October 31
Gulf News, one of the local UAE newspapers, run a FUN DRIVE once a year which can only be commended in that some people get the 4x4 bug and become serious off-roaders as a result.
However the number of person participating is in the region of 600-700 with around an extra 60 marshals helping to keep the masses moving.
I have always avoided this melee of 4x4's until recently when somehow I seem to found myself volunteering to become a marshal for the event, perhaps I need a sanity test, too much sun this summer.
Today was the first of many Drive Throughs and I was under the impression that there would only be approximately 6 vehicles involved, so I was rather surprised to see at least 15 vehicles at the meeting point as Dubai 4x4 seem to be heavily pushing their involvement.
So off we set with 20+ vehicles in convoy then into the desert. The first part was not too difficult with Ian Barker and myself bringing up the rear and Dave Aldis, Sue and Chris on sweep.
The antics of the vehicle in front of me did not give me a good impression of safe driving, and as we headed into more challenging terrain, the pajero drove his Pajero into a small dip, which if he had followed our instructions could easily have driven out but was more involved in arguing with the driver of another vehicle and apparently blaming him for the incident.
A sample of what is going to be perhaps. No recovery gear on board and very little idea of how to get out of this situation which was then taken care of by Ian and myself.
Later on a Tahoe managed to get stuck and as can be seen above, not too much involvement in getting it moved until Chris stepped in.
