Sorry no photies with this story! Just glad to be here to tell the story.
After leaving Molong, supposedly a not to long trip to our next destination of Burrendong Dam. We chose this spot as it was listed in Camps 5, and seeing all the rug rats had gone back to school, should be fairly quiet.
So we ventured forth, with high spirits and thoughts.
Just to back track here a bit, I said to the bride, on leaving Narooma, "I will get a set of new rear tyres for the Val once we reach Dubbo, as the existing ones had been on for a few years and had done a lot of work." Although they were, and looked fairly good, when taking into consideration the weight on the front of the van, for safety sake time to up grade.
So moving right along with the story.........we were very happily motoring towards Wellington, and during that time, always in communications with trucks on our UHF radio. We chat for safety reasons with the truckies, who really appreciate the communication, especially from caravanners. One truck had passed, and I noticed another coming up fairly quickly from behind. As I do, I called the truckie, and advised him, I will get out of his face as sooon as I can pull off the road safely. He answered with the usual, "thanks mate"
No sooner I put the radio down.....then we experienced the most frightening thing of our lives......BANG, BANG, BANG in decibels that AC/Dc would be proud of. The Val veered, rocked and rolled, went sideways to the left, then side ways to the right, heading towards a tree on the wrong side of the road....the banging was even louder.......feeeeeeerk I heard from the bride.....we're gone!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was wrestling with the Val, the bride was hanging on......I looked in the mirror, the RetroLiner was still there.....I corrected to the left, then to the right......were we going to roll............feeeeeerk was from me......more feeeerks from the bride....are we going to join the relos in Molong.................NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! not going there, no nude beaches in Molong.
The val is slowing......the banging is decreasing.......we are back on the right side of the road. The RetroLiner has helped in pulling us up....what happened!!!!!!!
Once we gained control, I managed to pull our rig over to our side of the road. Shaking like no tomorrow, and as we were pulling up the following truckie came on the radio, "Great recovery", with my reply, "Pretty good for an old bloke". Geeeeeeezus we could have been killed, how can I joke about that!!!!!!
On stopping the first thing I thought was a blow out on the van.......or maybe a rear tyre on the Val. You guessed it, a blow out on the Val. What a mess. The tyre was shredded, ripped the mud flap off...but all in all we have survived. The truckie that was following us, pulled over a little down the road, with me advising, by the radio, we were all good. "That's cool mate", was the reply, "I'm just going to have a piss." Maybe I should have joined him.
As per normal I couldn't get the rear wheel nuts loose, bloody rattle guns. I huffed and puffed, but no movement. As we couldn't get mobile service I radioed a few passing trucks to alert the NRMA in Wellington. Even trucks passing the opposite way, after the incident advised us the NRMA had been contacted. I can't thank those guys enough....and thank heavens for our UHF radio.
Anyway we stayed for ever it seemed, with no NRMA truck in sight. Then out of the blue along came a farmer who's house was just down the road, to see if we needed some help. Being a big strapping man, like a man mountain he grabbed hold of our wheel brace and promptly released the wheel nuts. He even bent the frigg'n wheel brace. Wouldn't like to get on the wrong side of him.
We changed the tyre to the spare, of course isn't a mag, and then limped into our destination of Burrendong Dam. All the way I was waiting for that tyre to burst as well....but it didn't. We also kept saying what if..there was traffic coming the other way...what if we rolled......what if the truck was over taking us.......what if!!!!!!!!
We can only be very thankful we survived. I am not a religious person, but Susie who we love dearly, and is very strong faith always prays for us, during our travels. I am sure someone was looking out for us........thank you Susie.....thank you God.
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