Into the Desert We Go

DAY 2: KATHERINE - TENNANT CREEK (700 km / 435 mi)
Early rise at 5am again.

Before the 450 mile run to Tennant Creek, we had to refuel the Saab from the E85 drum in the back of the Rodeo. This is done under the event marshall’s supervision and then the fuel tank is sealed.

During that time I did my first daily live interview on ABC regional radio. This is scheduled to happen at 6:50 am every morning during the event. We use a Next G phone supplied by Telstra to ensure clear transmission. So far we haven’t found any dead spots…most impressive.

After that we called into the compulsory checkpoint just south of Katherine, got ticked off and waved away. Next stop was to be a designated refuel point at Dunmarra about 180 miles away. But we decided to take a little detour about 60 miles out, on to the Carpentaria Highway. There’s a very old, very famous sign there which reads “Next petrol stop 500km” at Borroloola, which translates to about 300 miles. Correction, that should be “was”…some sod has put in a petrol station about halfway and when we got there and looked for the sign…there it wasn’t!

So, our bright idea for a great photo of the Saab and the Rodeo nose to nose under the old sign, with one of the team sitting on top of the E85 drum, holding up a card reading “who cares” kinda lost its impact! Oh well, the best laid plans of mice and media men… (We found a picture of the sign on the Internet before it disappeared. It would have been a great shot.)

So with pain in our heart and ethanol in our tank we continued on and stopped for lunch just out of Elliot. The heat hit us like a hammer when we climbed out of the cars. It was well over 100F but at least we were now below the tropical stickiness. Travelling south takes us into hotter temperatures but lower humidity. And from now on it’s time to break out the fly nets. Because it’s so hot and dry the little buggers are looking for moisture and crawl into every facial orifice looking for it. You don’t need fine mesh, anything moving in front of the face will stop them from landing. Hence the time honoured Aussie swagmen tradition of hanging corks on strings from their hats. Very loose open weave netting, which fits over a cap is the modern equivalent.

We hit the checkpoint in Tennant and then moved on to a community reception and display only to discover that the officials and Team Ethanol were the only ones there. Turns out that they had seriously miscalculated the time it would take on this leg (by about two hours!) and we were the only team with the speed and driving nous to meet the impossible deadline…BioPower rules! The team set up a display but it was so hot that not many people turned up. It’s said that these conditions test one’s mettle, but in this heat the mettle quickly becomes molten! In the meantime I did an interview on ABC Radio Drivetime. The organisers finally gave up and called it quits, so we adjourned to our cabins at the Outback Caravan Park for a good long soak in the pool. Tonight we’ve booked out the local Memorial Club for a multi-team dinner…and no doubt the odd alcoholic libation.

A quick note on Tennant Creek. It’s located two thirds of the way down south from Darwin to Alice Springs (which is about the mid-point of the World Solar Challenge course). Tennant is also close to Threeways, the junction of the main highway east into Queensland.

We’ve just heard that the Tassie Saab Motor Club members (thousands of ‘em) have joined our followers…welcome aboard Saabites and Saabettes. I’ll be adding some more specific details on the car and its performance in future blog entries, in your honour. Here’s a little taste to think about…as the temperature climbs our fuel economy improves…

Off the Mark at Last!!!!!

DAY 1: DARWIN - KATHERINE (317 km / 197 mi)
The big day arrived. We got up at 5am…after checking the time every hour, just in case the cell phone alarm didn’t go off! Took a quick cold shower to wake up, did the last of the packing, loaded up the cars and headed off into the dusky glow of the tropical dawn. The humidity was still high, but the temperature was less than 90 F.

We arrived at the allotted time to be greeted by chaos, with solar cars still arriving, some trying to leave and some still in bits on the ground. The disorganisation was still working well. Nobody knew where we were supposed to go and finally the Greenfleet cars were bundled into a vacant lot two car parks away from the action. Any sort of display was pointless because the spectators didn’t know where we were.

Finally the chaotic melee evolved into a complex, near miss mechanical ballet, whose intricate moves were accompanied by shouted commands, rude gestures and muttered curses. The way finally clear, the Greenfleet cars were moved to within striking distance of the assembled multitudes, so we unrolled the Team Ethanol banner and started spruiking our message to anybody who would listen. Met up with two Mackay couples who were in Darwin on holidays and had heard about their local team on one of the Darwin radio stations. We even got to meet…drum roll, blare of trumpets…Hans Tholstrup, the man who single handedly started the World Solar Challenge two decades ago. He must be close to his 70’s by now, but still has fire in his belly and looks as fit as a mallee bull.

The tension builds as the solar cars start to leave the start line at one minute intervals, but tragedy strikes one of the favourites, which has some sort of electrical haemorrhage and refuses to start. We don’t know the outcome, but if they can get it started they’ll have to start at the back of the grid and if they can’t then they’ve spent all that time, effort, money and travel for nothing.

Finally it’s the Greenfleet turn and our hearts rev up, as does the engine in front of us and the adrenalin kicks in like a blast of pure ethanol. We make our way to the start line, starter announces us, the flag drops and we’re on our way through cheering crowds which line the streets all the way out of town and in enthusiastic patches for miles down the track.

It was quite slow going in a lot of places, having to negotiate our way around some of the slower solar cars and their support vehicles, which travel in front and behind them. We noticed some on the side of the road in trouble early and heard on ABC Radio that one had had a major embarrassing “oops”…he crashed into the back of his own support vehicle!

We got a call from radio’s Australia All Over, which goes out every Sunday morning Australia wide and Syd spoke on air with “Macca”, telling him all about the event and our part in it.

Changed drivers at Adelaide River and continued on to the first checkpoint at Katherine, where we had lunch and the Greenfleet cars set up a display for the community. That was the end of the formal journey for the day and the car performed brilliantly. Syd has set it up so that we can monitor fuel consumption on the fly, distance travelled and amount left in the tank. The fuel consumption is actually better than we expected and doesn’t seem to vary whether we have the aircon on or not…now that’s a real bonus because the temperature is really starting to soar. We’ve decided to run the car as it would happen in real life, rather than some airy fairy academic exercise of no aircon, all windows up and travelling at unrealistic slow speeds.

We finished the day with a trip up Katherine Gorge, which is a huge channel carved out of sandstone with rock faces sometime hundreds of feet high. It’s actually a series of 13 gorges, each one more spectacular than the last. It’s populated with huge numbers of freshwater crocodiles, diving birds, kangaroos and fish.

Today was only about 200 miles but tomorrow is a biggie, about 450 miles down to Tennant Creek. This will give us a much better look at the fuel consumption.