Clockwise Round Oz in a Wasserboxer Campervan.

Ask most people about travelling around Oz in a campervan and images of aircooled T2 Kombis or caravans towed by Aussie six cylinder sedans come to mind for most people.  Today the average Aussie traveller is probably doing it in a Japanese 4WD towing a camper trailer or small caravan.  In the case of the many foreign tourists who outnumber Aussies on the road in tropical Oz, they are either cruising along in an endless procession of Mercedes Sprinter based campervans ie Britzwagens or in the case of the backpackers, 1980s vintage Falcon wagons held together with bits of wire or a prayer or two.  The Sprinters are great machines and their 2.9 L TDI engines rocket them along while averaging 10 L to the 100 km.  Also Falcons are much loved by aboriginal communities and as a consequence are very common up north as any viewer of ‘Bush Mechanics ‘ will have seen.  On my trip in 2002 I found that there were still lots of T2 aircooled Kombis doing their umpteenth trip and more T3 Wasserboxers  than I expected.  I even encountered a few stalwart T1 spilt window campers still out there. However  I saw hardly any VW T4 based campers outside of South Eastern Australia.

After much preparation, my T3 campervan and I  left Canberra on New Years Day 2002 heading south to follow the Snowy River Valley down into Victoria. My first encounter with the squadrons of Britzwagens was along the Great Ocean Road in Western Victoria where the Twelve Apostles draw tourists from far and wide.  I then found that I was driving through the coldest summer for 30 years as I  made my way along the cool coast of southern Australia.  More seaside towns came and went and at Mt Gambier I crossed into South Australia or SA.  This is about the only green bit in the whole of SA.

 After Mt Gambier I said farewell to the last of the greenery for another 2000 kms and rolled up the coast to the Murray Mouth. There I diverted across the water to Kangaroo Is or KI,  which is an enormous island.  These days one can drive around KI on bitumen but side trips take one onto the infamous KI corrugated dirt roads covered in ball bearing sized red gravel and a lot of interesting driving. After recuperating in Victor Harbour  I pulled into Adelaide.  A compelling attraction for VW owners in Adelaide is  a visit to Edwardstown.  Not only do they have several VW spares/ repair shops there, but also several car yards selling aircooled VWs for very reasonable prices by east coast standards. A VW garage there gave my T3 a service and told me that those awful KI roads had damaged the  rear gas shockers.  Soon it was time to head up North Road for the Barossa and then Port Augusta where I turned south again in order to head west via the Eyre Peninsula.  At the tip of this Peninsula, lies  Port Lincoln of tuna fishing fame. There I found that this very prosperous town supported not only an impressive fleet of expensive cars, 4WDs etc but also lots of T3 Kombis in daily use by lots of tradesmen.  Then I headed north to Ceduna through dreamy places like Venus or Streaky Bays.  Ceduna is not only the last chance to go shopping before arriving in Kalgoorlie but it also boasts a VW repair shop about 10 kms west of town on the left.

After having had my aircon compressor replaced, before I left Canberra,I drove in early Feb across the tree covered Nullarbor with the windscreen wipers going and the heater going!  WA is another world away.  One soon learns that the main industries in WA are mining, mining and more mining.  Kalgoorlie, my first stop, is surrounded by them.  I found it useful while driving along the endless dirt roads to have my UHF CB going to pick up the enormous ore carrying road trains  coming the other way.  Many of their drivers were women!  One copes with these monsters by getting off the road as they sit in the middle and give way to nothing but other road trains.

I then headed for Esperance and made my way along the stunning south coast of WA to Albany.  There I met my first WA T3 owners who almost always drive Syncros.  Albany also boasts a VW specialist.  While off on a morning walk with some locals  around some stunning scenery along King George Sound thieves crowbarred the front passenger door open and stole my cameras. As I was to discover repeatedly thereafter this is an issue one has to cope with right around Oz. After more dreamy south coast towns like Denmark, I made my way to Perth via Bunbury and Augusta, the SW tip of Oz.

While the East Coast of Oz is undergoing a bad drought, Perth has been struggling with a drought that now spans decades and desalinisation is now being seriously considered. Perth boasts one of the 3 VW dealerships to be found in Oz west of Melbourne.  The dealer there seemed to be doing well selling upmarket Golfs to the Café Latte set in one of the wealthiest cities in Oz.  However I saw very few T4 vans on the road.  Perth boasts a dozen or so VW specialists who mainly service air cooled VWs which I found to  be the norm away from Australia’s South East.  My T3 got its next service there and a new pair of rear German gas shockers.  Hence road handling improved greatly. This took place over 2 visits as a consequence of almost everything having to be flown in by overnight airfreighters.  Unfortunately the new door rubber for the rebuilt front door was sent by a disinterested Sydney supplier by road which involved a weeks wait.

