Googs Track and Beyond

These next two days proved to be technically challenging as I’d not previously attempted to tow a trailer over sand dunes. 

Googs Track was built by John and Martin Dinger in the mid 1970’s.  John’s nickname was Goog, hence the name of the track.  The family had purchased a land lease at the southern end of the track in the 1960’s and decided to build the track north to the access road beside the Trans-Australian Railway.  Their idea was it would expand the marketing potential of produce from the region by using the railway as a mode of transport.

The track is approximately 200km long and crosses an estimated 300 sand dunes.  Some have likened it to a mini Simpson Desert crossing which has an estimated 1000 sand dunes.  Most people travel south to north.  This is the more difficult direction as the vehicles tend to cut up and rut the southern side of the sand dunes.  The northern side of the dunes is much smoother.

I took very few photos over the two days on the track as I was too busy concentrating on the driving.

My driving technique evolved into using 4WD low 2nd gear with some momentum to get up the southern face of the dunes.  I also dropped the tyre pressure to 17psi.  This worked on all but one dune.

The first night was spend beside Googs Lake where I took the opportunity to take some photos of the money trees.

On the morning of the second day we reached a particularly high and steep sand dune.  There were two tracks to the top and I opted for the right, whilst the other driver towing a trailer went left.  Both of us didn’t quite make it to the top running out of traction.  The vehicle ahead of me then reversed back up the smoother northern side of the dune and with a snatch strap between us I made it over.

By mid afternoon we had reached the TAR (Trans-Australian Railway) access road and turned east.  An hour later we reached Tarcoola.  This is where the railway line from the east splits with the TAR continuing west to Perth whilst the CAR (Central Australian Railway) goes north to Alice Spring and Darwin. 

We continued east on the unsealed access road eventually reaching Kingoona where there was a free campsite.  There is also a caravan park and pub where a shower can be purchased for $2.

There were four caravans in the caravan park which made me wonder why?  They can’t go west and Kingoona seemed a dead end.  After looking at the map I realised it’s actually on an unsealed shortcut between Coober Pedy, further north and Ceduna.

Jenny there is a Federal Government initiative to provide EV charging stations around Australia.  Moreover the manufacturers of EV’s would like to demonstrate their viability in Australia as an alternative to traditional ICE vehicles.  One of the major factors preventing acceptance of EV’s is the range of the vehicles vs the vast distances that need to be driven.  Hence the desire to establish charging stations.