The Land-Rover that lapped Australia four times

Remembering the trip half a century later, my mother remarked: “The Nullarbor Plain was particularly bad. It was literally just dust!

“We went for days without seeing anyone. We needed to have the front vents open to let the air in because it was so hot, but then you got covered in the dust.”

A friend, Margie Adamson, had written home about the first week on the trip.

‘We have only passed three towns,’ she wrote, ‘with no more than just a garage and a motel. It’s just miles and miles of desert and shrub.’

The 1972 route wasn’t the Land-Rover Series IIA’s first Australian circumnavigation

The first I knew about the Australian Land-Rover trips must have been in the early 1990s.

Idly rummaging through my father’s workshop aged 10 or so, I came across an old suitcase.

In it was a snakeskin, a small stuffed crocodile and packets of photos. I was mesmerised.

The full story has taken another 30 years to piece together – and to come full circle, because the car that crossed the Nullarbor Plain all those years ago is now my daily driver.

“We camped each night, the boys sharing a tent and Margie and I in the Land-Rover”

Sadly, my father died a few years ago, and never got to see the Land-Rover’s return to the UK in 2022.

More than a series of adventures, the full tale is, dare I say it, a love story, because it was on this 1972 trip that my parents got engaged.

Then, five decades later, the car took me and my new wife to South Uist on our honeymoon.

This Series IIA left the Land-Rover factory in Solihull as a flat-packed vehicle in April 1963, and was sent to Pressed Metals Sydney on the ship Ballarat.

The original suitcase, although a little mouldy, has survived the past 52 years in the workshop in Scotland

Once assembled, it was sold to the Regent Brothers dealership alongside two other chassis.

Although the car was registered on 5 February 1964, it wasn’t until 1970 or ’71 that my father bought it.

Well used, it had proven its capability in the Outback and was the perfect vehicle for his intended journeys.

Fresh out of studying Agriculture at Aberdeen university, my father spent a fair bit of time in Australia.

There was a family farm called Kameruka in New South Wales, and he lived at 21C Avoca Street in Melbourne with a couple of friends.

Re-packing the Land-Rover wasn’t a quick job

He was an adventurer at heart, and an avid planner.

The handwritten notes leading up to the 1972 trip covered everything, from costs to the route in detail.

The ‘expected accounts’ include the Land-Rover (AU$2240), an ex-Royal Australian Air Force bomb winch (AU$390), general servicing (AU$50), tents (AU$100), food (just AU$10 per person, per week) and so much more.

The fuel bill was worked out at 15mpg for 10,000 miles at 50 cents per gallon. I doubt such a trip could be done for AU$333 today.

John Foster’s fastidious trip notes run for pages and were found intact in his office desk

“We had two wooden boxes full of food and I recall eating quite a lot of bread and jam,” says my mother.

Looking at the old photos, the diet appears to have consisted largely of Ryvita biscuits: “There certainly wasn’t any fresh milk, and we didn’t buy meat.

“We had an Esky to keep things cool.”

And, according to my father’s notes, two stoves, one gas cylinder, one grill, a doormat (your guess is as good as mine), mosquito nets and gas lamps.

This Land-Rover Series IIA now lives in Scotland

It wasn’t all bad, though: Margie remembers eating oysters with tomato ketchup on the north coast.

My parents had known each other for a few years, having met at a friend’s 21st in 1968.

However, it was quite an ask, aged just 22, for my mother’s parents to sign off on a trip around Australia.

“They didn’t say yes straight away,” she recalls, “but your father had been to stay a couple of times and I know my parents liked him.

“We weren’t going out at that stage, and there was another girl coming on the trip.”

‘The Land-Rover was also used by Sydney University’s geological college in the 1960s, during which time it circumnavigated the five-million-square-mile country twice’

Alongside them were my father’s housemates, Loudon Greenlees and Barry Maddox, while Tim Lennie swapped with Margie in Darwin.

Ahead of the trip, my father fitted two extra petrol tanks and two jerry cans, meaning that he could carry a whopping 200 litres of fuel.

He also fitted the roo bar and the winch on the front, plus numerous spare wheels and tyres.

Ironically, they didn’t hit a kangaroo, but they were struck in the rear by a drunk local.

A local helps John land a big fish

I also distinctly remember my father telling me that they managed the entire trip without a single puncture, until they were driving back into the suburbs of Melbourne three months later.

