Rahimdad

@Amar it all depends on what kind of accessories you are looking for. However Satwa is one place where you can accessorize your ride, the other notorious place is near Sahara Center, just before the Sharjah College Signal. You will be able to find anything from bull bars, to tow hitch, chrome, wooden interior panels, to after market stereos, speakers, and much much more. If this does not satisfy your query, kindly be more specific in the kind of accesories that interest you so that we can help you better.

Thank you Waqas bhai for joining and thank you for a very valid question. As per my experience I would recommend that your family sit this one out due to the long hours and challenging terrain. Any family oriented drives will clearly be marked as family drives. However for couples who are more adventurous, we would not mind the spouse joining in. @Gaurav bhai, please do add your insight to @waqaszohair query, and please add your valuable insight.

Wow we already have some awesome adventurers on this one. @Gaurav Bhai, I am not sure about Nahel, but I will try to see if I can manage any route that is more targeted towards fewbie track. I will keep you posted.

Its been a couple of years since I have been to Sweihan. By no means is this an easy terrain so following convoy discipline will be imperative. Among the important stuff to carry would be loads of water and I would recommend everyone to have a 2 way radio. I am in with full support as usual @Gaurav bhai and I will try to dig out the route I did with JJ Bhai a couple of years back.

I am originally from Pakistan, but have roamed the UAE sands for 42 years now.

@derik Very hard question to answer. I have had brilliant luck and my 4x4s have never died on me before. I guess a lot would depend on your driving style and how well you take care of your vehicle. I have previously driven a Land Rover Discovery 1 which was a 1998 model from 2010 - 2015 with very little trouble and a lot of fun,sold it with still quite a bit of kick left in it, the mileage when I sold it was showing over 400K Kms. I now have a Nissan Pathfinder for the past year or so with 220K kms on the clock and it is running smooth for a 2001 model and Gaurav Bhai with his trusty 1999 Pajero has done his fair share also. My experience is as long as you take good care of your vehicles, they will take god care of you in turn. Part availability depends on the number of those vehicles in use and as long as scrap yards in Sharjah these 4x4s will always keep running. i have seen some 1992 Jeep Wranglers (YJs) and some Land Criuiser and Nissan patrol from the same era still running on the roads and still looking in good condition. I remember a couple of years back Nissan had asked owners of Nissan Patrol who had purchased their vehicles from AWR and driven it for 25 years or more for a celebration and there were quite a few and most of them were on the off-road scene as well. In conclusion a careful driver, who maintains his ride well and as long as parts are available, these machines never give up.

I was very excited for this wadi trip and had a fear also as I had not been to a wadi in a long time. We had delayed this trip over the last couple of weeks due to the weather keeping in mind that we wanted a safe passage for everyone. By God's grace we were blessed by having the best spot in the valley with a nice lake where we fed the ducks, children and adults had plenty of fun with this activity. The food from all was awesome, Haseeb bringing my favorite parathas and Waqas doing some magic with his drilled chicken, Kavin bought dishes I could not recognize, but only enjoy and Girish Kaka got some manly potatoes which were deliciously different. The later drive through a narrow path between the mountains and some puddles just gave us a taste of what the wadi would have been during the rains and why it is so dangerous venturing out in them during the rains. All managed well including my mate from my office, Rahul, who thoroughly enjoyed himself and could not believe what is Ford Escape managed during this trip. All in all, awesome company as usual, with some amazing food, a dream wadi and weather which was just right for this kind of a trip. Thank you to all participants and special thanks to Gaurav Bhai for all the hard work which eventually was rewarded by a trip which will have people raving till the next one. P.S. A separate gallery to highlight all our trips and much more seems like a very good idea, and people who do not want to read the words and just have a glance through all the pics will have the opportunity to do so without going through a whole thread. Kudos Team Carnity for such a brilliant idea. 3 thumbs up.

Weather looks amazing and I am getting all excited for tomorrow's trip.Wadi Shawka here we come.

Wish you all the best Greg, hopefully case will be resolved in your favor with you not loosing any major bucks.

@GregBhoy i heard on the radio some advertisement from a second hand car dealer ad that anyone who sells a second hand car has to give a 6 months guaranty to the buyer. If you have just purchased the vehicle and the police records show that, than you can approach them to log a complaint against the seller to give you a raw deal. This proves the saying "If it seems to good to be true, than it is not true". There is nothing in this world such as a sweet deal.

