Provence sabbatical day 25 – Christmas madness and fabulous friends
It was after 5pm when Rob, Diana and Naomi trundled into town. Bienvenue chers amis!
A Simply Fab LifeLive the Life You Love. Love the Life You Live.
A Simply Fab Life
It was after 5pm when Rob, Diana and Naomi trundled into town. Bienvenue chers amis!
A big adventure doesn’t necessarily mean miles and miles away … it can also be right on your doorstep! After inheriting his father’s boat, Rob and Diana, our…
Since returning from Portugal last year, Muddy Boots developed a rather nasty disposition of break-dancing across the road whilst travelling around 80 km/hour. Also known as the “death…
What kind of sadomasochist goes camping in -11 deg Celcius?! In a tent? And want their nearest and dearest to join them? Nutters, I tell you. The lot…
It was pretty cold and very misty. You could see only 50 meters on the roads and it remained that way, pretty much, all day. Our destination was…
The Dutch kitchen is quite simple: hearty “stamppots” [mash and stew] in Winter and raw herring in Summer. Cheese, on the other hand, is available all year round.…
How crazy do you have to be, to drive 250 kilometers for a few hours of off-roading? Well, if you own a Land Rover (especially in Holland), you’ll…
You’ve seen the photos right? Of people dressed up in long black dresses and funny white bonnets that curve up at the ears? Or holding baskets of tulips…
Could it be true? One more day of warm, golden sunshine? Walking to the bus stop, we’re hopeful, in our summer-to-autumn layers. It’s an early start to get…
With Marcel’s heavy workload our weekend camping plans went astray, so we were planning a quiet weekend at home. “Nothing of the sort!” thought Rob and Diana who…
Just how far would you manage to drag a standard Land Rover? I mean, Croatia Trophy 2011. A tough battle for many a well-prepared team with big budgets…
The final day of the Croatia Trophy! And an excellent roadbook that has it all – riverbeds, steep winchpoints and very fast logging tracks
OUR FIRST FINISH!! A very long 75 km roadbook today, but everyone is getting their groove now. Good navigation and some challenging winch points
Team Trophy day is great fun for the spectators – the action is very close, especially the spattering mud, winching and hard revving engines…
Our baptism of fire as the competition gets off to a challenging start! A long and confusing roadbook and the scene of the infamous ‘Carwash’!
The adrenaline level is high. The start signal goes off. I gas it… Some kamikaze runs at the hill… but eventually the winch is deployed
Staro Selo – setting up camp, checking the car (again) and the most difficult of all – calibrating the Terratrip!
Orawa 4×4 Challenge is a very technical offroading competition, consisting mostly of steep gulleys that the contestants need to winch themselves through. The goal is to get a…
A very long roadbook and a dramatic river finish is the setting for the finale of a great week of competiton and cameraderie in the mud!
“Hamburger Hill” – one of the most exhausting days of 2010. Extremely tough (fresh-concrete) mud and a huge winch challenge up a steep gulley
Snapped ropes and broken winch motors. Very rough going at the steep creek and river bed. A lot of mud and extremely difficult.
A waist-high muddy bog stood in the way of everyone on stage 5 of the Croatia Trophy 2010. Creative winching required – and don’t mind the snake
During the Night Stage the front diff has come off and the bolts holding on the crown wheel have all sheared off. The whole thing has to come…
The start is from eleven pm. Being in the last place due to a non-start in the Team Trophy, we are last to start at about 00h30. It…
Today was double-edged. We couldn’t take part in the Team Trophy because of the technical problems from yesterday, but have managed to sort them all out and can…
We had a relatively good start and caught some competitors early due to some good driving in some of the testing areas. Navigation is difficult at times but…
Following the last-minute prep on the car, we start in the third group and have quite an eventful first porlogue stage…
Final checks on the Land Rover Discovery (kindly sponsored by Land Rover Centre Jacob Schaap) and we hit the road by 09:30. Slow going at 90 km/hr, but all went smoothly.
It’s her birthday… However, lately, we have been in the middle of a dramatic shift in spending patterns. Consciously trying to move away from the pure consumerism that…
Driving Miss Daisy – watch out here I come. Rob Mieras is a 4×4 driving instructor and has the patience of Job when it comes to teaching new…
March 2008. It was hot! About 32 degrees and no wind at all. The region we were driving through was dry and dusty. We were on route to…
On my birthday, Marcel and I headed out to Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Game Reserve, about 40-min drive from Leopard Walk Lodge where we were staying. We arrived nice and early…
Isn’t it time we showered our loved ones with time, care and attention again (like it used to be), instead of buying tacky gifts at the cost of the environment?
With our cross-pollination of South African, English and Dutch cultures, we took a whirlwind roadtrip to examine our European African roots