2009 River trip

[Engel]

Every year wo do a river trip in limpopo and like usual a lot of fun! Im not going to bore you with a write up but here is some pics

[Engel]

some more pics

[Engel]

...and some more

[Engel]

ok 2 more

[Gerrit Loubser]

Nice pictures, Herman, but a little small. Could you perhaps increase their size?

By the way. What happened here?

[Engel]

One if my specialities is to see how stuck I can get! And I always post it as well. [look at the 4x4community thread] Some people just stay on the level dry tarr road and thus NEVER venture offroad. NOT ME, there is about another 5 places where I had to be snatched out. But then there is a lot of pics , where NO TOYOTA could go, and for that matter no other vehicle could get out. In fact 11 other vehicles would not even try go where the patrol went and there was a lot of places where the rest just could not follow ....and they got stuck when trying!

[Abri Hoffman]

Herman tell us more about the recovery as we could all learn from it.

[Gerrit Loubser]

Exactly, Abri, which is what I meant when asking what happened .

[Engel]

the ONLY way to sharprn your skills is to go for training and then play. You will never otherwise know your vehicles capabilities. So if you always stay out of trouble you would probably never know how to do safe recoveries or help yourself! The said event was a water hole where I could not feel the sturdyness of the soil. It started deep and then ended shallow. So Andre said we can try and go thru ,so to test it for the other guys,[ as some vehicles would be written off if they get stuck there] I slowly reversed in. The soil just gave way and was lying on my chassis in 2 secs. My fuel tank sucked water and for safety [less strain on the winches ]we just used 2 to pull me out. A snatch rope with a croozer could not move me 1mm. I pulled the plug on the fuel tank emptying the water, and flushed the filters and fuel line [lost about 2l of fuel] and started again. The basics of the vehicle allows me to do quick repairs and problem solving. Also by knowing your vehicle it was very easy to rectify.