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Well done to all ! Some clips can be found below:

Many thanks to @M.Seidam, @MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ, and @Ashok chaturvedi for great teamwork, patience, and calm approach to managing such extreme recovery. Last night after the newbie drive, we ended up at Big red and in an attempt to make few climbs I went up to check the Big Red climb, and after 70% climb, that area has recently transformed with endless shallow dips, soft sand pockets, and unexpected slip face all around. After reaching a 70% climb, I continued upwards and was greeted with a dangerous dip in the soft pocket. I stopped my car on the ridge for few seconds before going in with LO gear and escape from the first hurdle. The next ridge greeted me with a similar and tighter soft sand pocket that I manage to dodge but the third one left no space inside the bowl to maneuver and we have to rest our case in front of mother nature. We spent more than 3 hours of impeccable coordination mobilizing help on top of big red by dodging all pockets. @MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ was really brave and courageous to drive in a blind state (sandstorm) with just radio instructions to climb while dodging all pockets and slip faces. After a few attempts, refusals, and stuck he finally positioned his wrangler in right place to inaugurate his 12 ton WARN winch, which he installed last week. After my car was out we still struggled a lot to escape the second bowl as now we have two cars with little to no hard patch to drive out. I deflated to 6 PSI, to make that track as solid as we can and manage to reverse out at 6K rpm with precise guidance from @M.Seidam before I dive into another pocket behind the reverse climb. We even get to try out @M.Seidam sand track when @MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ wrangler was dancing with 2 wheels in the air on a soft pocket. Surprisingly sand tracks worked for the first time in the dunes, as we have tried and failed on more than 10 instances in the past with sand track which works wonders on beach sand due to solid ground underneath. A real good memorable night with insane challenges and a big achievement to remember forever.

First drive with you @Luca Palanca Falsini and thankful for it. We really enjoyed it and I am sure all. @Nihal17 @Ranjan Das @Dodi Syahdar @Nathan Evans @Danish Mohammad @Humayun Ghias @Russ @Chinthaka Ruwan and @Rawad thank you for joining, and look forward to see you in sand again

Most challenging and best drive so far. I have never driven this area before and it was really exciting. Thank you @Luca Palanca Falsini for this excellent drive. Also a big thank to @Ranjan Das @Dodi Syahdar @Hisham Masaad for the great support. @Rawad @Russ @Nathan Evans @Humayun Ghias Happy to join with you guys again 🤛. @Nihal17 @Danish Mohammad see you soon on sand again. Have a great long weekend guys.

Thank you @Luca Palanca Falsinifor the great day and the amazing area. What a scenery!! We were lucky to have such a nice weather specially for an all-climb mission that usually ends with so many cars overheating Great support from @Dodi Syahdar, @Hisham Masaadand his secret weapon (abode) 😁😁 Thank you @Ranjan Dasfor the 2nd lead, and congrats on your new toy😉 @Humayun Ghias, @Danish Mohammad, @Russ , @Chinthaka Ruwanalways pleasure driving with you guys @Nihal17, and @Nathan Evansnice drive mates👌👌 until we meet again 🤙🤙

Thanks @Luca Palanca Falsini for adrenaline filled drive made all the more enjoyable by the cool weather we had this morning. thanks @Hisham Masaadand @Dodi Syahdar for the support. Other mates, great driving today guys, loved the company. Hope to see you all soon. Wish you a wonderful weekend ahead

@Gaurav @MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ @Ashok chaturvedi It’s indeed for me a never forgotten memorable super event of a literally super team work of an extreme recovery situation which was executed by all the collective effort and attentive mind of all team 👍👌

Nice drive today it was fun. Added video. @Wrangeld @Jeepie @Hasan Wahlan @Josh T. @Aravind Sidhardhan https://youtu.be/XVGXvDKPtg8

Great morning. Thank u all

Thanks @Luca Palanca Falsini for this mornings drive, easily the best terrain I have driven on so far! Hope to return to that area very soon.. Thanks to everyone involved especially the support team. See you all soon 👍🏼

@Alexanderrr, i see you added tour self to manage tab on this IM drive! I just checked and you only had one drive with Carnity which means your next drive would be a Newbie drive and you need to RSVP as attendee for these drives. please review the Carnity grading structure which will give you an extensive idea about the different levels of drives and progression criteria. I am happy to answer any questions you have.

@Islam Soliman would love to join the drive. Can I add myself on the list?

