Army adventures: part 2

See for part 1 the previous post.

So, there we were. Driving up and down Vanessa (you should really read part 1) and having fun, still keeping Bob pretty clean and alive (I can only repeat that you should read part 1), when we saw this car coming towards us:

We know the guy behind the wheel, he'd invited us to this event, and he clearly didn’t give a shit (if you’re offended, I’m sorry) about keeping his car clean. Perhaps the fact that this isn’t really his car, but it is owned by Landrover had something to do with that. Anyway, who cares. They clearly were having fun. He’d brought his sons to the event and kept them in the back of the car. Obviously there were no health-and-safety-people around. I mentioned to Landrover guy that it was perhaps a little dangerous to keep the kids in the open back of the car without seatbelts, but he answered: “Don’t worry, they are holding on tight.” Which was true.

So they ‘did’ Vanessa a couple of times too:

…and had a lot of fun. Just like these guys who were thrilled to see that I was taking photos:

…and these people who kept their van together with what looked like a huge elastic band:

And then the entire Dutch army turned up to see if everything was okay:

(Just joking: this isn’t the entire Dutch army. In case you were planning to invade us. I’m pretty sure there are more people involved in keeping our country safe.)

And then we moved on, into the woods again, to find another exciting spot for me to take photos. We arrived at another muddy patch and I was just getting ready to get out of the car and take some shots of cars driving through it, when suddenly we saw a good friend of us (who owns a couple of Landrovers too and does this sort of off-the-road driving more often) driving towards us in one of the cars owned by Landrover. He took one look at our sparkling clean Bob, saw that we were driving around in totally the wrong gear (not in dif.lock, tut tut) shook his head, got out of his car, almost dragged hubs out of Bob, jumped in, put Bob in dif.lock and before I knew what was happening we drove off.
Fortunately I had the presence of mind to immediately start taking photos:

Well… and when we came back to where hubs was left standing, friend jumped out off Bob, shoved hubs into the Landrover he was driving around the terrain, and off they went:

…and back they came. The spot where all the other cars have gathered, is a place where almost everyone got stuck and had to be winched out, much to the amusement of the people watching.
We didn’t dare to drive through that mud pit. And fortunately friend didn’t either.

So, when friend was satisfied with Bob’s muddy state, he went his way again and we went ours. Back home, because it was time to leave all the excitement behind and take care of the furry bunch.

Aww… he didn’t get to play.

Army adventures: part 1

Years ago when hubs bought his first Landrover, he got an invitation for a one-day-off-the-road-driving-course. He came back with lots of great stories, about being able to touch the grass through the open window when the car was parked sideways on a steep slope, driving through water, driving up steep hills and off them again. He did have a great day.

Then I bought my Landrover, Bob, and I too got an invitation for such a course. Since I knew it would be a great day, not to be missed, I called a friend and asked if she wanted to join me on a fun day out. And so we went into the woods to learn how to drive up a slope. Landrover have a special truck, that unfolds into what looks like a Canadian wooden lodge, and acts as a bar/restaurant. They also employ some good looking rugged men to teach you how to drive through the wilderness in cars owned by Landrover, so your own car will not get dirty and/or dented. Friend and I had a great day. And indeed, we touched grass through the open window of a Range Rover while parked sideways on an extremely steep slope. All very exciting. What made it even more exciting, friend needs glasses to drive a car and see where she’s going, but because of the handsome Landrover guys she didn’t want to spoil her good looks by hiding them behind those glasses, which meant that half of the time she was driving the car in braille-mode. Not a clue where she was going. Sometimes the driving-instructor would scream things like: “What the…!?! Where are you… ?!?”, but she kept her cool and didn’t mention her blindness. And I was just trying not to wet my pants from the combination of fear and laughter.

Of course, with the Netherlands being asphalted over almost entirely, after that one day I’ve never driven a car through any wilderness, apart from our garden, again.

But, last Sunday we had the opportunity to join a whole bunch of 4x4 car enthusiasts and drive our Bob through army-training terrain. Where usually tanks and soldiers play war, we could freely drive up and down especially constructed hills and through water, without the risk of being shot at.

And we loved it. We did start very carefully, saying that we wanted to keep Bob clean, but secretly just not having a clue how to keep Bob alive in the more challenging parts of the terrain. These guys do this more often…

And as always ‘bachelor's wives and maiden's children are well trained’ or as we say in the Netherlands: ‘de beste stuurlui staan aan wal’ (the best helmsmen are on shore).

The fanclub:

We declined an offer of one of the guys there to drive Bob for us through this mud pit, because I’d just heard him jokingly say that he’d already lost 4 cars in this pool. So, with Bob still clean and alive, we drove further into the woods, looking for two hills known by the army as ‘Vanessa’ (after a Dutch ‘singer’ who has two strong points and singing isn’t one of them).
Since I was navigating, it didn’t take us long to find Vanessa. It could have taken even less time, but hubs has a mind of his own and didn’t always follow my instructions *sigh*.

Vanessa was very popular:

(not hubs and not Bob either)

This looked like fun and also doable, so hubs drove Bob up a smaller hill and through this ditch a couple of times and then I got into the car too to take some shots while we were driving up…

…and down…

This is Bob:

This is one of my favourite photos. Aww…   

And then we saw a couple of guys we know from the Landrover dealer and also a friend of us, and from then on everything went pretty much downhill for Bob’s cleanliness.

To be continued…

The adventures of Stupid Woman

Last Saturday I had arranged with a friend to go to Groningen to do some really girly shopping. You know: buy clothes, try every perfume in the store, have lunch, giggle a lot, jog past chocolate selling shops, high fiving if we succeeded in doing that, those sort of things.

