Hervey Bay Gossip

Hervey Bay is one of the centres that’s really being affected by the fuel shortages caused by the fire at the Caltex refinery earlier in the month.

At noon today the Caltex on Boat Harbour Drive at Pialba was out of Vortex 98 while the Shell on the corner of Main Street and Torquay Terrace appeared to be out of everything but E10.

The BP on the corner Queen Street and Torquay Road had stocks of all grades and the Mobil on corner of Main Street and Boat Harbour Drive also appeared to have stocks of all grades.

Limited deliveries are being made so the situation may change overnight.

Get ready for some interesting traffic delays at the busiest roundabout in Hervey Bay. Yep work is about to start on something on the Boat Harbour Drive/Main Street roundabout.

Speed limits have already been reduced to 40km/h and traffic controllers have been seen and there are some unusual marks and numbers painted on the road surface that look rather ominous … and don’t the school holidays start next week?

Now that’s what I call planning!

You just never know what hidden treasures might be hiding in some of the garages around Hervey Bay but every now and then one of them makes a a brief appearance somewhere around town.

Here are two that we spotted recently.

Looking for a small car but want something that’s a little different, something that stands out from the gaggle of vanilla flavoured small cars that are out there?

Here’s and exotic and passionate small car featured at Information for Her Australia. In one of these you will definitely stand out in the crowd.

The Premier announced today that another 200 service stations in Queensland were now able to provide an ethanol blended fuel for customers and there are already service stations in this region that can supply you with the blended fuel.

However, you need to understand that ethanol blended fuels are not suitable for all cars. You should consult your manufacturer’s handbook and if that doesn’t help you then you will find a list of compatible cars here at the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries website.

And for a list of ethanol outlets here in Hervey Bay, Maryborough and Rainbow Beach just follow this link.

My experience here in Hervey Bay

One of our daughters rang last night and announced that she wanted to buy a new car but where she works it’s a bit hard to get to a dealer. So she wondered if I would do the rounds and pick up some brochures for her.

Well what father could turn down a request like that so off I toddled early this morning to make enquries.

I told every sales person I spoke to that I was doing making enquiries on behalf of my daughter who had $18,000 to spend on a new car and she would be buying it around Christmas time because that would be when she would be here in Hervey Bay.

I also told them that she was a tall girl - about as tall as I was - so ease of access and comfort for a tall person was important.

The most helpful sales person I spoke to was at Jack Casey Motors - he showed me three different models and encouraged me to sit in all three just to check to see if they really were comfortable for a tall person.

He then gave me prices and brochures on all three and pointed out that one of the base prices was a little above the limit my daughter wanted to spend.

The least helpful sales person … well no names no pack drill but suffice to say that he wasn’t really interested in letting me sit in any of the cars - he rubbished the opposition and gave me a sucker price if I wanted to buy before the end of the week.

It was an interesting experience and comparing sales techniques was a bit of an eye-opener.

 Jack Casey - you’ve got a gem there in your trainee. Sales people like him make the buying experience a pleasant one.

The release of the new Holden VE Commodre is not far away and already it has aroused a lot of interest.

Visit Aussie Motoring to find out more about it and get a link to a site that is running some movies of the new VE Commodore in action.

Imagine a trip to Fraser Island in or on one of these. There would be no need to wait for the barge and you could launch from just about anywhere along the coastline here in Hervey Bay.

Amphibious vehicles are nothing new - the Army has quite a fleet of them, there have been amphibious cars before and many years ago one very brave couple crossed the Atlantic in an amphibious Land Rover but Gibbs Technologies, a company in the UK wants to put amphibious technology within the reach of more than just the military and eccentric.

And they just might do it with these three unique vehicles:

The Quadski is the world’s first high speed genuine all terrain vehicle.

The Aquada is a genuine two seat amphibious sports car.

The Humdinga is a concept vehicle with full-time four wheel drive. It’s powered by a 350 BHP engine that gives it a top speed on land of 160kph and 64kpm on the water.

Tough new measures were passed by State Parliament today to target drink drivers.

Transport and Main Roads Minister Paul Lucas said Parliament approved amendments to legislation that would see serial and high range drink drivers facing immediate licence suspension.

“These reckless drunks who are caught and charged by police won’t be allowed back behind the wheel until the matter is dealt with by the courts,” Mr Lucas said.

“Some people have a death wish by repeatedly drink driving on a single day, or driving at over three times the legal limit.

“It shows that they have a death wish but all too often death becomes reality for other innocent parties.

“If you are a repeat or high range drink driver your licence will be suspended until the court deals with the matter.

“Further, if you drive during that time it will be treated as disqualified driving with a penalty of between two to five years disqualification and that’s on top of the original drink driving penalty.

State Parliament also passed laws relating to the supervision of learner drivers.

“This means supervisors of learners must have the required blood alcohol concentration, in most cases .05, as they need to be driving the vehicle in question.

“Statistically, supervising a learner driver is the safest time to be on the road but the operative word is “supervising”.

“How can anyone expect to supervise a learner if they’re over the limit on grog?

“And I remind people that supervising a learner driver means just that. Don’t expect them to drive you home on L plates on a Friday night because you’ve been on the booze,” he said.

The Minister said the changes were among a whole raft of measures the government was introducing to make Queensland roads safer.

For this weeks motoring feature let me show you a classic from 56 years ago. It’s a 1950 Riley Drophead Convertible.

It was built by Riley Motors in the UK and was powered by a 2.5 litre motor motor that gave it a top speed of around 160 kph.

This beautifully restored example calls Hervey Bay home and I caught up with it down at the BP servo on Torquay Road at Scarness. If you appreciate fine motor vehicles you should start stopping in there for petrol - you never know what you will find lurking in the garage.