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Dont bring conversion rates into the equation otherwise a taxi ride in Zimbabwe probably costs a billion Zimbabwean dollars

Same in Belgium. We have the red Diesel for heating up your house and agricultural purposes, and the regular one which is heavily taxed. And yes in many industrial zones throughout the country the traffic department was checking vehicles. The fines for being caught using red diesel in your car were however very very hefty, so most people did not risk it. I have the impression that most European car manufacturers used all possible tricks out of the book to make people buy diesel, and the technology was pretty advanced, much more than petrol cars where no new things were coming onto the market. The common rule was if you do less than 20,000km per year, then a petrol car would be the cheaper option. Above that, the Diesel becomes more interesting, even taking into account the yearly taxes were higher and maintenance cost was also a bit higher.

It was the same in uk. Diesel was half the price of petrol so everyone invested in Diesel engines. More torque, more miles per tank, what’s not to like? Now all this emissions stuff is happening, the people who invested in diesel are getting penalised hard with fuel tax, road tax. MPG still makes it worth it (kind of) but the introduction of euro specs with DPF and Adblue can make it expensive if something goes wrong. I don’t know how it is everywhere else but back home we have 2 grades of diesel. Normal road diesel and agricultural diesel. Agricultural diesel is the same as road diesel with a red or green diesel (depending which part of Ireland you live in). But the thing about agricultural diesel is that it’s a quarter of the price of road diesel so naturally many people put it in their cars. Sometimes you will come across a her majesty’s custom and excise checkpoint where they will dip random cars to check the fuel but the savings far outweigh the fine. Many people also run illegal diesel “laundering plants” where they pass the agricultural diesel through fullers earth aka kitty litter, which removes the dye and makes it “legal” again. Massive profit to be made at such operations. Diesel cars can be fun contrary to popular belief. I was looking for something reliable and cheap to drive to work, it was a 2 hour drive, so I bought a cheap Mk 1 Renault Clio for a couple of hundred pounds to go to work and back. To my surprise the engine from the scrap Volvo 440 TD in my yard, same as the Laguna bolted straight onto the mounts so me and a friend did it one weekend for a bit of fun. The car was a real POS but nobody knew it was a TD and I beat many Nova and Corsa SRIs at the lights. I should have thrown a few pink slips down 😂

Amazing off-road terrain from Shuwaib to Iftar Bowl in Sharjah that offers an amazing mix of medium - tall dunes along with the surprise of small technical dunes and sticky pockets with soft sand. Plenty of opportunities to play and have good dune bashing or dune driving along these set of lovely red sand dunes. Advisable for seasoned lead driver along with intermediate drivers only. This area is not suitable for newbies/fewbies off-roaders. Minimum cars: 3 capable proper 4x4 cars with recovery points. Sharing the track of exact drive and terrain we followed. Starting: Shuwaib Waypoint: 24.823900º N 55.768604º E Finished: Iftar Bowl (Rifadah) Waypoint: 24.916928º N 55.740696º E Complete route track in GPX and KMZ file attached below - Enjoy. Shuwaib Iftar bowl.gpx Shuwaib Iftar bowl.kmz