Forster to Coffs - The Back Way

ghetto folks at Kalinin here there is an area of Australia that is extremely popular for aussie holiday makers especially around those Easter and Christmas holidays in that area is between Foster and coffs harbor now I've been coming to this area for a good 15 years before I truly discovered what this area is all about sure there are these gorgeous beaches that we all love to play on but with the keys of a four-wheel drive you can unlock a whole lot more and on today's program we go well beyond the tourist hot spots to discover new tracks old mines and magical campsites I'm joined by our very own unsealed 4x4 photojournalist and lover of all things 80 series where's Whitworth well I guess we're lucky it was only a batson it aren't we we catch up with the wool Gorger history hunters and get up close and cuddly with a million tiny bats we flex our way down the ruts and bumps on the fabled McBride's beach then beat the tides to set up camp at what I reckon is one of the best waterfront campgrounds on the East Coast it all happens on a stretch of coastline that starts in foster dips up to Farquhar Inlet then out tobago and the cells before heading north to explore the hinterland behind coffs harbor and wall gorga and so to our first adventure which begins with a gnarly little track down to McBride's Beach where I'm told on a good day a fella can catch a seafood feast the bride's Beach is a real rite of passage for local fall drivers on the Mid North Coast it's a cracker and it is quite dangerous and with more traffic it is getting even more dangerous this is one track where you can seriously damage yourself or your four-wheel drive if you don't get it right be sure to get the relevant permits one for this national park and another for the beaches of the coast [Music] literally in the first five meters of this track Wow oh gee if this doesn't stop all ninety percent of people from wanting to drive this track I will be very very surprised so we are gonna try and straddle them and make it look at it easy go decide boaters on my tires hi and they have thank you very much [Music] so where's how is our resident biking enjoying the first part of this track map no this is absolutely magic now because of modern technologies such as hill descent control low range and diff locks these am rocks make McBride's track look a lot easier and it really should be [Music] one last little patch of jungle and I can see the sands golden sands of McBride's beach what a day we have stumbled across this is why you drive these things folks this is just magnificent and we have this all to ourselves this is something special look at the color of that water absolutely magnificent they do look like pristine waters that I may - that's going to be chock-a-block full of fish right this is piscatorial Wonderland here okay so the competition is on to catch dinner and while where's goes for a technique shrouded in mystery and luck as you'd expect from a Toyota driver I'm whipping out the trusty speed and the first thought that fills my head is sharks why the heck am I dressed up as a well-fed slow-moving seal hey folks this isn't as easy as it looks [Music] and where's all the seafood meanwhile where's his trying his patience that was nearly where's one pat zero right here folks this is what happens when four wall drivers try to make a fishing show and I'm pretty sure it's not edible and this is the sum total of my efforts the giant snail it is kind of cool to folks when you've got a beautiful leather seat under here the you know the trash on your rough muddy full drive adventures and you've got them covered in some good quality seat covers because we have spilled coffee we have mud we have salt water and Pat don't care because the seats underneath absolutely mint so great Drive lovely swim and now more fun driving back to town this time up the track [Music] it's so funny isn't it a track looks completely different and drives completely differently when you're coming from the other way I'm pretty happy I didn't format Oh a comes some serious holes [Music] this is so fun [Applause] there are even tougher tracks here for you to have a full day's drive maybe just bring your own lunch it's just an hour north to our next destination and this is one of those places you really do need a full drive to access I always think it's kind of funny that one of the first baptisms into the world of four-wheel driving that people tend to have is on the beach and it can be one of the most challenging locations to actually learn how to fall drive so I'd recommend going out there with a mate the very first time and some snatch traps some basic recovery gear some tread pros and you will find it much easier but one absolute tip is grab a tide chart you can download the apps and if you're going out there on a run out low tide you will find it a whole lot easier and going out there on a high tide where the sand is soft fluffy and quite boggy when you're driving up a beach it is really important to get your speed right go too quickly and you can damage your four-wheel drive quite seriously why well this is a natural environment and with all natural environments they tend to change but none more so than beaches tides can change furrows can occur lumps and bumps can occur you can even have creeks coming across the beach and you drive too quickly and you will get out of control but drive too slowly and that can present some other issues particularly when you're trying to enter or exit the beach those are the areas where the sand tends to get the most fluffy the most soft so unless you're prepared to put the foot