Organizers: Rae Warne / Lindsay Brooks
Trip Report by: Darin Benseman
The venue and meeting place was the Waahi Taakaro Golf Club up the Maitai Valley. We began the day with an informal theory session upstairs of the Golf Club clubrooms. Rae and Lindsay covered topics from the basic preparation and safety procedures through to On the Trail expectations and precautions for crossing rivers and ascending/descending steep slopes. Included in the informative theory session was a variety of videos including a failed hill climb of a V8 Land Rover that resulted in the vehicle rolling continuously down a slope.
After lunch at the Clubrooms it was off up the road to our training ground, to put into practice all of what we had just been taught.
We regrouped at the rally point for the practical part of our training day. 11 trucks were present and accounted for with Chas and his mate joining us to cut a few more tracks in the Suzuki
and Cruiser respectfully. In all we had 3 Jeeps (mean trio in green), 1 Pajero, 1 Surf, 1 Mistral 1 Challenger, 1 Suzy, 1 Defender and 2 Cruisers.
Lindsay and Rae invited us all to walk the tracks that we would be driving for the afternoon. Capabilities of all the vehicles present were catered for with some tracks more challenging
than others. We were broken into two groups.
Lindsay lined up the three Jeeps of myself, Harald and Lex to do the initial trail blazing for the rest to follow. I have to point out at this stage of the report that I am now the proud owner of
a Jeep Cherokee. Once all terrain had been smoothed out for others to follow, I decided to demonstrate the correct procedure of a kinetic recovery. I am positive Lindsay said this was
the spot to demonstrate.
After we all travelled the tracks in one direction it was decided to then try them in the opposite direction. The two groups switched areas after a couple of hours with other obstacles such as
mock failed hill climbs and a sidling to be negotiated The less modifi ed trucks had more of a challenging time negotiating the tracks that we had cut up from the fi rst session. Still they
gained knowledge of what your family 4x4 is truly capable of and some more fi rst hand experience of recovery techniques.
As the day was beginning to draw to a close a few of us decided to cut a few more challenging trails with young Chas and friends in a Cruiser doing a bit of bush bashing. Defi nitely a
day that all club members should attend on a regular basis. In all a great day had by all with some new members going away with a new found respect of 4 wheel driving in a controlled
and safe environment.
Thanks to Lindsay, Rae, Jackson and Ken
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Past club trips 
