4WD on M&M

The Mighty Canning Stock Route

Mon, 06 Oct 2025 11:30:10 +0000

Four years ago on our first Simpson Crossing the topic of the Canning Stock Route (CSR) first came up in conversations with Ed, Bill, Megan and Julie. Back then it wasn't really something we had every considered doing or felt the need to do, since it was meant to be nothing but 2000km of the worst corrugations in all of Australia.

Fast forward to May 2024 and to an email from Ed suggesting August 2025 as travel date for the CSR, since Angus and Teja would then be on the road for their honeymoon and could join us.

Simpson Desert via Madigan Line

Mon, 10 Oct 2022 19:52:00 +0000

We made good on our promise to return to the Simpson Desert with Ed and Karen whom we met on the trip last year. We had started planning late last year but realised three weeks before leaving that due to the unexpected amounts of rain we had to redo some of our plans. There were another few hickups like Markus injuring his back a week before leaving and two of the other couples that meant to join us pulling out on the last day.

Crossing the Simpson Desert

Tue, 13 Jul 2021 19:51:06 +0000

The last year saw us make very little use of our car and we started thinking about selling her. On top of that she had turned 11 and various bits and pieces had started to break down and needed repairs. Given that Martina couldn't bear to sell her, we decided to instead make more use of her. This was aided by the fact that we were very limited in where we could travel to and there were still a lot of empty patches on our Australia map.

Closing the Loop

Sun, 14 Aug 2016 18:02:57 +0000

In the past ten years of us living here we have been slowly filling up our map of Australia. But there was always this top left corner that was too far away and too remote to do in a single short holiday.
For a while now we have been planning on maybe doing it in two separate loop drives. But then we ended up doing the upper part of NT last year when Markus' brother was here.
And really - why do we own a big 4WD, if we don't use it for trips like this?

Better Range

Wed, 04 Mar 2015 18:32:45 +0000

We nearly ran out of diesel on our last tour. We upgraded. We should be good for a whole day without bowsers now.

WA 2012

Wed, 02 May 2012 12:53:56 +0000

The highlights were the Karijini National Park, the Millstream Chichester National Park, Cape Range National Park (Exmouth) , Francois Peron National Park and lots of other stuff (Coral Bay, Kalbarri NP, Pinnacles, beaches, lookouts).

The old image gallery versions (works in IE and all other browsers): Sydney to Exmouth Exmouth to Perth

The new version works under Firefox and Chrome: Sydney to Exmouth Exmouth to Perth

The Stockton Beach Experience

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 10:09:52 +0000

Stockton Beach is a 32km strip of beach and sand dunes stretching out just behind Newcastle nearly all the way up to Nelson Bay. And it is open to 4WDs as well as camping and fishing.

Birthday Girl

Sun, 28 Aug 2011 09:58:35 +0000

We don’t know when Elsie came off the production line, but it was exactly one year ago that we took her home. Since then we did 25 weekend trips with her which averages to roughly every other weekend.

SYD-BNE-SYD

Wed, 27 Apr 2011 12:43:59 +0000

We decided to use up all our frequent flyer miles, all our credit card award points as well as a little bit of our savings to do a different kind of trip.

Beginner 4wd course

Sun, 12 Dec 2010 06:27:26 +0000

Kicking Elsie around the mud and gravel. We learned how to do it. (Well, a bit)

Bigots!

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 09:25:55 +0000

After ~7 years of not even owning one we now own one that is 3 times bigger than a normal one.

Central NT

Sun, 08 Aug 2010 04:46:18 +0000

We spent 11 awesome days in May with Barbara and Matthias driving around in central Northern Territory starting and ending in Alice Springs.

Farewell drinks, Nissan Patrol

Sat, 05 Jun 2010 03:08:39 +0000

The real purpose of farewell drinks and our first experience with a Nissan Patrol.

Cairns to Alice Springs

Sat, 25 Apr 2009 08:25:35 +0000

Rather spontaneously we had decided 3 weeks before Easter to try and cover another bit of our Australia map. So we took 3 days off and combined them with the long Easter weekend and drove all the way from Cairns to Alice Springs. This time it only took about 2 weeks to get the picture galleries online AND a travel log written.

SA to WA trip galleries online

Sun, 23 Nov 2008 10:39:01 +0000

It’s done. I have finally managed to put pictures from the trip online. The travel log will still have to wait a while. But I’ll get there eventually.

Adelaide to Perth

Mon, 20 Oct 2008 09:41:34 +0000

We covered another part of Australia’s cost. Another 3000km closer to finishing the long drive around the country.