down over some of those softer areas you will crawl to a stop but above all get out there have a blast because sand driving is an art worth your learning how fortunate are we in Australia cruising up a beach across a sand spit and then camping on this gorgeous little sand island welcome to Farquhar Inlet this campground offers excellent facilities all just a stone's throw from beautiful sites right on the bank of the estuary and incredibly we have the entire place to ourselves pretty rare that you can actually camp top of the water in fact a privilege a campsite this good calls for something special for lunch and although where's and I were completely hopeless fishermen the ton curry co-op came through with a seafood feast fit for a couple of hungry kings [Music] inside this nice big canvas bag is an entire kitchen but unlike most kitchens that are powered by gas this one is powered by Ozzie charcoal what we have here is in my humble opinion a revolution in camp cooking you know I'm big fan of the camp oven and gas cookers are great but this snow pit kitchen grill is the stuff of fancy-pants restaurants once you've got it all set up you ignite your charcoal in the starter now this is good clean sustainable Aussie charcoal anything cooked over this stuff will taste incredible but I'm not just cooking anything where's one a coin toss which means I had to buy him whatever he wanted from the seafood coop he chose lobster of course check out these puppies this is gonna be quite a simple lobster dish because I'm gonna let the charcoal and a little bit of butter do the talking and here's a little trick taught to me by an old fish onw way he reckons if you clean your seafood in seawater its season for flesh perfectly while retaining all the natural flavors right once the hot coals are transferred to the grill we're ready to cook what a luxury is this Barrington Coast craze now these are really easy to knock up because you just want the flavor of that gorgeous flesh so I'm keeping it simple folks I am simply dropping some butter on top of that flesh because we want to keep it nice and moist now the other thing that we're going to do to keep it moist is to actually cook it shell down all righty so we shall pop him on [Music] pop him on there absolutely gorgeous and now we're just going to throw on a few sides and already the smell of that digi wood with the lobster juices just dripping down on it it smells pretty fantastic I'm just going to make sure that they're cooked evenly so flipping that first one over look at the color on that shell absolutely beautiful we are on the home stretch team this smells I am getting at the moment absolutely glorious Wow look at that sure crepe it what a gorgeous feast I think wares might actually like this and if he doesn't I think I'll roll him into the water these coals have another hour of cooking left in them so what you do is dump them into a water bath and dry them out ready for your next meal where's where's where's look at that champion oh it looks good doesn't it and it doesn't taste bad either it's such a sweet maid isn't it absolutely has its advantages to having a coin with two heads on [Music] that is absolutely delightful folks you should be here what are you doing I sent you an invite I'm sure they [Music] for our next adventure we're heading inland we can't set the Maxwells flat campground and now we are way off to the coast this is vastly different country folks we're out the back of the hills very steep mountains a little bit rain forest a bit jungle E and the tracks around here they're pretty steep and serious in fact last time I was here it didn't end so well for me but we are back to explore some of the magnificent history in this area Maxwell's flat is one of those free campgrounds dotted around the National Parks and state forests of New South Wales you do need a four-wheel drive to get in here and the facilities are pretty basic but in my book that's all part of the charm in fact this entire region hasn't changed much since the days of the gold rush over a hundred years ago it's these beautiful creeks that were the key to the gold rush because not only did they wash that alluvial gold down into the valleys they also allowed the gold miners to process it [Music] today's mission is to explore the cells they're a fascinating part of our Gold Rush history straight out of camp and we have had a little water crossing a little bit a mug and a whole lot of jungle they are our beautiful ferns very overgrown tracks as you can see let's we sort of push our way through nan wonderful cars have been on this track lately even the signs are overgrown with moss and lichen beautiful no sooner do we head off in search of the cells then we hit a roadblock but when you are traveling through the bush if you do have a chainsaw it is a really nice thing to actually be able to clear the truck because you never quite know who you're going to be clearing that track for could be just other travelers could also be the fire ease coming here to respond to a fire or someone with a fire at their back wanting to get through so it's just a nice thing to do likewise a lot like this you know we could probably have a crack at driving over it but we could rip out some fuel lines do some damage to our vehicles in the process so it's just generally a good thing to do as a responsible for driver [Applause] [Music] [Applause] so where's how are you enjoying the cells Jeep trailer definitely a gorgeous part of the world we are a little bit lucky that she's a bit dry because yeah these trails some in the wet I can tell you about there they're not real pretty sounds an awful lot