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I will bust that myth. Just give me 2 more years

I have always loved driving. It was the thing i most wanted to do from an early age, sitting behind my dad in the car pretending. I got my driving licence within 5 weeks of my 17th birthday (the age a licence was allowed in the UK) but had been driving for years before that. On motrobikes, or 'borrowing' my parents' cars when they left them at home. Perhaps I was the original inspiration for Ferris Bueller? Take a look at my car history, you'll see that I have had a lot of vehicles, normally just one at a time but sometimes as many as 4. None of these was new, some were classics in the making, some I knew were already classics, but all of them had character. A day driving through the Negev desert with friends got me hooked on the possibilities of offroading. We spent a day in a few jeeps just crossing the empty desert. Nothing extreme, just a day of cruising through wadis and valleys and crossing otherwise unreachable places (if you were there with another sort of vehicle). It took me another few years until I was able to convert my wish into a vehicle. I had made sure my (then) wife had a wonderful car for our growing family, I had a TR6 that was my first passion and business was good. One day I was invited to a corporate fun day which involved a number of 4x4 treats, including blind jeep driving. There was also a 4x4 course at the end the day. That was the clincher and within a month I treated myself to a 2nd hand diesel SWB Nissan Patrol. It was officially a work car, so was kitted out with Leather seats and all mod cons. My wife organized for me to go on a full day 4x4 driving course, which was brilliant and exciting and massive fun in SJ413s and Land Rovers and that was it. I was determined to get off road. I also joined the 4x4 club and as a result spent one day every weekend after that for around a year taking my car and some giggling girls strapped into their child seats through muddy tracks and water filled paths mud plugging - as it's called in the UK. My Patrol was cleaned meticulously after every trip. It was all part of the fun, seeing the mud drain away leaving my jeep clean on the street each week. Life has a strange way of teaching us lessons, because just as I bought my next 'toy' (my Yamaha GS1A motorcycle) I got offered a job in the Netherlands. The toys did not come with. From having pretty much my dream garage (the family car was a V6 Citroen XM with all the Bells and Whistles), all the cars were sold and I ended up living in the Netherlands with a Honda Motorbike and a Fiat Multipla (please, please stop laughing, it's a great car). Roll on 20 years, a divorce and two global financial meltdowns and a redundancy later which drained the bank account, I end up in Dubai with my wonderful new wife. Off roading was high on my list of things that I wanted to do again in coming here. Problem was that this was new to my new wife. When we spoke about a car for her here in Dubai, she was talking about a small city runaround, maybe a nice sedan. We went to see quite a few cars, exotic or otherwise, but none of them fit the bill. Then one day, our TJ was advertised. With some trepidation I took my darling wife out and let her know on the way that our outing was to test drive a Jeep [that I have to admit, I had test driven a few days earlier to check it was everything promised]. Within 10 minutes of sitting behind the wheel, she was hooked on the car. Next challenge was to identify an opportunity for off roading and after a bit of research it was clear that an organization called Carnity was offering the easiest way to try out desert driving. The rest, as they say is history. I knew I would love it, but was a little worried that my passion might not be shared. I should not have worried. Not only is this now my weekly fix to clear my head from the stresses of my working week, it's a shared hobby so there's never a question of having to choose between our being together and my hobby on my day off. Now the biggest challenge is getting behind the wheel as much as I want. A very small price to pay for having found my way back into my natural environment - high up, behind the wheel of a 4x4. See you soon in the sand.

