The Leyland Brothers- Are they Hardcore!

[awright]

Ask the Leylands, bit of an embarrasment to some of the stuff we do these days right!!

At least that's what I thought when a 4by mate of mine pulled out the DVD as I took the piss out of him and the Leyland Bros for the next 10 minutes....

Despite all this he put on the doco on the 40th? anniversary of the first crossing of Australia from the very very West coast to the very very East coast at its widest point.

They did this in modern day (at least for the 1960's they were) landrovers. (complete with a custom made dog trailer). 2 vehicles 5 people and 1 trailer.

No GPS, No Sat phones, not tourist stops with spares etc just a dodgy setup to the flying doctor in case things went ultra bad.

There werent any real tracks and hardly any roads like there are today, these guys found there way through via a motor bike scout and used a sextant and basic maps for navigation.

So next time you want to check out some landrover action scope out the leyland brothers crossing of Australia at its widest point 40 years ago- it is hardcore!!!

Oh ...and they do a heap of bush mechanic repairs and outback cooking but there is no Roothy on it!!!

[bogged]

watch and findout for yourself.

http://www.catchoftheday.com.au/smallfi ... ts_id=3103

[DK]

Might have to have a look around and see if i can find the torrent..

[dobbo]

Yes it was an adventurous journey.

It's not that they were or were not hardcore, I know of a few older blokes who did similar things back then, I think it's more that the world has gone to soft.

[Bush65]

Before they started that trip, I I think they believed they would make the 1st vehicle crossing of the Simpson and convinced their sponsors of that.

When they reached the western side, they spoke at length to Mac Clarke and also the driver who had graded the French Line. At that time Mac Clarke was continually driving along the French Line to deliver supplies to the oil crews.

AFAIK they may have been unaware that Reg Sprig and his family had driven across some years before them on pretty much the same route. That was the 1st oil survey, and vehicle crossing.

However I can't believe they didn't know that the French Line and oil exploration crews weren't there. The cynic in me thinks they continued to lead people to believe that they ventured into where no one had gone before.

I don't want to discredit their trip and what they risked at the time, just their lack of honesty, which was probably to try and do the best for their sponsors.

At the release of the film, I was unaware of those other matters, but still would have enjoyed it as much.