like experience talking there Pat yeah may have may have Worcester detsen in these hills man this place still gives me the chills this is the location of my biggest ever stuff up as a fall driver yes some patrol camp a trailer on the back and we had been winching for about four hours because there was absolutely no traction to be had on the hill you couldn't even walk up the thing I got out to connect the winch rope when I got out of the vehicle she slimmed back down the hill 40 meters this bum jackknifed and then went straight over a cliff into a ravine the only thing that stopped the vehicle was a 40 centimeter Tala wood tree that it's snapped in half now there's a few lessons out of this one toe drive these tracks in the wet folks they're not pretty - I really should have actually stayed down in that Valley and waited for it to dry out because these hills do dry out very quickly but the other lesson that I learned is that I pulled that handbrake on all that was doing in that Patrol was breaking the two rear wheels of the Patrol who wasn't breaking the camper trailer all the front wheels of my Patrol so essentially I had two wheels trying to hold six wheels back on a slippery Hill doesn't happen I went to it again though [Music] [Music] [Applause] so where's keep an eye out for some mineshafts just driven in to the side of some of these hills mate because they are definitely around here and you can access some of them pretty easily all right will absolutely keep my eyes peeled there we go right there now this one is an absolute beauty check it out guys all the way in there now the rumor has it that the reason why this area is called the cells is because the miners used to send the Chinese in here and that would actually put bars over the end creating a cell basically a jail cell so the Chinese miners will work even harder and longer not a nice slice of history but anyway let's go and check this out [Music] oh one thing's for certain those old Chinese miners didn't cut these shafts for blokes the size of million where's my suit the models I think I'm a bit too big a breakfast for this okay we bump into a micro bat colony they're not very pretty the kind of people like faces and in here down about feet inches deep in bat food but this is pretty cool is it the track out passes by a curious warden iron structure dubbed by locals as the Hilton then it's time to climb well we found a pretty serious track out of the valley now you can hear a few rocks being knocked around the underbody this is fun it's a blast could not do this in the wind I can tell you that maybe hanging off the winch cable this is the sort of form of driving that I like folks you are staring at the sky you are picking your line with a massive grin on your face beautiful view off the side of the track afternoon sunlight streaming in it where else would you want to be seriously [Music] after roughing it for a few days exploring some fantastic tracks hidden caves and Stein camping spots Emma from RV daily magazine has invited us over a bit of luxury in her Lotus trooper Caravan knock-knock hungry you've rocked out rided no time you cheeky buggers well you know where's can't cook and I'm tired of cooking so you know it's good time all right come on in looks a wee bit more fancy than our swags I would hope so oh my little bit fancy we've been doing it all wrong mate I think so need a drink oh please you can twist our arms been living in the trooper oh look it's been delightful it's a really luxurious band really off-road capable as well don't let the Italian leather seats fool you I've got plenty of fresh water capacity plenty of soul lithium batteries you can pretty much stay for you know as long as you've got leave from work really the rather small fridge there I see yeah yeah we're rocking a Dometic fridge here and a fat furred stove with oven four burner so yeah if you like cooking this is yeah it's really functional excellent kitchen so I speak on behalf of wares here in terms of washing the stink away I mean I didn't want to say anything but thankfully yes there is a shell oh there's even a toilet but upgrade from the shovel we've got a washing machine so you can bust out your dirty undies if you like well is that an offer I mean no DIY operation miss laundromat it's a pretty fancy way to go camping let's face it yeah so on the menu this gorgeous night at Casa del Lotus is an easy chicken eggplant and lentil stew Emma's been cooking over low heat for a couple of hours with a bit of fennel and cherry tomatoes and some sneaky white wine dig in guys thank you and what are these some fancy green things on top those are sure lot style in the morning we're back onto the pacific highway to our next adventure playground [Music] this is one of my favorite four-wheel-drive haunts in all of Australia just because of that beautiful coastline it is because those mountains that lie just up the hill you see coffs harbour is the closest place that the Great Dividing range gets to the ocean in all of Australia and that gives you this beautiful recipe of mountains with ocean views and absolutely killer for drive tracks and it is literally five minutes from the carpark through wool Gorger to our first track I told you all wasn't fibbing look at this beautiful fall Drive track a little bit of a banana plantation down there just a bit further the Sun glistening off the Pacific Ocean no bees fire trial and bennett's fire trial they are fantastic tracks for people who have gone and bought their full drive that come up here to the coughs coast possibly stay at a resort even you don't even need the camp and you are right into these hills