Canning Stock Route

This is a 40-day personal trip diary of the 2003 ExplorOz Team Research Trip. These trips are conducted annually to gather new information for the Trek Notes on the ExplorOz website, to test new equipment and also because we love our travelling - especially very remote, desert travelling.

This year we started out from home in Perth and onto the Canning Stock Route. Our plan was to travel the full length of the stock route to Halls Creek and then head to the west coast at Broome, following the North West Coastal Highway through much of the return trip home enjoying as much sun and fishing during winter as we could. The CSR section of our trip was undertaken for a number of reasons - mostly because we've never done it and secondly because we were commissioned by map publisher Hema Maps to conduct a full and detailed survey to enable them to reprint a totally updated map. We also conducted a unique online fundraiser for the Royal Flying Doctor Service called the ExplorATHON, whereby members of the public could guess the kilometres travelled whilst donating funds to this important Australian outback service.

Within these notes, you find numerous references to maps and books used in preparation for our trip along with notations were anomalies with this information was identified. No ill-harm to the publishers of any material is intended by pointing out errors or where we became confused due to misinterpretation of the information (in all cases we have a healthy open relationship with the publishers who would see these comments as constructive). We have merely pointed out anomalies in the interest of clarifying certain points that we encountered so that you might be avoided any confusions during your own trips.