Day 6

Today was supposed to finish in Peak Hill but ........ it's a long story.

Just a glimpse of the lovely cliffs

  I left Richmond at 9am and the first part of the journey took me up through the Blue Mountains on the way to Lithgow. It was a twisty road with plenty of steep grades but Yemmy took it in his stride and after we got on the Great Western Highway he delighted in passing slower 'Saturday' drivers.

Then after Bathhurst and a coffee break he started losing power up the hills and wouldn't change down to lower gears.

I stopped to see if I could find the cause that I suspected to be a leaking vacuum hose and as I shook  a few hoses one - that turned out to be a heater hose - came off its fitting and showered my hand with very hot coolant! It was indeed a split vacuum hose that had caused the trouble - so now we had two problems

A call to the NRMA had a serviceman there quite soon but it wasn't just the hose, it was the fitting it goes on to that had broken so that meant it had to be put on a tilt truck and taken somewhere - either home or a nominated place. I chose to go the the Mercedes dealer in Orange and so a tilt truck arrived and after a bit of a struggle Yemmy was on board and off we went.

Our free campsite with lawn and table thrown in!

 The Merc yard was open but there was nobody around so we put Yem back on his feet and parked him in a nice spot near a lawn.

We managed to get someone on an after hours number and told him I'd be camped in the yard till Monday morning when people come of duty

Yemmy's carrier

  

I walked to a takeaway shop and yes - you guessed - another hamburger with the lot!  

So here I am and here I will stay until Yemmy gets fixed.