The Lachlan Excursion

Wyangla Dam the scene for a weekend of skiing, BBQ and fun. Simon, Steve and myself set off for a boy’s weekend with Steve’s River Craft/Lexus in tow and staying with our Tassie trip companions Steve and Kay in their beautiful old house in Cowra. The main aim, to deliver the Lexus to our friend Danny in Cowra, a genius with a spanner and expert Toyota engine builder. The 4.0 liter lexus will soon have a new lease on life with a low boost (4-5lb) supercharger to be fitted. This should provide approximately 30% more torque and power and be well suited to the 212-jet unit whilst maintaining reliability.

We set off Saturday morning for a day out on Wyangla Dam, however all did not go smoothly. Somehow a huge amount of water had found it’s way into Steve’s fuel tank, quickly the water/fuel separator was overwhelmed and the engine was a coughing and spluttering. Frequent attempts to remove water from the separator meant we made it back to the ramp where we all piled into local boatie Steve Links’ J73 for the rest of the day. Late afternoon was spent pumping water from the tanks, replacing fuel line and unsuccessfully trying to source a new fuel filter. The supremely reliable Lexus was now grounded for the weekend, John Laws would be devastated!

 

Some idle chat back at Steve’s house revealed he had a little toy hiding in the garage. Some how Steve had managed to shoehorn a Kawasaki 750cc engine, half a jet ski jet unit and custom cast inlet and grill into a 9ft aluminum dingy! What the!!! Also on the trip was ex pat NZJBA Kiwi Ross from the North Island, living in Australia for a while and brought his Kwik kraft with him. Red rag to a bull, with the Lachlan River flowing at 1539 ml/day and quite skinny we were off. With the local council destroying the launching site about 100m out of town we were searching for access. A small country town has its advantages, not too many city do-gooders meant we launched off the bank in the middle of the town park.

 

Simon was first to get his pre-flight check in the little dingy rocket, including how to use the steering and throttle fashioned from a whipper snipper handle bar. A flat bottom, no weight and plenty of horsepower, combined with Simon’s penchant to go fast and furious provided for a great site as he opened up the throttle. Simon launched onto the plane as he hurtled up the river only to get the death wobbles, air under the hull and then straight into an unwanted violent spin. No problem for Simon, he hit the bilge pump and back on the throttle. This was one hard accelerating rowboat and declared a roaring success by Simon and all of us that piloted it.

After launching Ross’s Kwik Kraft, which quickly rested on the bottom, Simon followed in the jet powered dingy as we headed off upstream, about 45km to the dam wall and the tiny hydro plant supplying us with our water. For the first few km’s Ross was learning to read the sandy bottom as we alternated between river banks following the boatable water, the Kwik Kraft certainly now in unfamiliar territory. After passing the confluence with the Boorowa R the river bottom turned to pebbles and the depth dwindled, now Ross was starting to feel at home on the shingle. The river was flanked by trees and was constantly being cut by fault lines which made for very exciting boating, bends so steep as to not see around and tiny chutes barely wider than the boat to get through. At one point the river seemed to all but disappear and Ross hit the brakes, too late as we collected a few trees on the bank, then floating back down to where we could get going again. Now with the advantage of hindsight, there was a way through, and we continued up stream frequently being challenged by rocks and logs and stopping a couple of times to clear stones from the grill.

We did not quite make it up to the dam wall, instead deciding to make our own luck (some had already been used up) and head back. We followed a few different channels as we headed down stream and all in the boat were having a great time. Until we had a choice of three channels to take, Ross opted for a channel on the far right going around a small island, I pointed to the middle one and Simon was keen on the left, too many cooks…. The wrong path was chosen, and as we rounded the tight bend on the right stream we were faced with all the water going straight under a very large logjam at speed with nowhere to go! I can remember at that moment thinking what injuries I might receive, will they impact on those I had just recovered from in NZ, how heavy Simon and Steve might weigh as they were sure to use me as an airbag and just how much the alloy boat would crumple assuming I was not thrown out. Ross threw the wheel around, wished he was somewhere else and put his foot down, we were now sideways and parallel with the jam I braced for impact just as by some miracle the long boat spun just enough and we barely kissed the log jam, now we were side on to it and came to rest in a awful hurry. Few words were spoken as we got the boat out through a gap and over to the other bank to clear the grill. With not much water about and little room I had to climb over the wind screen as Ross put the hammer down so we could get on the plane before running out of water and fouling the grill. Like all exciting times the camera is rarely out and after shots are not taken, however the video was rolling the entire time and was quite exciting.

We had a good run back down to the halfway point. And what about Simon in the Jet Dingy? We had left the Jet dingy on the bank at this point on the way up to relieve Simon of severe vibration injuries, whiplash and industrial deafness, so we dropped him off for his run downstream. Ross offered me a drive of the yellow Kwik Kraft back to the trailer, great fun but I could not help thinking I hope I don’t hit anything to hard. Simon was ahead of us leaving a good bubble trail and disguising any flat rocks or bars so it was time to pass him, in a quiet section we flew past him as he was flat stick sounding like a leaf mulcher. Simon not one to be out done was trying to keep up and was last seen rounding a bend behind us with the whipper snipper handle bars on the jet dingy in opposite lock and a look of UH-OH.

A great day out on the river. As for the jet dingy, well Steve Links is a crazy man for building it!

 

 

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