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@Srikumarit was great to see you again in happier (suspension) circumstances. The old girl was really on form today and she showed the Gadgero a clean pair of heels and taught her a few lessons in light weight/high traction physics! It's a long grind from home to the mighty Sweihanistan mountains but well worth the time and fuel for me, it's just majestic. It really is good for the soul to see the dunes sailing off into the far far distance in the early morning light... The sand was wind groomed and very soft, many times I had rooster tails of sand flying from both ends as the Gadge scrambled to follow the leaders path and frequently had to opt for a variation as the nose kept plowing and refusing to answer the helm Considering the high speed challenge that was laid down to the team today, everyone drove really well with few stucks and only a soft serving of refusals (I cannot imagine it was easy at number 10 with how soft it was at number 2!). @Simon Dawoodmaybe it's time to trade up to a 40 year old Jeep Cherokee? lol (jut kidding bro). Great to hear @Tom B chuckling away on the radio while the mighty Yamato booms and thunders along at the rear, shaking the earth and helping to slow the earth's rotation. Thanks to all the NASCAR pit crew for swinging in to place and repairing my pop out in what seemed like record time, I have no excuse for blasting my tyre off other than "I was trying to follow Srikumar" lol. Great to catch up with some old faces like @Mus_hus78who I haven't driven with for a while and looking forward to getting back into the 'mountains' again soon!

Hi to everyone. Thank you all for joining the drive and for coming at the meeting point on time me. We were all ready for the adventure deflated and flagged by 5.40 A.M. After the briefing we began surfing at 5.45 A.M , riding through some me small dunes and incredibly soft patches. Gliding across those magnificent land scape..which were mostly vargin was fantastic. The terrain was fairly difficult and needed undivided attention and considering the terrain…, we all did an amazing job today. We had a handful of refusals and retries and few stucks and two pop outs. But with amazing support from the support team we were able to overcome every obstacle on our way and not to be forgotten… you guys delivered your best effort today. Well done guys 👏. We had our first pop out in about an hour after we started and the second one about another half an hour later which were handled quickly. We had our share of fun today with plenty of side slopes and crisscrossing and we had enough opportunities to learn more and test our skill level. Thanks to @Thomas Varghesefor executing the CF role today. I suppose you had a great day today helping others. Thank you for your assistance with the jack in fixing the pop outs and well done with your tugs and guidances when ever needed. Thank you @Looper for sweeping every one of us safely out. You were all busy today guiding and re routing . Well done buddy. The support team today shone bright.👍👏👏👏👏 Thanks guys. @Pierre de Maigret Thanks buddy for being a vigilant SL and for re routing when ever needed. Well done buddy . @Ignacio Quindos. You did an amazing job man. It was your first FB drive and you handled the terrain much easier than I expected. Well done and keep it up . @Jessica Lambert initially had some issues but picked up the pace soon..You had to take out your tool box today to fix your first pop out and I believe you enjoyed the drive 👍👍 well done.. @Ashutosh Gargwith the X you did wonderful today. Didn’t seem to have any issues and handled those intense ridges very well. Keep it up bro. @RiaanJH my second drive with you and you did a brilliant job . You were unstoppable today😸 with out any major refusals. @Lucky sAmhad to face some issues at the back ..but you came back strong … @Looper tips and tricks worked !!!😺😺. It was a pleasure to drive with each and everyone of you and see you guys soon. Some pic in the gallery

What an amazing experience on my first fewbie drive!! (Pop-up included). Thanks @Shaaz Sha for your lead and support during my event. Also many thanks to @Thomas Vargheseand @Looper for their help, tips and gear sharing. I definitely felt the notch up, so all your help was much appreciated. Some crests made me sweat a lot, and today I learnt that if you loose the track for a sec, it’s better to make a loop and regain the crest than push the car to the limit and ending up having a pop-up. Like I said at the beginning, a wonderful learning experience for me. Big thank you to @Shaaz Sha for letting me be part of the drive, even though having none experience on this level. Following some pictures of the day. Hope you like them. Cheers! PD: zero sand found a side the tire.

