Stuck: How to Assume Problems
We are in Marla. A town where we would have stopped to get petrol. A town bypassed by the Stuart Highway. A town that we would not have remembered on long travels, except maybe by a receipt found from my wallet when I was cleaning it out in three months. But here we are; talking to the staff at the rest stop; watching travellers come and go; waiting for a phone call from the RACV.
The kids are out under some trees in the nice breeze blowing off the outback open roads. They had run under a sprinkler, eaten lunch and asked questions about what was happening. Now they are under the trees, listening to a story - The Princess Bride. I had planned to read it to them but Tony has started. I think they will love it.
Stopping in Marla was not a plan. We are around half the distance into our planned journey for today but we have been stopped by a car refusing to go further. I could limp the car along the road but it would probably leave us in the desert on the side of the road, or like the roadside carnage dotted along the side of the highway. It is not worth pushing it further.
I am not sure if there is a way to plan for breakdowns. We planned ahead as best we could. The car went in for a service a few days before we left and nothing was flagged. The mechanic said "She is in great nick mechanically, even though she is a bit rough to look at." That gave me some confidence in the car, until two days ago, on the drive to Coober Pedy it started overheating.
This is something we have dealt with before: we took a long drive out to Beeac for a Christmas lunch, only to spend the afternoon sweltering in the car because we needed to use the "second radiator"; with a standard car you would call it a heater, in our car the heater is the second radiator. Just push the gauge onto hot and watch the gauge drop to normal levels again.
Last time this happened it was the water pump, which was followed by fixing a head gasket. Surely it cannot be happening this close to getting the gasket fixed. I guess we will see.
How It Happened
We were asked to come on this trip by the MIllars. They blew into our town and took us away on a magic carpet, a whirlwind adventure. The thought of seeing some of the outback and Australia's great monuments with great company was an opportunity we couldn't pass up. So we didn't. We made lists, we packed for everything possibility we could think of and within twelve days had our car and six kids all packed up ready to depart.
I had some doubts about the car but the mechanics words and my optimism for a smooth ride was all we needed. So I thought.
It first started playing up towards Coober Pedy. The temperature gauge started rising and so did my suspicions on the coming days, with temperatures set to increase to 38 degrees celcius.
I took it into the local mechanic and told him my woes. He pointed at a old pickup and said his car did the same thing on the roads, the wind blows across the front of the car instead of in towards the radiator. The car overheats. But because I hung around a little longer he invited me to bring the car around the back to have a look at.
They took a closer look at the radiator and blew some compressed air through it. Said it was okay and didn't take any of my money. I guess they see plenty of suckers come in after underestimating the vast and brutal place the is the australian outback.
We saw some sights and camped underground. Then we left on our scheduled departure.
Marla. Where the Bloody Hell is Marla?
Above 80km per hour the car got a shudder. It was not too bad at first, but it started to get worse. Adeline was sitting in the back of the car making a noise that sounded like someone was patting her back. She was entertaining herself, I was getting worried.
The car had a shudder and for the past 70km we had had the heater on the entire time. Something was wrong and I was beginning to think the head gasket was gone. We pulled into the Marla service station and I went in to make a call to the RACV. It turns out the closest service point was Marla, so we didn't get a tow and the local mechanic wouldn't even look at the car.
I waited and chatted to the man behind the counter. His name is Nick and he didn't mind the conversation. Finally the RACV lady called back, she sounded concerned but kept saying "You sound stuck." and "You've got thinking to do." Well, I knew I was stuck but her suggestion of thinking wasn't really in the RACV brochure.