Thanks @Wrangeld and @Jeepie for an amazing experience and thank you @Farouq Owdeh @Josh T. and @Aravind Sidhardhan for being a part of this amazing convoy. Be safe and hope to see you all soon.

Thanks @MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ and @M.Seidam for letting me know.. hope to see you guys soon.. wish you and your families a happy and blessed EID

Post Drive Report Having experienced the Sweihan dunes a few weeks ago, I was excited at seeing what another Abu Dhabi off roading terrain had to offer. Al Khatim is not an area where I had driven before and I thought that as this was a newbie (potentially Absolute Newbie) drive, the fact that I would need to use the drive as a partial recce/exploration drive was acceptable. As it turned out there were no absolute newbies on the drive and as a result we were able to take the level up a notch. After I got to grips with the softeness of the sand we were lucky enough to enjoy virgin sands, swooping dunes and exciting climbs and descents to the content of our adrenilan glands. The start of the drive was puncutated by an area we needed to cross that was filled with multiple puncture risks. Old fence posts, barbed wire, discarded pipes and more rubbish than my heart could bear to see littered the vista, making navigation quite challenging - especially as we had started our drive in the dark and were crossing this dune complex through the morning dawn. As the sun came up we made our way across the tracks in the general direction of Sweihan and a veritable treasure of navigable dunes. other leads that have been in this area had told me that one of the greatest challenges of the drive is choosing between so many atttractive and interesting looking dunes. Dune structure is not something that leads talk about in their reposts because mostly, the shape and style of dunes is quite predicatable in the areas we drive. Al Khatim was full of little surprises (some less pleasant than others) with unexpected soft patches, hidden pockets, complex rises and descents and height. Ridge riding was kept to a minimum today because after all this was a Newbie drive,but there too were new challenges: sharp ridges which make driving on them a challenge because there is a metre of soft slick slip face where wheels really have no purchase. If you get the sense from this that the drive was challenging but fun, then I have done my job and hopefully enticed one or two of you to venture out to Abu Dhabi (most lilely after restrictions are lifted) to experience a different scale of dune to what we experience most of the time in Dubai and Sharjah. We managed the drive almost without recoveries @Hasan Wahlan @Farouq Owdeh @Josh T. all had the chance to relax with the pace of the drive well within capabilities leaving @Jeepie with very little to do, excellent in support as ever. @Aravind Sidhardhan as the only true newbie on the drive, you handled everything very well. Sorry about the bumper - hope your garage can help you sort it out easily. Thanks to all of you, espeically @Farouq Owdeh for bringing us into some areas I would not have found without your excellent local knowledge. Please let us know when you and your friends are visiting Maleha again - I'd like to book a seat and bring my own popcorn!

Another great and fun ride courtesy of Vanessa and her support team. Thanks again.. Looking fwd for the next one...

Thank you @Brette for the wonderful drive. Your initial briefing said that the drive would be slow as the wind was playing spoil sport and there were lot of soft patches. This gave me some solace as it was 2 weeks since my last drive as I skipped drives last week and was already feeling a bit rusty 😀, plus it was my first fewbie second lead. The drive turned out to be a great one with a right mix of everything. I need to apologise to the rest of the convoy, as I had multiple refusals due to my car cutting off power, I had my OBD scanner connected full time during the drive and saw that during short steep climbs , my engine load was reaching 100% which obviously would result in power cut offs. Coolant temperatures were fine and never went above 110 degC. did a google search and it seems there are plenty of reasons why this happens, and not sure where to start 😃..will keep this under observation good driving with you guys @Miguel Codes - thanks for the advices, @Zixuan Huang - Charlie - our paths cross again , @Abdul Rafay-S, @darren thompson, @Paul Zeitoun thanks @Shaaz Sha for sweeping the convoy, the drive report and the encouraging words on my second lead Looking forward and coming back for more!!!

pictures posted. Unfortunately I cannot post the video's Josh T. @Josh T. Hasan Wahlan @Hasan Wahlan Farouq Owdeh @Farouq Owdeh @Wrangeld Aravind Sidhardhan @Aravind Sidhardhan