Both valid points from @ayman_khateeb and Gaurav. I would just like to add that I had the worst possible experience with Dubai Insurance and Reinsurance company which literally drove me nuts for over 8 months before handing back my Jeep Commander back to me. This incident was not covered by video clips or photographs, and police report had everything on it, plus I shared the same details with the Insurance company, but with disbelief in my story they kept on dragging the case until I threatened them to take this case to the police as they are not accepting my claim as per the police report. So bad insurance companies will try and find any loop hole to get out of a claim, however, a little extra investment in a well known Insurance company can make your life easier. Rightly said by Gaurav Bhai, even Police before making the report wants to know where the accident happened if you do not have pics or videos, so these media devices only help and not hinder your case.

Your videos speak a thousand words and more. They always take me back to the amazing times shared and it is absolute relief to know that we can just click on the link and relive the moment whenever we want. Thank you @Gaurav Bhai for all your hard work.

Same here Barry, i was thinking that it was something you could conquer the Dunes with, but alas just a GTR in a Patrol body, even the tranny and gear has been changed and it does not have the Patrol 4x4 gear anymore. But at 1500 HP it is one hell of a machine. Real Patrol are found on the Moreeb Hill climb at new year Liwa bash which either are found on top of Moreeb or explode into flames trying.

@ayman_khateeb I will hand it to you on this one as I have not seen or experience a Renault Duster 4x4 version in the desert, however the Front Wheel Drive will not do the trick.

Thank you Gaurav bhai for posting after considerable research. This has been on the cards for a long time now, however due to the prediction for the rains we were waiting for the right time. The weather shows that it will be sunny with a little cloud cover at times and very cool temperatures. Wadi Shawka promises to be a beautiful scenic place and very true on the North Eastern region of UAE being the green tourist destination in the near future. Looking forward to the support of Carnity members as received in the past 5 drives. You encourage us to bring something new every week and continue to enjoy this awesome weather in the outdoors.

Nobody better than you to fix it in the best way possible, as only you love your car the best @syedmeesamali

For original stuff and fixing contact your closed Al Futtaim dealer. If you want original and cheap, Sharjah Industrial area could also be an alternate, you could by the strip of any Toyota parts seller, like Divya and get any good garage to get the same fixed. If I am not mistaken, its not that tough, you could even fix it yourself saving you a few bucks.

I love to listen.

Thanks @Mujtaba for your kind words. Thanks @Gaurav bhai for the short write up and some awesome pics which somehow gives me a feel that this route will be repeated again in near future, as being there is much more awesome than just having a feel of it through the photographs. Now I would like to thank all participants for being on time and allowing us that extra half an hour set up the camp and than head out to prayers, I think this is what allowed us to get the best spot in the area. As we started from the meeting point and headed to the Zakher area traffic was smooth and the weather was amazing. Since we reached the point where we were supposed to pray half an hour earlier than expected we decided to head out to the lake and settle in before heading back for prayers. As we arrived we saw one of the Gazebos free and set up camp there, by this time we had a couple of stucks but Mujtaba and myself left for our Friday prayers leaving Gaurav with the task of getting everyone to the spot. On returning from our Friday prayers we saw that Gaurav bhai had cleared all but one vehicle, this was our very own front wheel Ford Escape. Thankfully Govind had figured out how to disable the traction and we were able to deflate it to about 15 PSI and get it out of the sand, get it back in again and reach the Gazebo without much trouble. At this point I sighted my favorite Gazebo which seemed to be not occupied at that time, so Gaurav Bhai and myself headed out with the Ford Escape to see if we could get the front wheel drive to that point, this would also ensure that the rest of the vehicles would be able to make it. Thankfully the Escape was very torque friendly and helped us make our way to my favorite spots with zero stuck. The smiles on our faces was from ear to ear and as Gaurav Bhai headed back to the previous spot to fetch the rest, Govind was amazed at what his vehicle could do and we started a discussion as to how I was able to manage his vehicle to that point. This in my opinion was the best move we made, as not only we got my favorite spot, but it was away from the crowd and we were hardly bothered by the noise and the dust being thrown around by people pulling stunts in the distance. The lake was looking as amazing as ever and the weather just took a turn for the better with cloud cover that made the stay more pleasant. Out came the food and drinks and we were all starving by than, which made the food all that more delicious. I narrated the story of the lake as to how it came about as we had our lunch and everybody was in further appreciation of the lake. With many unverified stories flying around on the internet about the lake, some very nervous well-wishers had inquired about the safety of the venue. Rest assured it was all fun and there was nothing to worry about, however that could have been one of the reasons why people after 8 years have kept away from this place. As soon as we had finished our lunch the announcement was made as to who would join us for the off-road part. Knowing the terrain and the amount of experience required to drive through such dune formations, warning was given. This resulted in us having 3 cars and a lot of space for the interested parties. As Gaurav, bhai, Mujtaba and myself got our vehicles ready to hit the dunes, the passengers looked around to see which ride they would prefer to experience this amazing part of our trip. With cars loaded we took off with me in the lead and Gaurav Bhai at the sweep, which meant that Mujtaba was nestled right in between 20 years of off-road experience. I must admit that Mujtaba did well and having seen him on almost every drive, this was the widest smile I had ever seen. Mujtaba had requested me time and again to increase the level of the drive, he had finally got what he was looking for. The area was so challenging that we hardly had time to stop and we just kept flying from one dune to the next and tried almost every trick in the book to have uninterrupted fun. After about an hour of flying across the dunes we headed back and reached safely, at this point the passengers had enjoyed thoroughly not knowing that the drivers had their hearts in their mouths at some point. With the experience of the team we had managed to fly through some really technical area without any injury to self, vehicles or confidence. At this point Mujtaba had to head back and Gaurav Bhai and myself had to head back in with a much younger crowd, the children on the trip. Second, round was just as thrilling as the first and we took a slightly different route which took us across a camel farm. As we completed the track, the children had a lot of fun, but wanted to go back to the camels before we headed back out. This was an excellent idea, as soon as we stopped one camel after the other started approaching us and before we knew there were a dozen camels breathing down our necks. We stayed for a while and let the children and adults enjoy these moments with the Ship of the Desert. As we returned to our base, Gaurav bhai felt the camels had come close to us due to the fact that they were hungry and we would have some food for them, than a brilliant idea from him to take the left-overs and feed the camels. So in with the food and the children and off we went to the camels again. As soon as we reached the camels and started laying down the feast for them, they started to eat which means Gaurav bhai had hit the nail on the head, he had got it right, they were hungry. We had some awesome time and some funny moments as the camels who ate the chicken tikka masala or the butter chicken came up looking like they had applied lipstick, while the one having the yogurt reminded us of little kids having yogurt and came up looking like the had a white mustache. Back to base and time to head out, Gaurav Bhai drove out the VW Tiguan and on return I drove out the Escape and we were all able to head back out to the road and the closest pump to fill in our tires as we said our never ending good byes and headed on our way back home. What an amazing trip, with some awesome people and pleasant weather. I would like to thank each and every participant for making this trip a wonderful one to remember for a long time to come.