Today's Faqqa fewbie drive under @Shaaz Sha's lead. I have read comments from fellow drivers @Pierre de Maigret, @Ashutosh Garg & from the trip lead @Shaaz Sha. I'm happy all have given good reviews about the drive. To be frank it was a very good drive in Fewbie class. All the drivers showed up at Faqqa on time and was ready deflated with flags up by 5.30 except @DP1011 , Deepak wrangler. After the briefing from the trip lead about our goals and driving techniques with inputs from @Looper we all hit the sands at 5.45am. Thank you @Pierre de Maigret, @Ignacio Quindos, @Jessica Lambert, @Ashutosh Garg, @RiaanJH, @Lucky sAm and it was a pleasure driving with you all. I don't know how @Shaaz Sha finds these beautiful tracks to drive again and again. The entire drive didn't have any tracks from any convoy or any lone wolf traversing that area. Kudos to the trip lead. The track which was laid out to us had everything including ridge riding, side slopes, criss crossing, tight turns and some minor slip face side slopes to get a feel of what is it exactly. Considering it was a fewbie drive and except Shaaz, me & @Looper all had relatively less drives under their belt to make it all the way from the entry point to the exit. Now the big question is how did everybody perform on such a challenging track. On a scale of 1 - 10 I will give this a 8. I was expecting lot of refusals and stucks and cresting but kudos to the drivers it was kept down to a minimum. This is unavoidable once you are inside the desert and even IM drives and drivers face such challenges. The stucks, refusals & crests were tackled with expert guidance from @Shaaz Sha & @Looper without any incidents. No comments about @Shaaz Sha's expertise as he is the trip lead but @Looper was amazing. How he guided @Lucky sAm during his refusals has to be given top admiration. We had 2 pop outs soon after we started - perhaps in the 1st hour itself. Both fixed in very less time. Everybody chipped in with a helping hand and we were soon driving off again. @Jessica Lambert's pop out is a regular one on the front right wheel when she was side slopping on a left ward climbing side slope as the wheels were not pointed straight down when exiting the dune. The surprise one was the pop out of @Ignacio Quindos on his real wheel. The stalwarts of @Carnity like @Gaurav, @Frederic, @Srikumar, @Wrangeld & @Ale Vallecchi can please share their thoughts on this. I have a hunch it happened because of fish tailing but not sure how it happened as 2 cars were ahead of me. If its because of fish tailing @Ignacio Quindos has to work out more on this as its dangerous. I don't blame him as its his 1st Fewbie drive and he did very well for the rest of the drive without much issues. But need to work out on this more. @Pierre de Maigret did extremely well as 2nd lead. Its not an easy task to follow @Shaaz Sha when he is in full flow driving in his Xterra. He must have felt bad for a couple of refusals but for me he did very well. The surprise driver who did well in a 2.7L prado was @Jessica Lambert. She can drive with just 10 drives under her credit so well and looks like she knows what her car can do and what it cannot. With helpful tips from the support team and encouragement I didn't see any terrain she left unconquered. @Ashutosh Garg seemed to fish tail in the initial stages but after some tips didn't see him fishtailing at all. Fast learner. Never heard @RiaanJH on the radio claiming he had a stuck or refusal. The most important lesson I learned from this drive is how much ever experienced you are if you try to show off you can find yourself in a bad crested situation. Thanks @Looper for tugging me out. After crossing an upward climbing ridge Shaaz wanted to re route and told everybody to take different track and I thought it was a easy climb and promptly crested myself by attempting it. Sorry guys for being impulsive and I learnt my lesson. It was a pleasure driving with you all and sure enjoyed meeting you all. See you all soon in the sands.

Thank you to all the drivers for a superb day in the desert. It was a long drive to reach the sand, but hey with no pain there is no gain. As mentioned in the briefing this was an area that I had in mind for the longest time, but perhaps it needed the kind of convoy that we had today to enjoy it to the fullest. A "warm up" at Old Lady Dune did set the tone for the drive, criss crossing on top of it was indeed special as you need a strong heart to do it, and I thank everyone for putting their trust and executing it so well. Some of those bowls and ridge were an absolute off-roaders delight and to have them so clean without bumps was like icing on a cake. @Warren Flay @Simon Dawood @ASAD. @Naveen Raj @ShereenMK @Gregory @Tom B @Mus_hus78@Karthikeyan Govindarajan once again thank you and look forward to seeing you on another episode of Sweihan Adventures. P.S. @Simon Dawood I second the suggestion of Warren 😂

@Islam SolimanThank you for today's drive. We started the drive with waking up our mind and warming up with technical dunes. As time passed we went for for big, bigger and biggest dunes in Badayer with pace and control. You did an exceptional job with leading us specially with the wind and soft sand. Kudos to you. @munkybizness after @Islam Solimanyou were the most active on the Radio with giving instructions with obstacles which @Waqas Parvezfollowed exceptionally well. I am sure Islam, you and Waqas had a lot of challenges with the bumps and soft sand. The FJ Boys @Rajiv Sam@Gilbert Khalil @Ashok chaturvedidrove exceptionally well. @Mohamad AnwerFirst Intermediate drive of yours but we have driven previously in many drives before and your skills are really good. I love your car. Really a beauty to see it climb big dunes. @James Thorn following the beast is a challenge, good drive today mate. @Matt.T Good to meet you and hope I did not leave the sand churned for you. @Ranjan Das As a sweep i know it gets lonely specially when the convoy drove exceptionally well and though there were refusals it was handled very well by each individual. 3 Wranglers at the back had a big challenge specially with the churned sand But I am proud to say wranglers performed the way their built for. Looking forward to see everyone on the sand soon

