Willy Willy Window

Thursday, and we drive into Cloncurry to stock up on a few food items, and restock cold drinks, after all we're not camels. I think even camels would struggle in this heat.
Cloncurry is beautiful, we found a shady park at the Mary Kathleen Museum to have lunch. It was nice to have a look at all the machinery and some old buildings rescued and restored from the Mary Kathleen Township ( an old Uranium mine shut down 40 odd years ago), the old police station dates back to the 1890s, and now houses one of Australias best mineral displays, but it was just too hot to appreciate it.

 

 

We have seen in our Camps 6 book (campers Bible) that there is camping by the Corella Dam about 60km this side of Mt Isa and planned to go in there for at least one night maybe 2.  The gates to the Dam were closed but not locked so we entered with a bit of a feeling of trepidation, leave gates as you find them so we chained it closed behind us, we followed a dirt track for a km or so and it brought us into sight of the body of water, the dam level was considerably low but the banks were green and spotted with shady trees, we set up camp near a clump of trees in a valley hoping to catch a gully wind to cool us off, anything in this heat.

Did I say anything? Oops. We didn't just get a gully wind we got a God almighty cyclonic gust, everything outside was caught in it, unfortunately this also meant our open windows on the van, one gusty burst of wind and our windows on the van went crack and one ripped entirely off. It only lasted a minute, if that but it was enough to shake the entire van, a wreak havoc on our little camp.

After a few choice words from you know who, we picked ourselves up and collected all the items strewn over the countryside, we found the cover to the generator 100m up a hill. We were lucky no one was outside at the time it struck, the hole in the side of the van can be repaired, we hope.
And as for the name Willy Willy Window, that was Jessica's suggestion, they name cyclones so why not this?

So come Friday, we taped some cardboard over the hole in the wall so we could tow the van safely into Mt Isa, The cardbaoard didn't hold up too well and poor Jessicas bed has worn the brunt of the road grit and dust blowing into the van.  We have called the Insurance company to make a claim, but we have an issue with the fact that Trakmaster who can supply the exact parts don't reopen until 14th Jan.

Thanks to Lyall we have a contact in Mt Isa who can do the repairs, but just require a supplier for the parts. We will know more on monday when mst businesses reopen, until then we have a cardboard window, and a powered site in a Mt Isa caravan park.