Water was carried in a large container as well as canvas bags that hung on the roo bar to keep it cool, while my father’s fishing rod adorned the roof-rack.

“I remember the fishing rod,” my mother says. “He was determined to use it, and he did catch quite a few black backs [the Australian version of the salmon] and a now-protected groper [known here as a grouper]. It was enormous.”

The Land-Rover and the 97kg groper

So large, at 213lb (97kg), that it made the The Cairns Post on 3 August 1972.

‘The groper had to be pulled up a tree by their Land-Rover to get it out of the water,’ it wrote.

‘They propose to take it on board the Land-Rover to the Cairns Game Fishing Club, where it is to be weighed and presented to the club.’

“It was definitely put on the roof,” my mother confirms. “It wouldn’t have fitted inside, and it would have stunk!”

John with a brown snake and rubber hammer

“The snakeskin was from the Nullarbor Plain,” she continues, “and I remember him dispatching it with a rubber sledgehammer…

“Before we left Melbourne, there had been a last-minute panic trying to get everything fitted.

“Your father had everything in the car – toolkits, every conceivable thing he might need.

“He probably even had a distress flare. None of us really thought about the dangers – we were young and stupid, I suppose.”

There is a great tradition of overland trips by Land-Rover

The route took the group of friends west from Melbourne to Adelaide, Port Augusta, across the Nullarbor Plain and on to Perth.

There was a four-day detour to Albany on the coast to see, among other things, a particularly gruesome whaling station.

“That was quite eye-opening,” my mother admits.

From there, they headed to Mount Magnet and deep into mining country.

Desert water bags of the type used on the Land-Rover’s Australian adventure were difficult to find – this came from the USA

“Your father’s uncle William,” remembers Loudon, “was a friend of my father, Kenneth.

“He took an interest in the Australian Stock Market and especially the mining companies, including Mount Isa Mines.”

“I remember visiting a lot of mines,” says my mother.

“The boys loved them, but even then the machinery was simply massive, so they were quite impressive.”

The Land-Rover Series IIA has remained largely unchanged

Margie continues in a letter home on 9 June: ‘Most of the gold-mine towns are now rather run-down and dilapidated as the gold has run out.

‘The iron-mine towns are brand new, though. All the workers have houses practically rent-free.

‘One place we went to in Paraburdoo, Hamersley Mining, has spent about AU$50m on building houses and roads for the workers, but they have no one to sell the iron to so the mine is quiet and there are rows and rows of empty but brand-new houses.’

The Land-Rover crossing a river – Barry Maddox stays dry

The route continued north to Dampier and then along the coast to Broome, before weaving its way to Wyndham, Normanton and Cairns on the east coast: “We were supposed to be going down the east coast, but we’d all had enough by then, so instead we came south via Birdsville.

“We did that road in record time as we didn’t stop much.

“We had done a lot by then – look at the map, it was blinking miles!

“We camped each night, the boys sharing a tent and Margie and I in the Land-Rover.”

A rare chance to use the Land-Rover’s winch

“The car did break down near Meekatharra, but it was nothing major,” she remembers.

“I remember camping in the same place for a couple of nights so your father could get it fixed.”

Margie was quite happy with the arrangements in another letter home: ‘We sleep in the Land-Rover, and all the kit is in wooden boxes, which are the same height as the seats so make a good bed with the lilos.

‘We also have a roof rack. Even so, Clarinda and I were ticked off for having too much luggage!’

Tightrope practice (John fell off shortly after)

“We used to keep an eye out for the snakes,” my mother continues, “but we didn’t see a single spider on our whole journey.

“I think they preferred people’s back gardens rather than the dust on the open road.

“We saw plenty of kangaroos, camels, dingos and wombats, though.

“We listened to the radio when we stopped driving, but it was quite noisy in the car, so conversation was limited on the move.”

The Land-Rover trip is recorded in great detail with photographs, mementos and an 8mm film

“You looked at the view, though, and it was an adventure.

“Back then, a Land-Rover was the thing to have. But it was never going to be luxurious; it was a utility vehicle.

“Keeping in touch with everyone back home was also difficult.

“We had a list of post offices and their addresses, which my parents had, so they would write an Airmail letter and send it to the post office in Cairns or Darwin or wherever.

“We’d then drop in as we passed, to pick up and drop off any post.”

