of vehicles and camping the one big thing you do notice is the different interpretations of road conditions.Yeah, actually I just did mainly because I was wondering how we could view the same road so differently lol. The advice was that this particular road has been getting regular maintenance for a couple of years now, and as a result is in good condition (local rainfalls have a large bearing on this apparently). It was maintained a few weeks ago and as a verbatim quote "it's nothing like the road it was a few years back".
So maybe it depends when you're there, but when I was there I would go as far as to say it is up there with the worst roads I have ever driven.
After travelling for the last 17 years around the country with various modes of vehicles and camping the one big thing you do notice is the different interpretations of road conditions.
The cape road at the time we did it about 2003 was ok if taken carefully but then we drove on the telegraph track which was slower but better on the vehicle and came down through Pawmpuraaw and Kowanyama which also was easier except for the bull dust.
The Gibb river road was no drama if you went steady, but the savannah way from Mataranka across to Chilagoe was pretty rough with IMHO the roughest bit corrugation wise in the Limmen National park from Normanton to Chillagoe was washed out more but easy if taken steady, mind you we were in an Isuzu NPS300 towing a van.
Still got to do a lot of desert tracks which is what the d22 is for, got sidetracked for 8 years towing/sailing and living in a 26' trailer sailer around the coasts so now back to more basic inland travel before they plant me in one place.
The one part of any of the vehicles we used that got the least use was the 4wd and trust me we did do plenty of supposedly 4wd tracks in fact went out of our way to find every remote road, track or river we could but then we hunted foxes in the 70's right through western NSW in all weather conditions in utes and even wagons eg HT Holdens and XL falcons with just winter treads on the rear.
Sometimes you need to listen to advice about how bad some tracks/roads are and then ask questions to suss out the credibility of the person giving the advice also find out the amount of traffic and ask those coming the opposite direction what they encountered, we carried a HF radio for a few years until we sold the boat but might consider getting another now.
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