Ale Vallecchi

Thank you very much @Shamil. You are a big part of this incredible achievement, as driving with you has both tested me and made me more confident. See you soon out there. Thanks a lot @Chaitanya D. I look forward to more challanging drives together.

Grazie @paolo dassi. Look forward to see you very soon. A presto!! Merci beaucoup @Emmanuel. Yours was the first Fewbie drive I attended, and it was my first important insight into what my car was capable of. I look forward to soon be in one of your exciting drives.

Thank you so much @Tbone. Looking forward to see you again with your new drive.

@Javier M thank you very much. I am really grateful to you for showing me the way in the drives we did together. You certainly have pushed me to become more in control of my machine, and feel more aware of my potential. We'll need to celebrate with a toast (whether it be mezcal or wine) as soon as possible.

@Xaf what can I say, other than you have been my closest driving partner throughout my history at Carnity. As you mentioned in another post, I could not have been the Yin off-roader that I have become without your Yang. I am truly looking forward to our next drives, where your energy, enthusiasm and absolute control will certainly spur me more, and further along the learning curve to the top. Thank you so much. @Srikumar thank you so very much for your words, and most of all for your tutoring. You may not remember, but my first newbie drive was under your Marshalship (I guess I just made up a new word ), as has been the case for my first lead. This must not be a coincidence. I am very grateful for your confidence in my abilities, and look forward to many more drives together.

Thank you SOOOO much @Wrangeld !! As I said before, you and @Jeepie have been so much a part of this upward path, that I would not have been able to follow it o quickly without our drives together. I am waiting for both of you at the higher level, in no time. Thanks a lot @J J. You have helped me achieve this. Thank you so much @Jeepie. You have been a great part of this amazing path. I am grateful to you for driving alongside me so many times lately. Looking forward to your promotion soon.

Thanks @Vanessa8580, I could not have done it with your help and support during our last drives. Thanks Fred. I have been learning a great deal from each of you Marshals, and all my fellow drivers. I am super happy at this level, and will enjoy it as much as possible, before even thinking of moving on. This seems very much a dream to me as it is

WOW!!! This is totally unexpected, and extremely humbling. I would not have dreamt of this, as I feel my learning process is still (and will always be) ongoing. I have been lucky to be able to spend enough time driving, and most of all, in the company of great experts (as I mentioned in my last trip's report, each Carnity Marshal - @Gaurav, @Rahimdad, @Srikumar, @Frederic and @Emmanuel - have unique driving skills and styles, allowing all of us as Carnity members to learn from a living encyclopedia of off-roading). My companions along this path, to whom I owe my improvements have been @Xaf, @Wrangled, @Jeepie, @Javier M, @Shamil, @Brette, and more recently @Mels Wolf, @Vanessa8580, @Desert Dweller and @Foxtrot Oscar. I am very much looking forward to see them all progressing to the top, as they deserve. It would be very long to list all the other fellow club members with whom I have driven, but I would like them to know that I have learned as much, if not the most, by joining Newbie and Fewbie drives, and learning from other drivers' performances and mistakes, looking, evaluating, reliving their failures and successes. I very humbly thank, from top to bottom, this whole Club, whose familiar, warm and collegial atmosphere makes it unique in the UAE. See you soon on the hot sand. Thank you so much @Rinelle Sanaani. BTW, you did great yesterday.

Well done @Rajeevan Vickneswaran

Good job @Colin Jordan. Well done. See you soon on the sand.

@Foxtrot Oscar this is great news!! Congrats. You have done great, without breaking a sweat in any of our last drives. Too bad you'll have to start sweating now, doing recoveries 😅😉. Enjoy the new rank, and see you soon out there.

@Gaurav I truely appreciate your compliments, and humbly accept them. I am learning from the best!!

Thanks @Kalahari That is truely a beautiful area, and I enjoy exploring it very much. You are very right to remind all of us about the correct distancing between cars. Especially in a hot day, with soft sand, one should always plan for a possible refusal from the car in front, and consequently to avoid his/her own refusal due to poor distancing, and sudden breaking. Plus, if one keeps a bit more distance, can have more time and better visual to plan his approach more carefully. See you soon out there, and enjoy your Saturday.

