EXCEED AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2017 EXCEED AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2017 | Page 22

TRIP REPORT
Saturday Morning Sleep In
12th August 2017
by Peter Symons
Trip Leader
TEC
Trip Participants
Peter Symons and Janine Harron
Russel and Kerri Chatfield
Steve and Tom de Mamiel Prado
Guy Fawkner and Rod Salan
Nick Parsons
Lyndon and Sandra Bell
Noel Prictor and Kerry McNeill
Jake Howard and Jenna Leek 75 Series
Defender
Pajero
Ford Ranger
Triton
Pajero
80 Series
The alarm clock went off at 4:30 am on the morning of the trip. Sitting up in bed, I rubbed my eyes and reached forward
for the ringing alarm clock. Stumbling in the dark my hand found the snooze button, I grabbed the clock by the snooze
button and threw it against the wall and went back to bed.
At 7:30 we rolled out of bed, stepped over the broken clock on the way to the shower, had a lazy breakfast before we
headed to the BP at Officer to meet others before heading to Moe.
A lazy drive through the sunshine with much banter on channel 15 between Officer and Moe between all trip members.
I knew it was going to be a great day – especially if the rain held off.
The trip started about 40 mins before the scheduled kick off time given that everybody was there waiting and frothing
at the bit to get going. So away we went…..
First stop of interest was a water crossing at Cooper Creek. Nice easy entry as the river was well down but did dip to
headlight depth just before the exit. So a nice easy start to the trip.
There are old mines and smelting equipment up behind Cooper Creek so we thought we would exit the cars and have
a poke about. Its amazing to think about the people that worked the dig way back when, and how much effort it would
have taken to get the huge steel bits in there. Life is easier these days.
The rest of the day consisted of driving some great tracks like Deep Creek 2 and Beardmores. Whilst on Beardmores
track we detoured slightly to see the Thompson Dam spillway. The Thompson Dam has only been full three times since
its construction completed in 1983, being in 1992, 1993 and 1996.
The time was drawing close to when we needed to be at the Erica pub for dinner but one track was left to do – Flats
Track. We bee-lined to Flats (and bumped into Ruthy with Milo 2 along the way) before we tackled the uphill of flats.
All trip members took on Flats and all did it well.
Having the days tracks under the belt it was off to the Erica pub to put some food and wine under the belt (along with
the aforementioned tracks) where we arrived spot on at 7:00pm and enjoyed a meal and a drink to end the day.
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Vol 34 No. 6 Aug/Sept 2017