I-Venture

In case you are wondering whether the gap since the last update is a result of laziness on my part I can assure you that isn’t the case.  The study and computer systems have been dismantled to allow me to refurbish the room.  The painting has now been completed and new carpet laid.  today I reassembled the desk and reinstalled the computer systems.  We’re back in business!  Whilst I’m still using the laptop as my main computer you may recall the laptop keyboard has failed.  Letters C,V,B,N and S, plus the 0 key and the spacebar.  I don’t use the laptop keyboard opting instead to attach a full sized usb keyboard.  However that needs a desk or table and we had neither.

Last weekend I was invited by our good friend; and blog reader; Ken to join him on an Isuzu Australia I-Venture Club training day in Lancelin some 100km north of Perth. 

Ken has purchased the latest model of the Isuzu MUX 4x4 and opted to purchase a slot in the I-Venture Training Day.  As each vehicle can have two drivers he invited me to have the second position. 

Isuzu Australia created the I-Venture Club as a means of demonstrating the capabilities of their vehicles and conduct these training days around Australia.  Ken took his caravan enabling us to have a base to work from.  We drove to Lancelin on Friday afternoon to be ready for the start on training at 7.30am the following morning.  We also stayed on Sunday so we could practice what we had learned the previous day.

There were 13 vehicles (26 participants) all our age or slightly younger.  We’re no longer young enough to know everything so no ‘boy racers’ in the group.  Most of the morning was theory on the characteristics of the vehicle with the rest of the day spent driving in the large area of sand dunes behind Lancelin or on the beach.

It was excellent training on driving in sand.   Something which I previous had little experience with.

After an hour of ‘baby steps’ we started on the serious dunes driving up and down some rather steep slopes.

The sand recovery phase was also interesting.  The instructor managed to recover his bogged ute without using any recovery aids.

One of the ‘boy racers’ wasn’t so good and we were shown how to recover a vehicle using a snatch strap.  This is what can happen if you drive over a steep sand dune without checking what’s on the other side!

The following day Ken and I were back in the dunes practicing what we’d learned the previous day.  We even managed to recover a Toyota driver who had managed to go over a dune the wrong way.

He had managed to run his front passenger tyre off the rim  turning too swiftly at speed.  We were able to re-inflate the tyre and pop it back onto the rim using Ken’s 12V air compressor.