COVID19 Compliant - Evening Fewbie PLUS Desert Drive - Exploration from Qudra to Little Swehian - Dubai - 24 Jul 2020

[Jorge Stepniak Felippe]

1 hour ago, Ale Vallecchi said:

Thanks for advising @Rinelle Sanaani.

@Jorge Stepniak Felippe let me know if you still wish to join. Thanks

Yes I would like to join, can I?

[Ale Vallecchi]

19 minutes ago, Jorge Stepniak Felippe said:

Yes I would like to join, can I?

@Jorge Stepniak Felippe Of course. Make sure you reach the meeting point no later than 4:15PM with the goal to leave at 4:30. See you soon. 

[Ale Vallecchi]

Note to all drivers: @Kalahari, @Jolly Abraham, @Shiju Manuel, @Salarios, @Lucky sAm, @Anish S, @Chaitanya D, @Jorge Stepniak Felippe, @Lorenzo Candelpergher 

The drive will leave at 4:30 pm SHARP, no exceptions.

It's quite a long track and visibility may be reduced sharply due to wind in the southern part of the drive. Please be punctual.

You will reach the meeting point driving on a dirt road leading away from the main tarmac road near Bab al Shams. Pleaas proceed to the meeting point before deflating.

See you soon.

 

[Chaitanya D]

Thanks @Ale Vallecchi, @Frederic and @Wrangeld for a nice long drive , and describing in detail how to do ridge riding and criss crossing.

@Kalahari thanks for the plank.

Well driven everyone 👍. Some pictures uploaded in gallery. 

Edited July 24, 2020 by Chaitanya D

[Salarios]

Wow. What an amazing day. Thank you very much @Ale Vallecchi @Frederic amd @Wrangeld for managing this incredibly fun and educational drive. 

Fred I really appreciate you taking the time to provide such thought-provoking and constructive comments. Words of wisdom of the day: "Switch off four cylinders, mentally; less power and more finesse." 🙌👏

[Anish S]

Tricky Drive

It was very nice to start the drive earlier, i think it would be better for all evening drive to start @16:30 so that we get more time on the wheel. It was a fantastic drive led and managed by @Ale Vallecchi @Frederic @Wrangeld. It was great to have information provided by @Ale Vallecchi as a foretaste where the expectation was set well in advance and made us mentally prepared. It was a goal achieved for all of us. 

The tricky terrain made the drive more interesting where we had opportunities to learn how to manoeuvre a different nature of sand and dunes, we also had the chance to do some ridge riding and criss cross...Luckily this week as well, i got the privilege to drive behind one of the most skilled senior member @Frederic, it is really gainful and enriching to attentively observe highly experienced driver and again i made the most it. 

Lesson learned from today's drive is refreshed knowledge on ridge ride and criss cross which was briefed and explained by the leader  @Ale Vallecchi. Secondly, it was enhancing to learn how to navigate through soft sand though I got stuck twice. The first one was actually after i self-recovered from a refusal and i reversed to gain some more momentum when i found myself in super soft sand. My second stuck was also when i lost momentum and i was trying to descend and found myself in another soft sand pocket. Thanks to @Frederic assistance and @Wrangeld guidance, i was able to be back on track. Eventually, it makes me more confident to tackle such circumstance in future.

Understanding different dunes is essential when off-roading and the direction of the wind tells lot about the  form of sand dunes. There was an article by @Frederic on 'How to read sand dunes formation and texture?' which tells a lot about dunes and it is also mentioned that the wind direction in UAE is from NW to SE, however i was always wondering how to identify the wind direction in the middle of the desert without a Compass 😬. This dilemma of mine is solved when @Frederic shared with the team that wind direction can be guessed by looking at the flags mounted on our vehicles which is a new thing i learned today.

I really appreciated the patience and guidance from @Chaitanya D when i got stuck.  Thank you so much @Kalahari for the wooden base for the jack, i was looking for it for long.

Thank you everybody for the enthusiastic drive. 

Edited July 24, 2020 by Anish S

[Shiju Manuel]

That was an amazing evening drive, @Ale Vallecchi thanks for the wonderful routing which we could taste the different type of dunes with lots of learning. You are master in studying the route before taking the whole convey, which helps reduce the stuck and increase the drive time, really appreciated 👍 Thanks for @Frederic and @Wrangeld for taking care the convey at the back and support through out the drive. 

