The Big Red Bash (BRB), for anyone who doesn’t know is the worlds most remote music festival. It’s a mission to get there depending on the weather, the impact of that weather and the roads you take.
This year Birdsville had 10ml of rain, just before the event and it’s amazing what 10ml can do in the desert.
We put the caravan on and headed off on the 24 odd hours of driving 5 days early. Despite our 2021 attempt and the nightmare of issues to get there, this year was much easier.
We set up the caravan with a decent lithium battery set up, and had most of the wiring in the van overhauled. In 2021, every electrical issue we could have happened, so 2023 was comparatively a breeze.
In 2021, our generator and our invertor died at about Charleville, 10hours from home so we had no way of charging anything, particularly charging Zac’s V4 Frontier Electric Wheelchair.
When we rolled into the Bashville site (the Big Red Bash Site 30min out of Birdsville, at the foot of Big Red at the start of the Simpson Desert, we sort of hobbled in, in 2021. Our trailer jockey wheel had snapped clean off, we had no power because god knows what had happened to the invertor and the two attempts we made at it’s replacement. We had no water because the rock peppering ripped the plumbing out, the destruction was high and the mood was low. Thankfully when we got out to the Bash, everyone wanted to help. We happened to pull up in the last spot left, next to Caboolture Bus Lines, and they helped us with everything. They ran into town to get parts for us, got under the dusty van and fixed the plumbing, not to mention a few grocery runs in town for us!
This year, Zac’s Dad Glenn, AKA Papa also went over our Caravan, a Supreme Getaway 21ft, with a fine-tooth comb. He re-sprayed the underbody, built cupboards, and siliconed up every hole he could find where dust would get in, and transferred our hitch to a DO45. Papa had even gone over all of our plumbing to make sure it was protected from the peppering of the dessert rocks.
We were set.
And you wouldn’t believe it, but this year, 2023, pretty much nothing went wrong! Our first DO45 hitch had already clean snapped off a bolt and we had it replaced under warranty, so anything not ideal that was going to happen had sort-of already happened.
When we got to the site, we rolled in 2 days early, which was lucky, because, because of the rain they closed off the roads 1 day early when we were supposed to go in.
We sort of accidently ended up in someone else’s campsite, which they weren’t impressed about it, but once I’d heaved Zac out into his chair, got the kids out and half unpacked the van, I was not gonna move.
Being the only sort of family with a female driving the caravan, a baby, a ten year old on the spectrum and their Dad in an electric wheelchair was sort of a spectacle for a few Bashers think. This was our everyday, but for everyone else it was an eye opener. I love hearing people’s getting to the Bash tales, then introducing them to our vagabond bunch, like yea, but this mob made it too somehow!
The unfortunate bit about sticking out like a sore thumb was that was that you sort of become a fish bowl, everyone’s looking, but not looking, and it got a bit exhausting being everyone’s eye saw.
Apart from the mammoth task of dragging us out there, the actual festival was awesome, great music, the wheely spot is nice and close to the main stage, so you didn’t have to go fair to enjoy it.
You don’t even need to leave your site if you don’t want!
The grounds were a bit messed up because of the earlier rain, which the roads could’ve just been rolled over a bit after, and that probably would’ve sorted it out and saved a few broken ankles here and there.
I was so keen to see the Waifs, and as the festival is BYO I had a great time with a bottle of rum sitting just in front of the wheely section mat, singing away. Zac of course couldn’t possibly be on the
wheely mat, he insisted on being just in front of it, because he doesn’t conform, baha. I kid.
The Bashville site goes out of their way to accommodate for people with accessibility requirements, but let’s be honest, there’ only so much you can do to make the dessert wheely accessible.
If you can get there, you’re probably going to survive so I wouldn’t worry to much about the site itself, that’s if you’re coming in an electric chair. I definitely wouldn’t recommend getting around in a manual chair, but that’s my take. It’s dusty, dirty, bumpy, hard to push and just all round frustrating.
The food this year, was epic, post CO-VID so many more vendors came and the variety was awesome, from brisket, to decent coffee, to mouthwatering doughnuts and the iconic curly deep fried curly potato. Food was epic. Price not so much, but that’s the way of the world now isn’t it!? Plus when you’re the driver, cook, cleaner, parent and everything else with kids in tow, getting out of cooking is always a win.
All round the 2023 Bash was a good trip, I think we decided it will be the last one for us, just because we’re still learning to pick our battles, and how many picked battles we can have before we gas out. We’re ten years into Zac’s Spinal Cord Injury now and some things just aren’t worth it, not because it’s not great but just because we’ve enjoyed it, and that’s enough for us for the moment.
Thanks for the read, upcoming is our Trip to the USA Adventures!
