DX grunt's holiday at Boat Harbour
Trip report…… BOAT HARBOUR – Great Southern Region of WA.
Day 1….. The missus came home from night shift, sick, and reported she was not going to work that night and we were going to meet her daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter at the campsite….a day early. She really was sick and didn’t want to spread the germs around. I’m the exclusion!
I thought….’great’. Usual last minute packing took over – grabbed what I thought I’d need and we took off.
Arrived at the ‘no frills’ – BYO almost everything - but very beautiful camp site on the south coast of WA, about 120km north of Albany.
To my surprise, we were greeted with a free gas BBQ, seating, shade, drop dunnies and a concrete rain water tank. Thanks to the Welstead Progress Association and the City of Albany.
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Set up camp
We were blessed to have the best campsite. It was at the end of the ‘cul de sac’ and no one came near us. Apart from that, we were the only ones there on weekdays, but had a few other campers rock up on the weekend.
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The kitchen
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Grunt’s ‘Den’
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Note: My only ‘creature comfort’ was a double bed inner spring mattress, with my favourite pillow brought from home. The mozzie net was a blessing too. No little bustards to wake us up in the middle of the night by buzzing around our ears. LOL
The Bathroom
We started off using the solar showers, but because the weather wasn’t hot, we had to top up daily with kettle water. I got sick of doing that, so the missus went to the shop and brought a 20lt fresh water container and we still topped that up daily with kettle water, BUT, I used our shower that plugs into the cig lighter, and it was bliss.
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The only downside to the den was it leaked water. With the pod doors open, rain leaked down from the top and soaked our mattress and the sheets at the end of the bed. Luckily I found it in time and was able to dry it all out before we noticed it in bed. PS. I haven’t started peeing the bed yet. I’m too young. Lol
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Family photo time. Awwwww.
DX grunt’s first drive in the sand – ever! Dropped tyres down to 25psi and took off. It was fan bloody tastic.
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Had an issue doing a U turn at the end of the beach. DX Grunt was too heavy – on the day.
I forgot I had a heap of stuff in the back storage area and the main fuel tank is at the back end.
Silly me transferred fuel from the sub tank to the mains, so I had 90lts of diesel, as well as having lots of gear in the back end to weigh me down.
Dropped tyres to 20psi, dug underneath the back end and out she came. Sorry no photo’s. Somehow all 10 pics came out blurry. That’s my story. Lol.
I didn’t intend driving on the beach, but couldn’t resist the temptation. My son in law would have gladly got me out in his Tojo ute. Hey, at the end of the day, I got home safely, and my truck didn’t get swallowed up by the high tide. Lol
A bit more sightseeing
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Just to prove it wasn’t all sun, sand and surf, I did a bit of manual labour too. Must have lost a couple of kg’s trying to dig this fishing net out of the sand. In case you’re trying to guess, the roof of the vehicle belongs to a Tojo. A lot of digging went on and ‘recovering’ by 2 x Tojo’s. Man that was hard work.
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We were camped at the bottom right hand corner of picture.
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For the first 9 days, the wind was howling, intermittent light rain hung around and waves crashed onto the beach. I was not a happy camper and was absolutely ready to go home. Our solar showers were almost useless and had to be topped up with kettle water - daily. My misses said to give it one more day – so I did – and I’m glad I did. I hadn’t had hols for 6 months and Feb is supposed to be the hottest month in WA, so I was reeealy looking forward to my 2 weeks of sun, surf and sand.
The remaining 3 days of our hols were absolutely perfect. Did heaps of beach fishing, explored in the rellies 4 wheeler. Didn’t catch any fish worth writing home about and threw them back.
We were also blessed with the presence of ‘stingers’ (blue bottle jellyfish)
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Mozzies and march flies.
The last 3 days of good weather made up for 9 days of crappy weather. I learnt a lot about myself and how to improvise. It was DX grunt’s first fully self sufficient campsite set up. Can’t wait to go solar. Spent about $5-$8 a day for fuel for my little generator. Loved having a hot shower every day, but the wind cut straight through me.
Made a list of needs for future trips and was absolutely impressed with my little ‘Grunt’. She powered up and down the hills, loaded to the hilt, and performed well on the beach. It was my fault that it was too heavy, but hey, it’s my first trip in her. I’ll have to go with probably half a sub tank and half a main tank of fuel next time. It’s all trial and error to gain expertise for next time. Lol
Take care out there.
Ross
DX grunt
