The name of the roadhouse, ‘Hell’s Gate’ comes from the name of the small gap in the escarpment, through which the road passes, one kilometre south of the roadhouse

A long day driving from Lawn Hill via Burketown and on to Hells Gate Roadhouse for an overnight stop before tackling the really rough road between here and Borroloola which involves crossing a few rivers plus the border into the Northern Territory. The vehicle was fueled up and all the tyres deflated to cope with the deep bull dust and road corrugations. We had obtained our COVID-19 clearance so we felt fully prepared.

In the event, the road was fairly tough, rough and 316km took us close to 6 hours which indicates that we were only able to travel slowly. Nothing broke on our vehicle but we did see plenty of other breakdowns including one poor traveller who had broken wheel nuts on his camping trailer and was waiting for the flat bed tow truck to get him to town. The border crossing was a non-event being in the middle of nowhere, however we were stopped by a police road block just outside Borroloola for a vehicle check and saw several of the locals having excess alcohol being confiscated.