single malt…star trails and back-roads

I’m a storyteller; that’s what exploration really is all about. Going to places where others haven’t been and returning to tell a story they haven’t heard before.
– James Cameron

Living life in the fast lane can capture you in such a way that you will not even realize that you are caught up in the web of modern day world. Thus its time to dig deep and find the old from within your own soul and get out there and truly live your life to the full! Grow a beard and don’t worry about your hair, be wild to the core of your spirit then you will set yourself free from the bindings of mankind, forget about envy, forget about stress and all the things that eat away at your soul. Rather get out and be wild and see the world in a manner not known to others.

Not too long ago, i had the absolute privilege and honor to join up with the guys from General Tire South Africa as their adventure-lifestyle brand ambassador for a long weekend of epic 4×4 adventures at the Rust de Winter Toyota 4×4 jamboree 2017. This would be my first time to attend this event and boy what an event this truly was!! Major is not even the word but more of that later on.

So my planning was done and i packed my Land Rover Defender on the Wednesday night and headed off to the small town of Rust de Winter early on the next morning. the weather was good and the tunes were playing on the radio ready for the 4 and a half hours drive heading up North to the Limpopo province. I was quite keen to visit there as it would add some new data to my travel map as i would be driving through some towns i have never been to before, and Limpopo along with the Northern Cape is the two places i have traveled the least out of all our provinces.

So on my way not even 50km from home i had the luck of hitting some major road works as i was about to enter Volksrust town. As my luck would have it i sat there waiting for about 30mins before they opened the road again, so eventually i got going with the landy again starting to chow away at the distance remaining to Rust de Winter. After some hours later my very very old Garmin GPS totally lost its head and now i was driving on uncharted territory and have to navigate city roads and intersections by a little luck and some geographical savvy and a couple of turns here and there and i was out of the madness of Gauteng and now driving in the countryside.

(on my way to Rust de Winter)

The Landy was purring along the asphalt like a mid summer breeze as im thinking about where exactly to go, as I’m getting closer i start getting road signs of Rust de Winter but then the weirdest thing happened…my GPS told me to turn left but the road sign showed i need to be turning to the right at a cross-road. hmm decisions decisions…i went with the GPS and turned left, after driving about 8km or so i stumbled upon a a small road-side shop and thought it would be an interesting stop to make and see what they had to offer, I ended up buying an ice cold coke and packet of chips to keep me awake for the last couple of kilos to come. I’m now driving in ultimately what we know as Bush-veld area, the horizon spans for miles and miles without even a bump of a mountain, its as flat as looking at a map, along with an abundance of thorn trees, quite a different kind of beautiful but still something i would recommend to anyone.

I turn in at the Rust de Winter dam with the idea that the event is held within the Nature reserve and to my surprise the guy at the gate told me no i am in the wrong place i need to turn back and head to the other side of the cross-road then i will see the banners on my right hand side. So, i pointed the landy in the new direction and off i went, eventually reaching my destination and meeting up with David, – my liaison with General Tire – standing in awe as I’m trying to take it all in, its HUGE! definitely the biggest 4×4 event i have been to! I help the guys set up the remainder of the General Tire banners and branding in and around the campsite and got myself settled in my tent. The guys from Extreme Terrain adventures were hosting our campsite and i must compliment them on the great hospitality! Rynhardt and his team always made sure we had enough to eat, a decent campfire and something cold in the hand be it a good whisky or juice. The Camp itself was extraordinary in every way! a Big “dining” or relaxation area and our tents all together, and everything enclosed with wind shelters to make it our own private area.

(camp General)

After a night of good food and campfire stories the next morning we woke up to an epic breakfast,where after we had to brave the cold showers (at least I had hot water for some time) then David suggested we should go about an exploration trip with The Lady Alice to hunt for some antique or one of a kind novelties at all the road side farm shops, we started off at the same shop i stopped at on my way to Rust de Winter when i got a little lost, where we got ourselves a cold water and off we went…only the road ahead and some good music on the radio, we stopped at some interesting places along the way and ended up driving all the way to Bella-Bella where we ended up at a local restaurant for some lunch and some R&R’s, the food was great although the service could have been better but all in all it was a good round trip we made for the day.