Dear fellow Desertnauts. I am happy to share with you the first report after my first lead. I will not bother you (yet) with the different emotions that one feels before the lead (a concerned form of excitement), during (focused determination) and after (relieved elation). Before diving into the report itself, I wish to thank all the Carnity Marshals from whom I have been able to learn, in a relatively short period of time, the different tools of this exciting sport (incredibly, @Gaurav, @Rahimdad, Srikumar, @Frederic and @Emmanueleach has his own unique trade mark style, from which is easy to compile an encyclopedia of off-roading knowledge). Today's drive, the crossing from Al Faqa to Solar Park, started a few days ago, when I came to scout the location's trails with a few fellow Carnity drivers. Luckily, we discovered that the original meeting point was unreachable, due to the police's roadblocks at the border with Abu Dhabi, and changed the meeting point to the exit before Faqa. After a very punctual gathering and a quick deflation, we moved down the road for the briefing. With @Foxtrot Oscar executing a perfect second lead, the rest of the convoy was made of @Jun Zamora, with a much more efficient Jeep than during my previous drives with him, @Rizwanm2 whose Nativa performed impeccably (including a very nice climb of a high dune, with perfect side-sloping), @luwaimn working hard to control his powerful Prado, @Vanessa8580, as Center Forward, recovering impeccably the few stucks we got along the way (fortunately for her, this time we had decided to skip the shoveling, and immediately tug each stuck car, to save energies in the scorching sun), @AKR, @Rinelle Sanaani and @Kalahari, in perfect control of their machines, and last but not least @Srikumar sweeping and keeping a watchful eye over the convoy. Having started from a different point then planned, we proceeded to enter a few technical dunes, which initially I had intended to avoid, in order to spare the cars from overheating. With a bit of persistence we managed to get through with minor delays, and penetrated the depths of the Faqa dunes. This is a beautiful area, similar to a plateau, with medium height rolling dunes, dotted with groups of gnarly trees. We managed to move quite at quite a good pace, with just a couple of stucks, criss-crossing a good number of dunes, or riding their humpy tops. Along the way we found a very nice set of twin dunes, which all managed to side-slope impeccably, before moving toward another tall dune, at the end of the plateau, where we played almost until sunset. During his second drive up the dune Rizwanm2's Nativa spurted some white smoke, which prompted us to descend the plateau toward the sabkha in a very easy and relaxed manner. Sunset had started, while we were riding toward it. So, now you will ask yourself, did we reach Little Swehian? Yes and no: in fact, due to the softness of the sand, and the dark setting in, we decided to exit, after a couple of recoveries, to avoid getting stuck in the middle of this very challenging area. Hence, we coasted the dunes, along the sabkha, until we hit the small line of dunes separating us from the exit road. At this point @Srikumar took over as leader, due to my car’s night blindness (as someone in the group said: “note to self – buy desert lights”). And so the convoy reached Solar Park safely, after 66.5 Km and 4:14 hours of driving (minus the few stucks), at an average speed of 15.6Km/H, and a top speed of 64Km/H. This ends my report, but hopefully not my leading career. Thanks a lot to all for being part of this very special day for me. See you soon on the sand, again. PS. We had 2 last minute dropouts: @siddharth maheshwari due to car issues, and @Lucky sAm as his son was not feeling well. We wish Lucky Sam's son a prompt recovery, and Siddhart's car to be fixed swiftly. See you both soon on the sand.

Hi @Mahmoud Hamzawy. Thanks for the update. Hope you can still make it.

@siddharth maheshwari this is to confirm that we have been informed you will not be able to join the drive tomorrow, due to car issues. I hope all is OK with you, and that you'll be able to join next week.

