15-Jan-2012 - Warburton - Medium

[andrew_wale]

Looking forward to the trip tomorrow.
Have not driven Warby for quite a while.

[christover1]

I am coming.

[Greg]

Yay! Chris is coming!

[christover1]

Yay! Chris is coming!

Air con regas was $30 cheaper than I budgetted for,
so we can get petrol now

Probably I made the weather cold by fixing air con.
It rains when I water gardens,
gets hot when I fix heaters,
so clearly I made the cold snap.

But its perfect wheeling weather now

[christover1]

Great day out, Thanks Greg,
And thanks to all participants, spotters, recovery crews,
camera crews, and onlookers.
Perfect wheeling weather, well done:)

[andrew_wale]

Had a great day yesterday.

I think we only drove 3 tracks, and that took us all day.
I know there was Cemetry Track, Britania Range Track
Have not uploaded my photos yet, but will soon.

All gave some people different lines to take and get stuck etc.
I had to get snatched twice.

Also had some movies from the Go Pro...

But all good dirty fun.

[Greg]

Here is a quick trip report for yesterday:

Sunday 15 Jan marked the day of the big experiment – to run two trips simultaneously in the same location, but with different trip standards.

The intention was to run a Medium and a Hard trip at the same time, however, due to mechanical difficulties and track closures, this didn’t eventuate, and we instead ran the two trips one after the other.

Firstly, the Medium Trip:
A great day out with challenges for everyone.

We had a good number of cars:
Marty in his vitara
Harley in the winch challenge jeep
Andrew in the jk rubicon
Sam in his sierra (open diffs with 31s)
Chris L in his twin locked vitara
Brad in the gv (open diffs with almost road tyres)
Dank in his sierra
Travis in his twin locked X90
Me in my sierra

First up we convoyed to Cemetery. Upon arrival it turned out that Dans fuel pump was packing, so after a few unsuccessful tries to get it goes reliably again, Dan headed home.
The bottom of cemetery was great, there has been a dozer after the second spoon drain on the steep section so it was much easier than it should have been.
The rest of us continued up Cemetery only to find that the link track to Justice had been closed. So to drove the east end of Cemetary and returned back via the tarmac to the bottom of Cemetery again before trying out a second link to Justice, which had also been closed (at the Justice end).
Back onto the tarmac again to Brittania range which we drove all the way from west to east including the bog hole section which proved good fun for everyone. By this time it was 5pm and the medium day ended as all but Chris L and myself headed onto the Hard trip.

Secondly, the Hard Trip:
Chris and I convoyed over to the bottom of Ellis to discover Mika with his dad airing down the tyres on his Wrangler – we couldn’t have planned it better if we tried! We were both relieved to have a 3rd car in the party. We started Eillis at 5:45pm (so it was definitely not a 4 oclock track).
Ellis was in excellent form, but was amazingly dry with traction EVERYWHERE, and all 3 cars got to the top without too much hassle. There was one obstacle that I had to drive around (big washout section), but the rest of the time it was hard lines all the way.
Chris L and I were both really glad to have driven the track for what may well be the list time (ever or at least in its current state).
My day finished at 7:45pm in yarra junction for airing up tyres before rolling home for dinner at 9pm.

Thanks to everyone that came along. I had a great day out with a good mix of everything.

Here are a few fines for the next meeting:
1. Harley - for getting stuck in two different bog holes - both times while entering the bog hole
2. Everyone that built that log bridge - shame on you all!
3. Me - I might have had a shovel in my hand at one point on ellis.

[andrew_wale]

I have a very good photo of Harley stuck in one of the bog holes emptying water out of the XJ with a Milk carton.

[Greg]

I have a very good photo of Harley stuck in one of the bog holes emptying water out of the XJ with a Milk carton.

Are you an only child Andrew?

[andrew_wale]

Here is a video of Cemetery Track

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4SXewrDf8U