@Warren FlayWell said , except for the jeep part 🤣😂

Inspiring a drive theme “ the bone collector “ 😅 Nice pictures especially the bones 🤣

Well, Sweihan is definitely at the top of my places to go for dune bashing. @Vanessa8580thank you so much for showing me the place, your fantastic lead across the day and the tone you set from the briefing till the end of the drive, no matter what challenges we encountered on the way. @Islam Solimanand @Naveen Raj are the kind of guys who you would absolutely want to have in any drive as CF and sweep. What an amazing support from both of you. Big big luxury to have you yesterday. Thank you!!! The moment of the day for me was the “no pull” for Tony’s car, while it was driven by Vanessa 😂😂😂 Following some pictures of the day. Hope you like them. I did today my first fewbie drive, and have my first pop-up, so @Amr Aydin I think that confirms that my rims haven’t got real beadlocks. See you on the next one!!

What a brilliant drive and exciting drive. @Shaaz Sha you chose the most amazing and challenging lines and, as is to be expected, we had quite a few refusals and 2 pop-outs! Those were part of the fun and learning. Thank you @Thomas Varghese and @Looper for the great support, help and tips. It was a non-stop mix of adrenaline rush with phenomenal learning and experience. Thank you @Pierre de Maigret, @Ignacio Quindos, @Jessica Lambert, @RiaanJH and @Lucky sAm for an enjoyable drive. @Jessica Lambert as usual you amazed us with the display of your mastery of self-recovery and the ease with which you were surfing the ridges! Looking forward to the next drive.

The tracks always find the spirit of an explorer 😄

@Srikumar thank you for an incredible drive this morning. As the title suggested, it certainly was an adventure! The early start and long drive to get there was well worth it; large open dunes, no tracks and beautiful scenery as a back drop made it a memorable drive. This is my third time in Sweihan area and it never disappoints. Criss crossing “old lady dune” during our “warm up” was certainly one of the highlights. Everyone drove superbly this morning, with minimal refusals and no stucks. And the two pop-outs didn’t hold us back for long. Plus gave me a chance to try out my new toy! @Warren Flay great job as SL. Not an easy task today. @Mus_hus78 thanks for sweeping this morning and I hope the dreaded engine fault light isn’t anything too serious. I managed to take a fair few pics along the way and have posted them in the gallery. See you all in the sand soon.

Hi @Shaaz Shaand @Looper, thank you very much for the ride of today.You certainly made all sweat and I cannot remember to have experienced so many refusals, crests together with 2 pop-ups. Definitely a first price for it! It certainly challenged us all which is the best way to learn and soon we will all surf on dunes with great ease. Thank you again and see you soon for another fabulous ride.

@Thomas Varghese rear wheel pop out is less frequent than front one and both front and rear in the same time even more less . I have seen all of them last of which was the rear passenger side pop out on my last drive happened to one of the drivers. I believe the Rear one comes due to sudden slip of the vehicle to a relatively harder ground off slip face while the vehicle in slight obliquity , if in prefect line slip you see both popout. That’s what I think but maybe our friends whom experienced this can tell us more about it

What an amazing convoy today guys ! All of you took the challenges with a smile and kept coming back for more Of course, with a skillful @GauravSoni as second lead to correct my sometimes bumpy tracks, @Mahmoud Taha , @Amr Aydin and @Pascal wonderfully digesting the terrain, and our captain @Hisham Masaad in the back to keep us safe, it was evident that things would run smoothly. The terrain was pristine, and apart from the camels there was nobody else in sight. We eventually headed south to what I’ve come to call « Little Faya » which has a few nice big dunes where we played around (and shoveled a bit) the last half hour of the drive 😂. We exited after about 3,5 hours of driving and having covered around 72kms. That’s pretty decent and we had good fun ! See you soon in the sand !

Thanks @Ale Vallecchi for a wonderful drive. Calm on the radio said it all and your knack to spot wildlife in middle of huge desert is next to none... all drove very well as we ventured into some nice long range dunes, exploring some nice ridges to ride and some sweet slopes to slide through. Thanks again looking forward to c you all soon.