Dear fellow desert travelers. @Foxtrot Oscar, @Vanessa8580, @Kalahari, @Jun Zamora, @Rinelle Sanaani, @Lucky sAm, @Rizwanm2, @siddharth maheshwari, @Mahmoud Hamzawy, @AKR, @luwaimn. Find below the convoy order for tomorrow's drive DRIVER RANK CAR POSITION Ale Vallecchi Advanced FJ 1 Foxtrot Oscar Fewbie X Terra 2 Jun Zamora Fewbie Jeep Wrangler 3 Rizwanm2 Fewbie Mitsubishi Nativa 4 Lucky Sam Fewbie Nissan Patrol 5 Luwaimn Fewbie Prado 6 Vanessa Intermediate Pajero LWB 7 AKR Fewbie Jeep Wrangler 8 Mahmoud Hamzawy Fewbie Prado 9 Siddharth Maheshwari Fewbie Jeep Wrangler 10 Rinelle Fewbie Jeep Wrangler 11 Kalahari Fewbie X Terra 12 Srikumar Marshal Jeep Cherokee 13 Once you arrive at the NEW meeting and deflation point, please tune in to Carnity Channel 1 (446.006). You may also want to memorize Channel 2 (446.03125) in case we need to switch during the drive. The Seniors in the drive, besides myself, will be Marshal @Srikumar, who will be in the sweep position, and @Vanessa8580, who will be assisting as Centre Forward. Please follow their advise and instructions. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow at 4PM sharp.

Dear fellow Members: @Foxtrot Oscar, @Vanessa8580, @Kalahari, @Jun Zamora, @Rinelle Sanaani, @Mahmoud Hamzawy, @AKR, @Lucky sAm, @siddharth maheshwari, @luwaimn, @Rizwanm2. With Marshal @Srikumar we had to change the meeting and deflation point to the following location: https://goo.gl/maps/iNzc9eLGoE34eAdX9 Please, also check the drive's main page for reference. The change was made to avoid the traffic jam that develops on approaching Al Faqa town limits, due to the police road-blocks for those entering Abu Dhabi. This new meeting point is the exit just before Faqa. Due to possible traffic on the road, please make sure to consider a few extra minutes of travelling, so that you may arrive on time. On arrival, please proceed to spread out along the road, and start deflating. We'll see you on Friday at 4PM, for the Faqa crossing toward Little Swehian and Solar Park.

Everybody has acknowledged the anti-Covid19 rules, so we are all good to go. Thank you all very much for your compliance👍

Thanks @Martin. for the update, and hope to see you next week. This opens up a spot for anybody who still wants to join.

Thanks a lot @Rinelle Sanaani. Well done (sorry for my mistake). Thank you @siddharth maheshwari. All good. See you Friday. @Rizwanm2 thanks for acknowledging.

Just to add @siddharth maheshwari to the roster, and specify that @Foxtrot Oscarwill be with us in place of @Desert Dweller. Also, a reminder to @Rinelle Sanaani, @AKR, @luwaimn, @Rizwanm2, @martin and @siddharth maheshwari to aknowledge the anti Covid-19 regulations to be able to access the drive. Those who do not do so will not be allowed to join the convoy. Thank you very much for the cooperation.

@Rizwanm2 Inshallah we are planning to be on a track before visibility becomes too low for daylight driving, which on Friday should be 7:40pm.

Dear fellow Carnity members. While the posted drive is filling up, allow me to give you a first glimpse at the track we have prepared for you this coming Friday. With the support of @Srikumar, and the presence, so far, of @martin, @Vanessa8580, @Kalahari, @Rizwanm2, @luwaimn, @Rinelle Sanaani, @Jun Zamora, @Lucky sAm, @Mahmoud Hamzawy and @Desert Dweller, we'll cover one of the most varied terrains in Dubai. We should find much less vegetation than around Pink and Fossil Rock, with occasional group of trees hiding behind the dunes, a few technical dune areas, where we'll need to finesse our way around, several stretches of long dunes, where to practice side sloping, as well as some ridge riding and criss-crossing, and sabkha areas where we can make good time. The goal is to reach the area of Little Sweihan, and if possible, proceed from there, after a little playing around, toward our exit point at Solar Park. I will be more precise about the itinerary's conditions in a couple of days. In the meantime, PLEASE, remember to click on the "Totally Agree" icon to acknowledge having read and understood the Covid-19 compliance rules. All those who do not confirm this we'll not be accepted in the drive. See you Friday.