Then it was time to head north and temperatures soon climbed into the 40s. By Exmouth the aircon was  really getting a work out.  Snorkeling on Ningaloo Reef gave one plenty of chances to cool down.  After Exmouth I drove to Tom Price in the Pilbara in order to visit Karajini National Park and it s famous gorges.  For those with  a mechanical bent the mighty  mine trucks with the million dollar tyres were an interesting feature of a visit to the Tom Price iron ore mine which is huge.  From there I took the HI private road which links Tom  Price and Karratha on the coast.  To drive the 300 kms involved, one must view a video on the dangers that lie ahead and sign the usual waiver. As was to often to be the case thereafter I found myself making my way along a rough road linking one desert oasis with the next  in the company of nothing but Landcruisers.   With my T3 loaded with food and water I was worried about doing a tyre but the Michelin XCD LT  8 ply tyres never let met down then or later.  On the same road, I saw several overloaded Perth based 4WDs wearing wide tyres have some spectacular blowouts along the way.

At Karratha I realised that the master brake cylinder up in the dash behind the wheel was leaking brake fluid, thanks to the relentless pounding on corrugated dirt roads.  I had lots of phone conversations with the Perth VW specialist I had used and he sent up a procession of parts by airfreight while I and others tried to work out the source of the oozing brake fluid.   At Broome, in the Cable Beach Caravan Park I stayed in, I found myself in the company of 5 other T3 campervan owners.  One owner was a VW mechanic from Melbourne  who soon twigged my brake fluid loss problem was a cracked  cap assembly on the top of the master cylinder!  Also staying there was a young German couple travelling in their diesel T3 van they had brought over for the trip.  Their  poor  old very low powered van also had to pull a heavy trailer containing a big BMW motorcycle.  They had a lot of trouble getting their van serviced as it had a lot of parts that never appeared  on Australian parts lists.  A WA T3 owner I met there had set up their Syncro with 16 inch wheels which were never imported into Oz.

Next came the Kimberley, that mecca of 4WD addicts.  I could have done the famous Gibb River Rd but the Pentacost river was running too high for a T3 whose wading depth is only 350 mm. So I drove on both ends of it and used Highway 1 to get to Kununurra.  The Kimberley  is well worth visiting  for its rugged scenery, wildlife, great gorges, rivers, rock art etc etc. The mechanic who replaced yet more fanbelts in Kununurra was just back from South Africa and was quite familiar with T3s, the taxi of J’oburg it seems.

A highlight of my time in the NT was visiting VW specialists there. There is a new dealer in Darwin who sells the usual modern range all geared up to run mainly on premium unleaded petrol which is unobtainable in the NT ( only state I struck this).  Two independent repair shops have carved up the maintenance work in Darwin between air and watercooled VWs. I heard my first sad news story about T4 Syncros here, not standing up to gravel roads very well. More sad stories came as I went east. I headed for the Gulf after visiting Kakadu and the Centre.  My T3 saw some really adventurous driving in deep bulldust, crossing innumerable rivers etc etc. It was all worth it to get to Lawn Hill NP  with its rushing pristine rivers, lovely gorges, lush green vegetation etc.

After the Gulf, I headed for Cairns, where the rear brakes had to be rebuilt by an aircooled VW shop who services lots of old backpackers’ kombis going around Oz again. Yes and the fan belts and rear shockers got replaced again.  After Cairns I headed north to Cooktown, on a road to which is almost all sealed now. After a few days in dreamy lovely old Cooktown, I headed  a few kms north for Laura via Lakeland to see the famous rockart galleries. Alas another fanbelt went.  This time the coolant expansion tank announced its days were almost over.  The Swiss contractor for the RACQ patched things up and fitted another fanbelt.  As often happens in far north Queensland foreign communities have sprung up. Hence  Lakeland is mainly Swiss!  After this I headed down to Townsville where the local VW dealer had a new expansion tank flown up for me.  After Townsville the traffic got heavier and heavier and I started seeing lots of late model T4 vans in towns.

I got back to Canberra in September, had my T3 serviced and put it up for sale. To my amazement it sold very quickly.  Having decided that my T3 was getting too old for outback touring, I sold it reluctantly in good condition. I then bought a new Japanese 4WD diesel utility which is very common out bush and which should be able to handle lots of gravel roads.  In my view T4s are only for driving on good sealed roads.  For other T3 owners planning on  touring Oz, I recommend the use of oil rather than gas shockers as gas shockers overheat too easily.  Take lots of fan belts as the exposed position of the engine ie at the rear, means that lots of stones flick up and cut the belts up. The cooling system needs to be in top order to cope with the heat.  Be prepared to change the oil, oil filters and air filters a lot. I used a Finer (air) Filter which one can clean easily rather than simply replace the paper based VW filters which are very expensive.  Naturally it makes sense to have your T3 in top condition, since once one leaves the East Coast, one will find few VW garages with much knowledge of T3s.  A list of East parts suppliers prepared to airfreight bits when needed would also help plus a good manual.  Use light truck rather car tyres.  The T3 14” size is a common one.  Lastly on the positive side, I found the body of my T3 very stiff and dust tight which was great when driving through bulldust, the clearance was good by modern standards on bad roads and the robust well set up suspension stood up well, all things considered.

Auf Wiedersehen

 Chris Bellamy