traveling some magnificent tracks but a standard four-wheel drive can do this stuff you don't need additional clearance sure lower your tire presses but pop your vehicle in low range or off-road mode and start having a plate it's hard to find a better place in Australia to actually learn your skills particularly in steep terrain because the tracks around here they are very much on the sides of mountains what is you have done some travel around this area having a moment I have people think about courses that there's this everything from you know stuff that you just to be I'm gonna roll no matter what you do on and there's other stuff that you can come out just sort of find your feet with your four wheel drive so it's it's such a magical forward right plague we have the cops ghost as well as said there are plenty of challenging tracks for more experienced drivers like this one middle Ridge Road in the conglomerate State Forest have an interesting scraggly little Hill coming up here so I'm gonna pop in the rear diff lock and she goes and crawl my way up you the traction control working a little this is cool [Music] and this truck is getting a little bit more serious we have some nice little rock shelves just up ahead they are sketchy as spinning there I go forward progress has stopped I'm gonna have to have another go at this you know the little run up and there we go bloody stupid attract this and words isn't so lucky on this hill some she gets up there yeah a flat tire on the left rear mate sometimes no matter how good your tyres are and they don't get any tougher than BFGS you're gonna have to deal with a flat where's this rear sidewall is hit a steel spike and suddenly those steep hills aren't so much fun anymore but I've got a couple of tricks up my sleeve I recently grabbed this rattle gun because I've got a little bit tired of changing things in the bush with that one and it's pretty cool it's actually from Aldi cost me $79.99 and it's actually a 20 volt rattle gun and the thing that sort of sold me on this thing is that it has 350 Newton meters of torque which is more than a three liter patrol turbo diesel that has 380 Newton meters that's got a grunt now if you have wheel studs instead of wheel nuts you're gonna find it very difficult to put your tire back on so cool little tip the u-bolts on an Amarok the identical thread to your wheel studs in here so you screw those guys in and then you have a perfectly good locating point to put your wheel back on it will make life a whole lot easier you and we're back in business the next track has been recommended by Tom O one of the history hunters you'll be meeting later it's called Lionel's loop and Tom OH describes it as a funky ride I'm not sure what that means exactly but let's find out straight away I can see why because my suspension is flexing up beautifully this is pretty fun guys the angles that you put yourself as a fully driving away this is a blast a minute folks Lionel's track don't you forget it but I'm going to keep on going Lionel's loop takes us to a little-known & unnamed lookout [Music] then we're catching up with the history hunters at the golden dog in Glenn right [Music] most squeaks no rattles no clutch and a bit of inside knowledge here folks this place serves some of the best pub grub I have ever had anywhere and generous helpings if you're in the area check it out these days Glen Rey is a quiet little town but 100 years ago it was a bustling center for the timber industry back then Australian hardwood and especially red cedar were incredibly valuable and the best way to get it from the hills to the mills and down to the ports and cities was by train after World War two trucks started replacing trains and eventually all that incredible infrastructure and history was relegated to museums we know that the four-wheel drive tracks around these hills they're tight and they are steep and the same goes for the train tracks in fact the dorrigo line boasts the tightest and steepest tracks in all of New South Wales now to drive those train tracks you need a pretty special train and this one is one of those it is what we would call informal drive terms the short wheelbase six-wheel-drive six wheels driving and pretty tight and short to make it round those very tight bends this beautiful old machine is capable of pulling about 240 tons of cargo and passengers it is the third oldest operational steam train in Australia she and all this machinery are being maintained and restored by railway enthusiasts and local volunteers and thank goodness because we aziz are far too quick to move on and forget our history which i reckon is a crying shame seriously what will we do without volunteers some judge you by the company you keep and today I'm keeping the company of some Toyota and Nissan drivers these guys four-wheel drive with a purpose and that purpose is to uncover some absolute gems and relics in these steep hills from our past meet keV Mitch and Tom Oh or as I like to call them the wool Gorger history hunters today they are taking wears an eye out to a place they've recently brought back from the brink of obscurity but first we've got to get there so Kevin where are you taking us mate sounds steep mate Jarek and tamos couldn't agree more [Music] you should just understand it later okay isn't that typical well I take the mickey out of a Nissen driver and look what happens think we're over the harness stuff grunts I think I dropped down and hit something don't tell me I'm stuck this is terrible I hate to say that but I think your beach mate thank you look at this there has claimed me once before exactly the same mind if is