See you all soon on sand. 

[Ale Vallecchi]

The morning after of what was, for many of you Desert Wanderers, a very long and sand filled day.

Congratulations to all the drivers, who managed smoothly a long and diverse trek from Western Qudra all the way down to Little Swehian. Particularly, my appreciation goes to @Frederic and @Wrangeld, who joined the drive after having managed their own leads earlier in the day (super effort by Richard, who was also the first to arrive at the meeting point). Congratulations to @Kalahari, @Shiju Manuel, @Jolly Abraham, @Lorenzo Candelpergher and @Chaitanya D, who had also joined morning drives, but did not show any fatigue or loss of enthusiasm throughout the evening. A welcome back to @Salarios, after a forced hiatus. Well done to @Anish S, @Lucky sAm and @Jorge Stepniak Felippe: you all did very well.

Back to the nature of the drive,we started punctually just after 4:30 PM, using the track running parallel to a few feeding and drinking troughs for gazelles and oryx, to reach the first set of long range dunes. These allowed the convoy to gently get in the rhythm of the drive, with some sideys and very few and controlled crossings. Toward the end of this area we also had the opportunity to go over the basics of ridge riding and criss-crossing, which we practiced, when possible and safe, throughout the drive. The first sabkha took us beyond the furthest reaches of Qudra's bike track, into a second set of dunes, which revealed itself to be a mix of smooth, long ridable ridges, at the beginning, and a technical area toward the end, finally tapering down into the second, gazelle and oryx filled, sabkha. From here we managed to reach the south-western border of the area known as Little Swehian. Thanks to the limited number of stucks and very few refusals, we still had enough time to enter the tall, tight dunes of this magic location, and to drive along its canyons, side sloping and going in and out of small bowls, until the impending darkness prompted us to exit on the track that led us back to Solar Park.

Well done to all the drivers for completing 60.8Km, in 3hr and 3 min., at an average of 20Km/h (moving average speed of 30Km./h).

Just one encouragement to all drivers: keep looking for the feeling between yourselves and your cars' true potential, searching for the sense of security that comes from knowing how one's car will respond to different situations, so that you may "feel" which can be the best approach to a dune, its crossing, riding a slope, as well as when to go for a second attempt, without forcing yourselves into situations you are not comfortable with.

See you soon on another adventure filled week-end.

[Lorenzo Candelpergher]

It was a very nice and relaxing drive, with a pleasant pace, decent temperatures after sunset and very few stucks and refusals. 

Coming from a very demanding morning ride on small technical dunes, this afternoon exploration ride magnificently prepared, led and briefed by @Ale Vallecchiwas a very refreshing one, with a beautiful scenery at sunset. 

Besides getting crested in a moment of hesitation, the ride was super smooth, thanks to the enormous improvement in my driving conduct since I followed @Wrangeld's suggestions about using higher gears (and even D when it makes sense) and much much much less power. I really enjoyed the extended ridge-riding and criss-crossing, for which the briefing by @Ale Vallecchi was a useful prepping. 

Thanks also to @Frederic and @Wrangeldfor their prompt interventions in the occasion of the very few stucks (including my cresting) and refusals, which really minimized the idle time. 

Spending 11.5h ours in the sand in one day was the best way for me to get prepared for my summer break, as I will be (sadly, as far as off-roading is concerned) heading to Europe for a few weeks. Consider me already booked for the August 28th rides and don't churn up the sand too much in my absence!! 

Edited July 25, 2020 by Lorenzo Candelpergher

[Kalahari]

The little taste of Little Swehian was my highlight - great, steep but short, side-slopes. Thanks for selecting a few entry-level ridges and criss-crosses @Ale Vallecchi for us to practice - the more I do these, the less panicky it seems   The leisurely drive through the sabkha in the semi-dark was the cherry on top! Well-done to the unstoppable marshalls @Frederic and @Wrangeld who swept the convoy excellently, while seamlessly rerouting when needed. I will be sad to miss Little Swehian next week @Ale Vallecchi!