Paul had put together a really nice selection of BOAT’s which joined up really well without very long bits of ordinary A and B roads in between. I really liked the ones where we appeared to just drive off the main roads into the bushes to discover we were in a leafy tunnel!
Most of the BOAT’s were just over grown making for foraging for Blackberries and the like just a question of picking them up off your lap or reaching out a picking them off the bushes. There were a couple of wet / muddy patches and Lurch almost disgraced himself by sort of getting stuck – until it was pointed out to me that the rear diff lock wasn’t engaged! I had pulled the lever up, but obviously it hadn’t clicked into place. So we got out of that one. There were a couple of other places which involved the use of four wheel drive and both diff locks to navigate, but no one got stuck and had to be towed.
Lunch at a nice pub – See the only picture I took the whole day – Obviously enjoying the driving too much!
Back to the camp site after all the driving, a bit of time winding down before setting off to the Pub for an evening meal. Luckily, Stephen noticed Lurch had a flat front tyre whilst we were still standing around drinking tea, coffee and chatting. Time enough to put the spare on, I think it had a black thorne bush thorn in it. I check it out sometime this week. So another nice evening meal at a pub, different one form lunch time.
Then it was time to head home as Lurch was booked into another car show on the 13th. Again the drive home had no issue unless you can call following the silly Sat Nav woman, who I think is called Jane. Anyway she decided that the fastest way home was via Guildford and of course there was a road closed and traffic queues whilst we followed the diversion. Still not a problem driving at night as Lurch’s headlight are more than up to the task now-a-days.
A nights rest in your own bed does wonders and we were ready to get up bright and early to go to the car show at Edenbridge. Having arrived we took up a spot near the group who were running 4x4 trip round a course in highly modified Class 1 Landrovers. You know the ones with 35 inch tyres and V8 engines… Anyway, they agreed I could take Lurch round their course after some money had changed hands on the proviso that one of their “marshals” accompanied me. So off we went, the first part went well and I thought it was really rather tame considering the vehicles they were using. Then at the bottom of dip round a left hand bend and there was a nice deep rut on the drivers side where their tyres had cut a mound in half so the top of the mound was about a foot and a half above the hump between the tyre tracks. Now my “marshal” said that we should keep right and so straddle the two tyre tracks and put the drivers side wheels up and over on the mound and the passenger tyres on the centre mound between the two tyre tracks. As we approached the top of the mound the passenger side front tyre was obviously too close to the edge of the rut and it being soft wet mud, it gave way, Lurch fell ever so slowly on to his side!
No problems as it was a very low speed tip..... I had the two canvas doors on the back and they didn't even fall out. I think the poor “Marshal” sitting in the passenger seat got more of a shock that me!
The recovery was done using two Landrovers and winches. One via a snatch block to pull Lurch sort of upright and another to pull him backwards until he had all four wheel back on the ground.
As I have no idea how these engines react to having been tipped on their sides I opted for having the Landrover that pulled me backwards to get towed back up to solid ground. Took both spark plugs out and turned the engine over to make sure it wasn't going to lock up if there was fluid in the wrong places. Put the plugs back in and engine started as good as gold. I never did get to finish the course as they became very busy ferrying paying passengers round the course and although they sort of agreed as I was dealing with the spark plugs that I could have another go later, the “later” never happened and at the end of the day we gave up and headed home
Thought there was something very bent when we set off for home as I had horrendous wheel wobble at 35mph! Got out to check, couldn't see anything obviously bent, but did notice the lump of mud in the passenger front wheel - Just like the weights on Steam trains! Scrapped that out and the wheel wobble disappeared.
Still lesson learnt - don't listen to people who drive Landrovers when it comes to how a Haflinger handles!
Overall a very enjoyable weekend.
John Bennett & Lurch