So the fear comes true, but in true spirit it is a start and they can further experiment to see how they can crease out the bugs. Talk about cars without a character and a feel, We are one step closer to this nightmare becoming a reality, atleast no human lives were lost to this craziness.

Dear All, Please note my wife received a call yesterday from Mitsubishi, Al Habtoor Motors to inform that there is a callback for all Mitsubishi Pajero and Galant from 2004-2015 models for a problem regarding the airbags. The rectification will take 3 hours and you need to get an appointment from them to leave the car at one of their service station. So any Pajero or Glant owners for 2004-2015 models please get in touch with Al Habtoor Motors Service Centers to book your appointment and get the issue rectified. http://www.habtoormotors.com/mitsubishi/service-centres/

Dear All, Please note my wife received a call yesterday from Mitsubishi, Al Habtoor Motors to inform that there is a callback for all Mitsubishi Pajero and Galant from 2004-2015 models for a problem regarding the airbags. The rectification will take 3 hours and you need to get an appointment from them to leave the car at one of their service station. So any Pajero or Glant owners for 2004-2015 models please get in touch with Al Habtoor Motors Service Centers to book your appointment and get the issue rectified. http://www.habtoormotors.com/mitsubishi/service-centres/

@taqir in that case I feel the same way as Gaurav bhai. I guess the best thing would be to take your family and try both of them out along with your family. The one that you and your family feel more comfortable will make your decision for you. I remember I test drove one of the cars with my family and though it was a brilliant offer and I loved the feel of it, but decided against it because the back seats were cramped. Test drive both with the family and let us know which one you decide to go with. Sorry for the earlier mistake of comparing TB to an LC.

@taqir you are confusing electric cars with hybrids. Electric cars work on battery which are charged through charging stations. Hybrids work on part petrol and part lithium batteries. Hope that clarifies your doubt.

@taqir you sure that a Trailblazer 2010 model is for a 100K, it must be much cheaper. Land Cruiser would be my choice if the same price as lower maintenance cost, more reliable and better resale value. I would only choose the Trailblazer if it was AED 60K or less and my choice would be based on saving the initial cost, depreciation and some repair along the way just in case any, but also the comfort and options available on the American and overall safer than the Toyota Land Cruiser.