She lives in FarFarAwayLand (not that far away though, about half an hour in the car) and the plan was that she’d drive to our house and then I’d drive us into town with, and now you’re going to frown and think: “what a snob”, one of our cars. But I mention our assorted choice of cars for a reason.

You see, we have a Landrover Defender. Great car, joy to drive (if you like the occasional near-heart attack from loud bangs caused by stones that shoot out of the tires and bang against the wheel house, and enjoy feeling every bump in the road going from butt through spine to head), but it doesn’t fit particularly well in the average parking garage. Either the ceiling of the parking garage is too low, or Bob is too high.
So, as much as I like Bob, he’s not for going into town with.

Then there’s Gretl, our Range Rover. Incredibly comfortable, quite chic (if you ignore the fact that I often use it to get huge bags of carrots and other big bags of horse feed which inevitably leave a trail of… well, carrots and horse feed on the cream coloured carpet) and a great car for going shopping with. It can hold tons of bags, but it is wide and long and not a joy to drive around in in a crowded parking garage, looking for a space to squeeze the beast into.

Oh, and if you’re wondering why she’s called Gretl; there are two language options in her inbuilt GPS. German or English. We’ve tried English for a while, but she assumes that your driving on the wrong side of the road then and it became very confusing at times, so we changed to German and now we’re brushing up on German ‘verkehrsbezogene Begriffe’. Oder so etwas.

Anyway, the car of choice was therefore our smaller car. It’s a hard top convertible. Fast, good-looking and more importantly, it easily fits in a parking garage. This car is nice to drive in in the summer, with the top open (it does this incredibly neat magic trick in which it lets its roof disappear in the boot. That is almost the best part of this car, the roof/no roof magic trick. It never fails to amaze me.) and nice to drive in the winter, with the top closed.

 

The only problem was that we hadn’t driven it for a week or so, and as you know it was freezing cold here in the Netherlands and we don’t have a garage so it had been outside in the cold and the door on the passenger’s side was frozen shut.
Fortunately I had expected that that might be the case, so about an hour before friend was supposed to arrive here I put on a coat and thick, warm gloves and went outside to clear the windscreen and the other windows of ice, tried the doors, discovered that the one on the passenger’s side didn’t open and phoned hubs’ mobile (he was mucking the stables) with my mobile (I didn’t feel like walking to the stables to tell him) that I was going for a drive to see if the door-in-ice would thaw. It was either that or rolling out a couple of patch cables and attack the door with my hair/blow dryer. I chose the driving around option.

So there I went. It still was bitterly cold outside, but I was comfortably warm in my winter coat with the nice, thick gloves protecting my hands from the arctic temperatures. So I drove through a neighbouring village where another friend lives, waved as I passed their house and took a scenic route back home again. Meanwhile the car was warming up nicely. Heated seat doing its job to keep the posterior at a nice temperature, windows ice free inside and outside. I had good hope that the other door would be freed from the layer of ice that kept it firmly shut.

I parked the car in front of the house. And when I wanted to get out, I couldn’t open my door! I mean, w h a t ? Had ‘my’ door somehow been frozen shut too while I was driving around? But could that be possible? I tried again. No. Didn’t open. I tried the door on the passenger’s side. No. Didn’t open either. What in the name of Elvis caused these doors to stay closed? I pressed the distant control a couple of times to close and open the locks, but that didn’t help. Both doors stayed shut. I was baffled. And puzzled. Dumbfounded even.

And then I remembered that I had my mobile with me.
So I phoned hubs. “Yes?”
”Hi.”
”Hi?”
”I have a tiny problem.”
”Oh?”
”I can’t get out of the car.”
”You can’t get out of the car.”
”No.”
”Oh.”
”So…”
”Why can you not get out of the car?”
”The door won’t open.”
”Oh?”
”Hmm.”
”Where are you?”
”In our drive.”
*sigh* “Okay, I’m coming.”
”Don’t sigh.”
”I didn’t sigh.”
”I definitely heard… okay.”

He apparently wasn’t in a hurry to free me from my car-prison, because it took ages before he appeared. He had a vicious smile on his face I thought.
He opened the door from the outside.
”What do you mean, I can’t get out of the car.”
”No really. I couldn’t open the door from the inside.”
I got out of the car and he got in.
I closed the door, thinking that it would be really funny if he would be locked inside now.
But no, of course he wasn’t, because he knew that there is a tiny switch just in front of the door handle on the inside of the car, that locks or unlocks it independently from the distant control. Why? I don’t know why it has that switch. I never even knew of its existence. And I had unintentionally pressed it into the ‘lock’ setting when I tried to open the door with my hands comfortably nestled in my very thick gloves.

You learn something every day.

And the short drive had indeed unfrozen the other door, so when friend arrived we could both get in (and out) of our pretty little convertible with the not idiot proof lock/unlock switch.

Gawd.

Hubs thought it was all incredibly funny.
I don’t get his sense of humour.
It is totally wrong!

Sunday Selections

Kim from Frogpondsrock is the host of this meme which gives us a place to post those photos that have been hiding in folders on our computers until we’ve found the reason to let them see the light of day. Sunday Selections is just that reason. I suggest you hop over to the rocking frog ponds and join in the fun.

The story of the cutest little red car ever

This cute little old-timer (a Goggomobil) needed some assistance to get going again…

Isn’t it the cutest little car ever? I love the antique wooden skis and the little suitcase on its roof.

 

And off it went…

Bye bye, cute little red car!