Here is an amazing blog entry from a JUCY Lover who had one hell of an adventure in Oz! Thanks Pamela for sending this through & we are glad you enjoyed your JUCY experience. Love, Lucy xx
Picture yourself alone and stranded on one of the lonely stretches of road somewhere between Georgetown and Croydon in Queensland’s far north, in the middle of January. The mid-morning temperature is 38 degrees C in the shade, if you’re lucky enough to find some. The only sign of life since you left Georgetown was a road train that blew past more than an hour ago and two huge vultures circling what is left of a dingo pup from last night’s road kill. This, my friends, is the Gulf Development Road, a thread of bitumen that crosses Cape York Peninsular connecting Cairns on the Pacific Ocean to Kurumba on the Gulf of Carpentaria.
Instead of 4 wheel driving it and paying for hotel rooms every night, both of which can be very pricey in the outback, we chose to rent a Jucy campervan. These cleverly converted mini-vans with their kitchenettes and expandable tent beds on top allowed us to travel in comfort and offered us the freedom to stop where ever we wanted and stay as long as we liked.
We loved our little home on wheels, having the fridge within arm’s reach was a real advantage on the long stretches of empty road. The floor plan allowed for two double beds, one downstairs and one up. We had stocked up on movies and the two portable DVD players meant that we were able to watch the latest blockbuster even if we were in the middle of nowhere. I have to admit that we did worry about the fact that we would not have air conditioning when the engine was off but to our surprise when the scorching sun went down the temperature dropped to a very pleasant 20 – 24 degrees C and we were treated to a gentle breeze and a fabulously star studded night sky. We were given three insurance options – ‘no thanks’, ‘chance it ‘ and ‘stress free’.
Seeing as we were on vacation and heading into the great Australian unknown, we thought we’d better go ‘stress free’ – and so for $25 worth of insurance a day we bought ourselves complete peace of mind.
WHEN JUCY SAYS STRESS FREE – JUCY MEANS STRESS FREE
The thin strip of road unravelling before us was all we could see on our horizon. Not deviating even a millimetre from the perfectly straight line that it was, surrounded on both sides by the low growing scrub and arid grasslands of the savannah. This was the great outdoors all right; this is where one man’s property is as large as another man’s country. Not a human soul in sight for as far as we could see in any direction and then some. This is the frightening beauty and the life threatening isolation of the Australian outback. No cell phone reception, no radio, no internet, no gas, no water but a whole lot of respect for this gentle and yet formidable giant of a country.
The light was low and the shadows long as we chewed through the kilometres. Out of nowhere, a large rock appeared on the road ahead of us, followed immediately by a loud, clunking blow to our underbelly. It had happened before we knew it and without speaking we realised that all was not good. I’m not sure which thought crossed my mind first, thank goodness we bought “stress free” insurance or “we could die out here.”
Much to our relief, we seemed to have suffered no obvious damage and made the decision to continue on to Croydon. The thought of spending the night out there all alone, on the side of the road was a reminder to us of just how vulnerable we really were in that solitary and unforgiving environment.
It was not until we were safely parked under a shady tree in Croydon’s bustling CBD that we noticed oil pouring from the bowels of our vehicle. After a few phone calls from the only mechanic shop in town the decision was made that we would return to Cairns later in the week with Doug, a local station owner and stock man. Jucy stepped in and immediately took responsibility for the repair of the van which would involve waiting for parts to arrive from Cairns. Jucy staff were courteous and helpful throughout the whole ordeal and in terms of Australian rental car companies they have proven themselves to be one of the best in our opinion. Go Jucy!!
Pamela Mountjoy