You can disagree as much as you want. Not holding my breath

From childhood I have been more or less an indoor person. My first offroading experience was the GNFD 2012 in Liwa. It was a fantastic experience to see the vastness of the desert. After that I did the GNFD 2013 in Lisalli. It was a real struggle through some of the technical dunes and it turned me off from offroading. Then in Jan 2017 I received a notification from Carnity about an Absolute Newbie drive in Maliha. I had a rough week at home and office, and just wanted to get away. That's when I met Gaurav and Rahim Bhai for the first time. That drive showed me how beautiful nature is, if we are willing to step out of our comfort zone. The two of them not just became off-road friends but brothers for life. They were there for me when I had an incident on my second drive and ensured that I reached home safely. It's been 3 years and I have been out with the Carnity family every weekend. Drives for me these days are just to meet everyone, chat, have karak tea and ofcourse have Aloo Parathas

For me it all started 11 years back when after my fourth desert safari I saw a bunch of Jeep Wranglers and realized people have clubs and can venture out on their own. I had a Toyota Echo at the time and with a greed of saving around 45 minutes by doing a little desert stretch. I almost made it once, but with a stuck situation I decoded to read, some clubs at the time had awesome posts and was good for 6 months read. But just reading was not going to be sufficient, I needed some hands on experience. My wife had a Mitsubishi Outlander AWD, I had my first mountain drive in that and soon realized how important a proper offroad vehicle was. At this point I sold my Toyota Echo and went for a Jeep Commander 5.7 Hemi. It was just to get some experience and save my 45 minutes on that Sharjah to Dubai stretch. With my holiday cancelled by my office and no family in the house, I used to do up to 4 desert drives a week for 4 weeks. By now unknowingly I had been addicted to offroading. Desert had become my best friend and with the measures put in place by Sharjah police my saving 45 minutes was short lived. It's been since that I have not looked back and been around the desert. Honestly my love of the desert has survived, but not to push my boundaries to discover what I can or cannot do. My passion is to make more like minded friends on the way I can teach and learn from to have a safe passage through our beloved terrain.

I'm sure everyone will have different stories to share on how did they become an off-roader? I'll start with mine. I was happy being spoil with luxury sports car back in those days. One day my girl friend whose my wife now, got a free desert safari passes from her office and "forced" me to join. I was not at all interested based on my previous desert safari experience of being cramped with several strangers in one car and eating sand through out the trip. But she managed to convince me and during that trip she had an awesome time as she was sitting in front and kept of screaming on every dune and ridge. This made me inspire to sell off my Lexus GS430 and buy the king of off-road (myth) - Toyota Land Cruiser. She joined me for 3 drives and then she got bored thereafter, but I got the sand addiction for rest of my life. Time to hear your original story now, whether you wanted a "freedom", "explore nature", "beat the traffic" or "impress your girl"

That's a lie! 25 year old Jeeps is a myth They've all turned to rust by now

Though I am still one of the most Newbies with only 1 and a half rides, I have realized this is what I have been looking for since 2010, when I was 24 and I was living in Chile as an exchange student. A group of crazy friends and I decide that it would be great to buy an old VW Kombi and fix it to fit 9 of us to hit the roads of South America from Chile down to Tierra del Fuego, and up again until Rio. The truth is we only made half of the way, and the van broke in the middle of the Argentinian Pampa, but the previous unbeaten paths were amazing. So here I am, in Dubai with a small Pajero and my wife, who was one of those adventurous friends, joining (still not bored) to every weekend trip.