well and truly into it okay the wall of that rat has given way and I've bottomed out which means recovery time it's plenty of trees up there so I'm thinking a which is the best way to go here okay so I've put our winch in free spool mode there's a massive lever there that's quite difficult to see and that just allows us to pull it out not using our battery power in this recovery we're going to use what is called a snatch block and that gives you two times mechanical advantage so pretty cool little device is essentially a pulley it will slow that pulling down it'll have your speed but double your capacity when winching to a tree make sure you protect against ring barking and use high quality rated shackles and a tip here folks tighten the bolt and then back it off by a quarter turn this way won't get stuck under pressure and bind and for safety sake place dampeners over the lines in case they snap under pressure now it's important to know that you need to anchor to rated recovery points not just tie-down points a lot of vehicles come out with these little tiny shipping tie-down points they can turn into a lethal projectile in a recovery situation so don't trust them try and get some aftermarket ones fitted that are actually rated to carry the weight of your vehicle this rock should help lift my deer up off the ground as we move forward and we're ready to go the benefit of a winch recovery in this situation is because everything is slowed down that also means that damage is going to be slowed down as well we're going to be able to hear if things are scraping or getting damaged underneath our vehicle all clear wait before starting always call out to ensure no one is in the danger zone then shift into drive and work your engine together with the witch slowly moving up and forward and we're free [Music] when you want eat in your winch gently lean back on the line and guide it neatly onto its spool ready for the next time you need it right back to our history tool and it's not long before we get to our destination oh gee this is cool that tiny little spur track that we never would have driven along without the help of our mates has taken us here to this magnificent slice of quite historic engineering this railway is a wonderful example of what our forefathers achieved with only the most basic equipment cast your imaginations back a hundred years to when all this was being built the line climbed six hundred and sixty four meters in just 69 kilometers they had to dig and secure these tunnels then keep it all running during the wet season washer ways the ongoing maintenance unfortunately became too expensive which is why the railway commissioners closed it down and walked away so keV what drove you to come into this particular location in the first place mate it was just a rumour that we heard but it still took nearly eight months to find it this is what it was like back then Lantana and jungle everywhere Kevin the boys devoted their weekends to reclaiming this slice of Aussie history if I define a grant I'd spend the rest of my days clearings yeah I don't have a drama it's for our kids just for everybody and it's rebuilt it yeah as well it's for the people who built it they put this in at the time thinking we're building this line as infrastructure for the future because that's what they were building before for their kids and their to make their lives easier and I guess if it's not going to get used at least they've left us with a piece of history so in a sense they have built it for me they have built us like if they're build up all you guys here the tunnels are cold and dark and the walls are covered in eastern microbots [Music] and as I walk through dodging they're flapping wings I wonder what the future holds because without keV tomorrow and Mitch keeping Lantana at bay these tunnels will like so much of our history be forgotten and that would be a crying shame welcome everyone to Glen Road thank you for coming and now for something completely different and may I say just a little bit special our great mate Tom O has written a song which he's performing for the very first time right here for our show take it away Tom oh let's do it this is [Music] see [Music] that's brilliant stuff isn't it and what I love most is the pride Tommo Meech and kev have in this coughs coast region as well as our great Aussie history what better way to enjoy it than getting out here and sitting around the campfire with friends [Music] what a brilliant adventure we've had up here on the coast of New South Wales from the scraggly track down to McBride's Beach then out to the waterfront magnificence that is Farquhar Inlet one with the dramatic landscapes around the cells and here behind coffs harbour normally when you come to this Ridge and you see that beautiful facade the beaches and the resorts but it's when you peel back that facade that I think you see the very best of what this region has to offer do you don't just have an adventure you have an adventure with substance the history the tracks and the people the community that's behind this area is something to behold and I hope you can make it up here in your very own four-wheel drive and very very soon I'm Pat Kellerman and until next time keep this shiny side up [Music] be sure to tune in next week as we head from booked up the darling river and out to birdsville to party hard at the big red Bash [Music] [Music]

Channel: Pat Callinan's 4X4 Adventures

Views: 27,749

Rating: 4.9495797 out of 5

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Id: cCeCsB0_9Xs

Length: 41min 33sec (2493 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 11 2020