Bash Buddies Weekender had all the trimmings

There were cheers, beers, dirt roads, wrong turns, water crossings, breakdowns and mudguard parties. You’d think it was a Bash! But no, this was just the warmup.
This year’s Bash Buddies Weekender was a rip snorter, starting off at Bark Hut Inn with our mates Di & Brad teams Jellybean Crew, Hillbillies, Moana McQueen, Wiggles (virgin team!) and Muggles celebrated announcing the Eat My Dust Winners – The Hillbillies!
They raised their award high and by morning, like a sailor at port, they were gone, some lame excuse like “work” we heard….
Jellybean, McQueens, Wiggles and Muggles carried on and held the torch high. After a nice greasy breaky it waws “so, where are we going?” to which we held a meeting to decide where we were going. A call to Dave & Mel, the Crikey Critters, helped us along as they had done a reccie for the Marakai Track and it was not quite ready for us yet, bit too wet.

First stop, Humpty Doo Tavern for a drink and a think of where to next. We couldn’t come out this way without visiting our friends at Noonamah Tavern, so off we set but of course we had to take the back roads, nice and dusty they were but not before our pathfinder Moana McQueen in a Mini led us to a dead-end track! At least it wasn’t a Roman for once….

Noonamah didn’t disappoint with icy cold drinks and smiles abound. We settled in the beer garden to watch and cheer one of the Wiggles sons’ Bryce Fullwood claim 3rd on the podium for his incredible Supercar Championship race! A surprise drop in from Dave the Critter gave us a bit of dirt road and water crossing info to play with as we made our way to their place in Lake Bennett for Mango Daquiris.

That was enough to get us going, we headed off down Stuart HWY before making our turn onto a part of the Marakai Track that was good to go… says Dave. She was beautiful too, nice and dusty, bit of bulldust and corrugation and two water crossings. First up, McQueens in the Mini headed through, and not a worry in the world. On seeing how easily the mini got through, the Muggles decided to power on through which received a cough, spluttering and an engine kill on the other side of it!

The Wiggles made some impressive evasive maneuvers to get around the Muggles DOA and Jellybeans sauntered through no worries. Try as we might, the engine just wouldn’t turn over, so the Wiggles ask “what do we do?” to which was a reply of “no better time than now to have a Mudguard!” and how the Wiggles girls how it’s done.  Drinks were cracked, heads were scratched and along comes Dave and Mel to check on us, Dave as a bit worried about the second water crossing… well SURPRISE, we didn’t get through the first.

Not to worry, another try of the Muggles car and it turned over and roared to life again. So with steely determination and a bit more caution, we all weaved through the next crossing without a worry and headed up to Mel & Daves place…. not before McQueens, Wiggles & Jellybeans missing the turn off!

There we sat and chatted, sipping mango daiquiris from mangos picked right there at Dave and Mels farm and eating from a nice spread of food it was hard to leave for sure but on we must! Next stop would be Tumbling Waters Caravan Park to set up camp for the night… of course we went via some back dirt roads, are you mad?!

Into Tumbling Waters and what a glorious place this is, lush and green with the happiest of staff you’ll ever meet. They even donated the camping space to us, we setup our camp beds and tents before getting ready to head around the corner to Darwin River Tavern for the rodeo event, having scored guest entry. Again, not to be as they couldn’t find our tickets BUT we’re not ones to quit from a good time, so off we headed into the Tavern and there we stayed. We had a muso singing to us, the bar to ourselves and the chef whipping up glorious food without any wait time.  I’d say we won!

Sunday we lapped up a slow morning, breakfast at the cafe on site which was beautiful! Then off to Michelle & Darrens for a mudguard, it was when we went to head off to our final stop, lunch at Berry Springs Tavern that the Muggle mobile decided it liked it there and wouldn’t start… again.  Lots of poking, prodding, swearing at and blokes in under the hood did no good. So, there she stayed for Darren and his boys to tinker with while we headed to meet the Wiggles for lunch and cheers to a fabulous Bash Buddies Weekender.  Yes, we are absolutely revved up for the Bash in a couple of months’ time.

And the Muggle Machine?  The Elliots got her working and all is well in the world, see you on the Bash!