I was helping my friend renovate his house and it was a long drawn out month long process. Everything from the roof to the walls in the 7 bedroom Villa. His elder brother as a thank you took all us for a desert Safari since he would freelance as a guide on the weekend. And that was pretty much it. I told myself this is what I want to do as well. To cut a long story short after years of trials and tribulations and help from another friend I managed to get my foot into that world. I didn't give up never for a second thought I will stop persuing this line of work. Got ridiculed by friends and family as to what stupid line of work I'm trying to get into 2 years I worked for free or very basic pay like 50-100dhs per trip and started from the very bottom as helper then moving up to camp driver cum helper than mean driving as well as helping in loading and off loading the pickup. It was very very tough work but I enjoyed it througly which gained me a lot of respect later on as everybody had seen how I had struggled from the very bottom to the top and they knew I know every aspect of this field so one one could fuck me too. Made some great money and had the time of life because I was lucky the company I got attached too ( I say attached because I never officially joined them because that ways I getting paid freelance per trip money which was as high as 1200dhs per day to the lowest of 650 per day as opposed to a fix salary ) they got a lot of interesting projects like vehicle testings and events. I worked on projects from Toyota,Nissan, peugout, jeep, land rover, Mercedes, hummer, GM just to name a few. So most of my work was this rather than regular desert Safari you see and hear about. Did that mostly during summer and in between such projects and other events, which including a huge secret proper concert with huge stage, lights, pyro, screens fireworkd for Shaggy, UB40, lot of Bollywood stuff so on and so forth. But close to the economic downturn such things got less and less and I started to get bored with just the regular Safari day in and day out. Is when I quit. Then became a weekend warrior just like the rest of you. Then thought it would be a good idea to go out with more people so searching online I came across dubai4x4 one of the few off-road clubs at the time. Then emarat 4x4 which I stayed with till life decided otherwise and I stopped going all toghether. Now maybe when things take a change for the better might get myself another desert ride and start going out again. Maybe.

Totally disagree.

Unusual stuff while home isolation?? Well home isolation is not for me 😃 as I continue to work and provide my services for emergency cases as a Orthopedic surgeon specialising in Hand and Microsurgery @ a hospital in Dubai. At work the most unusual for me has been - to wear almost cover all with two to three layer apron and a N95 or N99 mask. This type is protection is good against the bugs but it literally suffocates you , even simple walking makes you feel breathless leave alone doing surgeries. But I am getting used to. - we are paractising social distancing among the staff , undergo tests as we come in high risk areas and we are always in for some changes happening almost every hour. - coming back home to undergo a complete disinfection before entering home and asking kid to wait who comes running to hug me , is quite a sad situation. With time even he is understanding the importance of it. - I am asked to be available on standby if need arises to help in this tough situation where some of the departments in our hospital are overwhelmed. I am a bit scared but I am willing to go , bring it on !! The same principle of desert drives and leap of faith working here too. If my colleagues are doing it , I will be able to do it too. There will be some stucks and refusals , but Hope and God being our marshals to pull out. Stay safe all of you

Oh good thing I stopped I was actually driving a Corona at the begining of 2019!

Back in Belgium I’ve always been a bit of an outdoors person. Grew up in a small town so we only had few friends and spent days fixing our bikes and playing in the woods. I’ve always had this dream of exploring the wild but only after arriving in Saudi Arabia in 2012 and seeing the magnificent deserted areas I became more hungry to explore more and find unspoiled places, seeing farms and meeting locals, but my 4x2 FJ Cruiser forced me to stay on the hard farmer tracks. I’ve left Saudi and went back to Belgium for a while and was happy to be able to get a job in Dubai. I bought a 3 series beemer but after meeting few new friends in the community that went camping often, I realized the fun in Dubai only started off-road so tried to find a 4x4 commuter car which was big enough to take the kids to school but small enough to enjoy in the dunes. Fell in love with my little blue Pajero and found Carnity from searching info about my car and that’s how I ended up here. Wifey later sold our Beemer and bought a LWB Pajero as family / adventure car. And now both addicted off-roaders 🤣

@Vanessa8580, @Mohammed Osama @Nivin @Sherif Hamed @Zed @Denizzalbayrak @Shahid Mehmood @asifk @siddharth maheshwari @Nizam Deen @George Francis@MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ Due to current COVID-19 advises, we are postponing this drive for the next Friday, 3 April 2020. Please leave the event if you are unable to join, so that others can join the drive.

@Melenany @Kalahari @Remco Snoek @Pancho @Chaitanya D @Colin Jordan @Cara Jordan @paolo dassi @Hariharan @Shiju Manuel @Jamy B. @Anvar Sadath Bekal @Lorenzo Candelpergher @Shamil @Brette Due to the current COVID-19 ongoing precautionary advises, we are postponing this drive until next Friday, 3 April 2020. Please leave the event if you are unable to join, so that others can join the drive. Keep safe and see you soon back in the sands !