The next day was when all the action started, its time for the 4×4 gymkhana event to take place, there was a lot of mud flying, tires popping and egos maybe broken among the drivers and crowd as everyone competes to score the most points throughout the circuit, and naturally with me driving a Land Rover i am automatically the target for the weekend as generally the South African public are all against us landy fans, but like a good friend once told me – not all puppies eyes open on the same day – so hopefully the general feeling towards the brand would change some day once the people start to understand and appreciate good quality and versatility. I was not to compete in the gymkhana event as out of the 150 odd vehicles that took part in the main event there were only a hand full of them that were stock standard and my landy was one of them, so i was not going to let a piece of mud in the wrong place screw up my 6hours drive to get back home. Most of the entrants were towing their competition vehicles to the site to then only drive them off the trailer and take part then come Monday they would just park the vehicles on the trailer again and head on home, for me its a different story as i was to still reach home with the same vehicle and still carry on using it on a daily basis so im not going to take unnecessary chances. Anyhow, i managed to get some great photos of the General Tires in action of various vehicles and enjoyed the day at the General Tire stand along with some great people while we were promoting the new tires that were to be launched not two weeks later, it was really a fun day in the sun.

The evening after the gymkhana we were spoiled again with great food and a proper camp fire, we all got to the subject of photography and of course i could not hold myself in on that topic so as best i could i started explaining some photography principals to the guys and i took the Nikon digital camera of General for a test drive, utilizing the zoom function to the max to get a shot of the moon that night and i must say I’m am super impressed by the power of a semi-compact digital Nikon camera, being a DSLR user i have never really been interested in digital since way back in the day before i started shooting with DSLR, anyway i was pretty impressed with the shot of the moon. Later that evening, at midnight I went out and about on a photo mission along with David to get a photo of my Landy in front of the old trade post doing a multi-exposure shot to create a star-trail photo, as soon as i got home i worked with the photo data and composed the image 🙂

Sunday morning dawns and everyone is getting ready to go and drive the mountain 4×4 trail! by what i have heard from the stories around the campfire on the previous night and drivers briefing its quite a tough trail that is split into two sections in order to accommodate more vehicles on the trail at once, this is it, im going to attempt to complete the trail with my landy to get some marketing footage of the General Grabber MT tires in action! so once again after breakfast we loaded the van and head for the hills (their idea of a mountain and my idea of a mountain is two different things but none the less we were about to embark on a journey to climb the ant-hill that peaks the vast flat landscape). Upon arrival at the starting point we first deflated the wheels a bit to provide great traction as well as preserve the tires, once completed we were out on the trail, and it starts out quite nice with a small river crossing just to get into the swing of things and then…from nowhere the second obstacle…a killer if not careful…i had to navigate down a very steep rock at a side slope and that made two steps rite at the bottom then turn sharp left and go back up another piece of rock also still on a side slope, not the best of feelings in the world to drive a Defender on a side slope especially with a roof rack on as well. None the less we made it and it got my adrenaline pumping so hard i could barely keep my foot still on the clutch pedal. we carried on with the trail, stopping every now and then to grab some photos and to just enjoy the outdoors and spectacular scenes. The route was very well planned and every obstacle had at least one marshal to guide you through the sticky situations and they had an interesting navigation “map” that took two co-drivers to figure out where and when to turn on the route to get to the next obstacle.

All in all it was one epic weekend of adventure into the unknown where i could sharpen up on my 4×4 skills and be part of some great stories, Thank you General Tire South Africa for making this weekend possible and for providing the awesome tires for my Land Rover! I really enjoy working along with the team and i am looking forward to all future endeavors! Also i was really chaffed that i managed to complete the second part of the mountain trail in my stock standard Land Rover Defender 110 Tdi, about 90% of all the vehicles that participated came to the event on the back of a trailer or they were kitted out with thousands and thousands of Rand’s worth of 4×4 kit.

Some more photos of the trip :