It was a great drive and an excellent crew. Thanks @Wrangeldfor leading, we may have not accomplished what you wanted to but still it was a smooth and very enjoyable one.
Great you shared your tyre experience. Some folks from the convoy know that I went through a tyre misery recently I needed to change my old BF A/T tyres - they were hug, heavy and very old, couldn't pass the registration with those. I went for the golden standard Yokohama G015 A/T . I also had issues with my rim size, it was just too wide for that tyre size. Stretching the tyre to a point where deflation didn't really get reflected in the shape. After spending an arm and a leg to fix all these, our drive was a game changer experience for me.Exactly as mentioned above, I first time felt great control over my car. All the technical dunes, climbs I sorted out in the past with using brute-force and horsepower which I could manage fine. However now it felt more like walk in the park. (In some cases I got even too confident that the Jeep will climb with a slight touch on the gas pedal - that's where @Christopher Assal you saw my recovery).
Long story short - don't run to change your tires but unbelievable how much different it makes when you select the right size, type, pressure, etc