Hello guys, Thank you all for a wonderful day offroading and you guys were amazing today. Everyone showed up on time and we had to wait for @Abdul Rafay-S car to reach .we had a smooth start and rarely had any troubles. The only break we had was when we had to deal with the torn off tire. Thanks to @Brette for the selection of the area and terrain, We had everything to entertain and practice our driving skills from technical soft patches, some super sideys to high climbs @Sunil Mathewexecuted the role of the second lead to perfection.Did very well👍. @Miguel Codes did superb with you wrangler and had no issues at all @Zixuan Huang - Charliehandled his pathfinder very well today and I am sorry about your bumper and inner fender. Did well bro @Abdul Rafay-S, good job bro. did Amazing with your wrangler 👏👏 And finally about the two beasts in the convoy 😁😁 F150 and RAM @darren thompson and @Paul Zeitoun, guys you were really good literally charging towards any challenges on your way.. superb. Guys once again thanking all for a superb day. some pics in the gallery 🙏

Amazing job well executed @Gaurav @M.Seidam @MUHAMMAD Kashif RAZZAQ @Ashok chaturvedi.. glad all worked out and everyone got out safely without any complications. I guess that was too close to a call for 🚁 recovery 🤣

😅 you just made this drive cancellation more painful than the PCR test 🤣. No worries, things usually happen for a reason, I'll be looking forward for next weekend's drives. Have a great rest of the weekend.

I am definatelly up to the game 🚙 I have patience,I just had a diffrent perspective of intermediate drive with assumtion of a next level of newbie/fewbie drive 😄

Sure. @Islam Soliman is a good lead and you have friends to guide you. Make us all proud @Lakshmi Narasimhan.

No worries, take good rest for saving future drives!!! See you on another drive.

I am sorry to hear this @Thomas Varghese.. take good care of yourself and wish you speedy recovery

Sure @GauravSoni.. c u in the morning Yes it will!

Good evening everyone,at the end can somebody confirm if this ride will happen tomorrow or what time will I know for sure tonight?

Dear @Mario Cornejo, @Josh T., @Naveen Raj @Mus_hus78 @Zed Unfortunately my car is not desert ready. Today during my Intermediate drive, the traction control is mot disabling and is prompting to take to service centre. Thus I will not be able to join you all tomorrow. I am checking if any other leads can step in for the drive. I will keep you all posted. Thanks

One of the best off-road club rides I’ve joined or been a part of! Thank you @Srikumar & @Nivin for being such amazing sports as marshals 🙏 You guys solved challenges on the spot making this such an easy thing for me (and I’m certain the others) to enter and meld into.Some real lessons today, on what to do when it goes wrong.

As always another thrilling and roller coaster ride thanks @Vanessa8580 and @Fredericfor the amazing videos..see you soon for the next ride

Was awesome drive, thank you everybody for coming, and @Srikumar and @Nivin for help and organisation! Now need to get some sleep ))

Good morning, Sorry I have to change the convoy list @Hisham Masaad will be our Swepp and @Dodi Syahdar CF.

