Plan B

Would you believe it, just as we are leaving Eden,out comes the sun which is handy for drying everything out! Sod it we're off anyway and it turns out to be a day to forget. Within an hour, the Navigator has sunk to a depth of ineptitude far below her usual standard. We miss 2 turns within the first halfhour then she puts me onto a dirt track for 15K. After visiting several farmyards we eventually reach the main road where at last we can see the Snowy Mountains with the Great Dividing Range beyond.Our aim is to cover about 200K but it soon becomes obvious that we are not going to get anywhere near that as we start to climb Mount Brown.It is 10K of serious UP and the poor old van doesn't seem to want to know. We are down to second gear and urging the van onwards and upwards by the seat of our pants at 20KPH we are not popular with traffic behind! About 8k up there is a lookout which we are very pleased to see as we can pull over for a while.This is Pipers lookout, named after a bus driver who drove up and down this mountain 6 days a week until he died in 1947 digging the bus out of a snow drift. The lookout is spectacular, but the view is a little hazy. It's onwards and upwards painfully slowly, it is obvious the old van is sick. At the top we face the plateau on top of the Great Dividing Range which stretches for miles in front of us. The van seemed O K on the flat, it just don't do 'ills! We reach Cooma and think we might try to carry on, but after about 20k it's obvious we have to turn back and find a mechanic. We find a very helpful bloke who fettles diesels, but after a new filter and a blow through things are no better. We have to take the van back to him the next day and if he still can't sort it it will be Plan C or D and maybe a trip into Canberra to a Mercedes garage. In the meantime we have found a campsite in Cooma where we can hire skis and snow chains. It has not rained here for weeks, they may be pleased to see us. Droughtbusters!