The Land-Rover’s well-used workshop manual

“After we changed our return route, I suggest that there were a few letters from our parents that we never got,” she adds.

“We only used the winch once, and that was when we got stuck in a dried-up creek bed after the boys wanted to go exploring.

“Although, that said, I think we might have rescued someone else with it at one point.”

John on his previous round-Australia trip – note the Land-Rover’s unpainted roo bar and extra rope

So, when did they get engaged?

“I can’t remember! It must have been over by Cairns because that was quite far round.

“He didn’t have a ring with him, and he wanted to ask my parents properly when we got back.

“It really was the most amazing adventure.”

After the trip, my father gave the car to his brother, Frankie, who lived at Kameruka with his wife, Odile.

An unfortunate detour in the Land-Rover

The Land-Rover was named ‘The Bush B*tch’ and was used without a roof.

By then nearing the 200,000-mile mark, it was used sporadically for towing a boat and for jobs around the family farm.

Once I’d heard about it, I used to tell Frankie I would buy it if he ever wanted to sell.

“But it’ll cost you more to ship over to the UK than it’s worth,” he exclaimed.

A heater was added when the Land-Rover Series IIA arrived in Scotland

A year or so after my father died, Frankie sadly passed away, but he had emailed to tell me that he wanted to give me the car. I was touched.

The Series IIA eventually arrived in Scotland, in the pouring rain, in April 2022.

It worked – just – but the lack of spares in Australia had taken its toll over the years.

The amazing part, though, was that the chassis didn’t have an inch of rust thanks to the dry local climate.

What’s more, the wooden boxes in which my parents had stored all their food 51 years before were still there in the back of the vehicle.

Barry Maddox with Loudon Greenlees on the Land-Rover Series IIA’s roof

Nothing had been restored, and nothing ruined.

The original paint was fading beautifully, and I even found a pair of my father’s boxer shorts hidden inside the engine bay.

Knowing him, it was probably an old pair for wiping the dipstick on – he rarely threw anything out.

The first job was to clean the chassis down and rustproof it, which then led on to doing the brakes. And the suspension. Then the wiring. And then the propshafts.

Clarinda Foster (née Cottrell) on the 1972 trip

A two-week spruce became a six-month job, but at last, ahead of a holiday in Durness, it rolled out of the shed.

Lisa, whom I married in 2023, and I set off with two dogs, three surfboards, two paddleboards, wetsuits and camping gear.

It was a fantastic holiday, until the front propshaft fell out of the gearbox while going down the steep hill into Inverness at 60mph.

It was like a cluster bomb going off and, such was the force, all the dials popped out of the dashboard.

The Land-Rover Series IIA when it arrived in Scotland in 2022

Having smashed the clutch mechanism and the brake lines, the only way to slow it down was on the handbrake.

A new gearbox was needed because it had literally ripped off the transfer box.

Then the rear differential went. So I replaced both of them with the longer, 3.54:1 diffs so that it was quieter at speed.

It was indeed quieter at 55mph, but you couldn’t get there any more.

Clarinda was reunited with the Land-Rover

It did get us to South Uist on our honeymoon, though, even if the reverse gate snapped when on the island.

Thankfully, Lisa didn’t mind me dismantling the floor and getting the part welded.

We even made it back to Fife during Storm Babet.

It turns out that it really can rain upwards through the footwells.

Since then, the car has had a full engine rebuild, and now gives a whopping 94bhp with 128lb ft of torque, and I’ve spent a lot of time trying to return it to just as it was in 1972.

The Land-Rover Series IIA in South Uist, Scotland

It was a task that was helped hugely when I found my father’s old 8mm film of his Australian trips.

I got that digitised and the footage is everything I’d hoped it would be.

It’s fantastic, and really quite an emotional watch.

In terms of getting the car back to how it was, the jerry cans were easy, the winch not so much.

That was another job for Agra Engineering in Dundee, which had sorted the engine.

It now works, and recently pulled a 3.5-tonne van out of a field.

My only regret is that my father died before I got the Land-Rover back here.

I always think of him when I drive it.

There was nothing naïve about his 24-year-old self’s approach to touring around Australia, he was too switched on for that.

They were truly enormous undertakings and proper adventures, all made possible by a little Series IIA.

It has been on more adventures than I will ever manage, but at least the next ones will be with me at the wheel.

Images: Ed Foster

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