While offroading, we cross dunes by using different methods, based on how the dune is formed and what the drive level is. Once you have spent some time in the desert, you will slowly start to pay more attention to the dune formations and how we cross them. Once you reach Intermediate and Advance level, you'll need to start learning how to read these dunes in order to navigate and create your planned routes in the desert. As a rule of thumb, the prevailing wind in UAE is blowing from a North-Western direction to South-East direction from 10AM onwards. At night and in early morning it will be reversed and blow from the South-East to North-West. This is something you should remember and you will notice when you zoom into certain areas with your navigation app (Google Maps, Gaia, MotionX, Mytrails,...) you will notice that the wind from that side has caused the dunes to take on their shape. This is a general rule and will not always apply, as you will see that in certain areas where wind is coming from different directions, you will see for example "star" dunes appearing. There are different types of dunes which are separately described below. As you can see in below picture, a dune is formed when the prevailing wind blows on a mound of sand, where the grain will move into the wind direction and create a ridge. The sand which falls on the other side of the ridge, creates a slipface, and this sand is not compacted by the wind. This is the main reason why we generally drive on the prevailing wind side or the convex side of the dunes on the Newbie level. "A dune is a curiously dynamic creature," wrote Farouk El-Baz in National Geographic. “Once formed, a dune can grow. It can change shape and move with the wind. It can even breed new dunes. Some of these offspring may be carried on the back of the mother dune. Others are born and race downwind, outpacing their parents. [Source: Farouk El-Baz, National Geographic, February 1982] The shape of dunes is affected by things like the strength, direction and consistency of the winds; the consistency and amount of sand; the hardness of the terrain and the amount of vegetation. Below we will describe the most common dunes found in the UAE. Different Dunes Crescent or Barchan Dune This is the most common dune. It forms the shape of a crescent moon when the wind blows from one direction. We generally use the words concave and convex to describe both sides of the dune: * Concave is a shape that curves inwards. * Convex is a shape that curves outwards. Crescent-shaped mounds generally are wider than long. On the concave side you will have the slipface. These dunes form under winds that blow from one direction, and they also are known as barchans. Parabolic Dune A parabolic dune is similar in shape to a barchan, but it is just the opposite. The tips of this dune point into the wind, and its main body migrates with the wind, forming a depression between the tips. Because of this formation, parabolic dunes are also known as blowout dunes. These dunes often occur when vegetation stabilizes sediments and a U-shaped blowout forms between clumps of plants. Example of Parabolic dunes near Faya: https://goo.gl/maps/ob8xu3y8VJJvF6hk8 Longitudinal or "Seif" Dunes They are also often referred to to as "sand ridges" or "seifs". Their length can range from a few meters to many kilometers and their height from a couple meters high to a couple hundred meters high. Wind pushes the sand and forms ridges parallel to the prevailing wind direction with slip faces either side of the crest. Linear dunes are straight or slightly sinuous sand ridges typically much longer than they are wide. They may be more than 160 kilometers long. Linear dunes may occur as isolated ridges, but they generally form sets of parallel ridges separated by miles of sand, gravel, or rocky interdune corridors. Some linear dunes merge to form Y-shaped compound dunes. Many form in bidirectional wind regimes. The long axes of these dunes extend in the resultant direction of sand movement. Barchanoid Dunes These ridges are similar to Barchan dunes. They are connected in long crescentic waves as the sand supply is much greater than that which forms a Barchan Dune. Star Dunes These dunes are formed when there are several prevailing wind directions - there is a complex wind regime. Typically there are three or more slip faces, whilst the dunes do not migrate they grow in height. Star dunes are radially-symmetrical, spyramidal sand mounds with slipfaces on three or more arms that radiate from the high center of the mound. They are created when the winds blow equally from every direction, causing the sand dune to grow many extensions and resemble a star. They are rare and are fairly stable and remain in the same place. Some are landmarks with names. Example of a Star dune: https://goo.gl/maps/jRnYghQc8ACzVz6T7 With this knowledge, the next time you step into the desert, you can start looking at the different dune formations, and this will give you lots of knowledge that you'll be able to apply in the future when leading and navigating off-road drives.

Mother Nature always has something in store for us. Glad to see the collective teamwork which will undoubtedly form a bond.

@Islam Soliman did not cross this information 👍

@Alexanderrr this is intermediate drive, you need to join a newbie drive.

Fun n Thrilling drive today morning… good learning… thanks @Vanessa8580, @Rizwanm2, @Frederic… hasta la vista..😎

Thanks for a fun drive! Left me wanting more. Maybe a bit less flying

From AD Alfayah F+ drive . Self recovery of @Xavier Treasurer upon guidance from @Frederic👍

The 3 things that are gonna affect your lighting is function (flood v/s spot v/s combo), location (bumper, hood/windshield, roof), and price. LEDs (especially strips/bars) are cheap and give you the combo. Otherwise you need to do some mixing and matching. If I wanna super honest, the location is more about aesthetics. The most functional location is a smaller (20 inch) bar on your bumper, you can very optionally support that with a couple of hood/windshield lights for spread (you need to angle them outwards). The price is more connected with the longevity than performance. You'll find a lot of really bright lights for cheap, but they don't come with proper warranties. My approach is dualistic: Get cheaper ones and try them out so that if I regret a location or level of brightness I can replace parts without too much crying in the corner. Commit when they break down and I have experience to buy expensive stuff. I'm also a "balance form with function" person, so I'll admit to sometimes compromising to get a better look. For example, I have roof lights that create a higher drag on the highway, but I love the way they look. Let's face it, if I wanted aerodynamics, I wouldn't have bought a brick with wheels. My setup is in the pics, I can tell you where I got the lights from if you're interested, but putting 2 of the roof lights on your bumper is more than enough, what I did was overkill for the balanced look. That said, don't skimp on installation. The wrong angle (especially for roof lights) will give a strong hood reflection and mess up your view, no chance of that with bumper lights that you can probably install at home (that's how i tried my first set but the wiring took a while the first time)