Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2015 i Go! Drive & Camp

After last month’s braai spice shootout, we decided to turn our attention to rusks-in-a-box and pitted 12 different types against one another. No doubt the purists among us will complain about commercial rusks, because you’re not supposed to eat anything that hasn’t been lovingly baked by Aunty Sannie from the local neighbourhood goods market. But that’s not the only dilemma modern man has to deal with. For example, I don’t wear home-knitted jerseys either. I buy a lot of my biltong from shops nowadays and, if I have to be honest, I’m using more charcoal for braaing than I feel comfortable admitting. The latter is but one of the problems of city-living, far from the nearest source of kameeldoring. Some of the rusks tasted a bit dodgy, but there were…

Snow chains are fairly cheap (a good pair costs about R2 500) and they’re easy to fit. They are sold in pairs and need to be on the wheels that power and steer your vehicle. A front-wheel drive vehicle has an advantage here, since the driven wheels are also the ones that steer. With a front-wheel drive, you can fit only two chains. With other vehicles, it’s better to fit four. THIS IS WHAT YOU DO: 01 Spread the chain out and make sure it isn’t tangled anywhere. 02 Feed the cable around the back of the wheel. 03 Hook the ends of the cable into each other at the 12 o’clock position and wrap the rest of the chain over the tyre. 04 Secure the red link in front…

As the product importer, this was our fault, but with a few precautionary measures you can prevent it from happening to you: Make sure that your fitment centre orders the stock for a job a couple of days in advance. Insist that the workshop checks that all parts are in order before leaving your vehicle with them. Always leave a contact number for the workshop while your vehicle is in for repairs. Never have extensive work done to your vehicle right before a big trip – we’ve all heard of Murphy’s Law, hey?…

WHERE EXACTLY ARE THE MOLOTOTSI AND KLEIN LETABA RIVERS? Both rivers are north east of the Hans Merensky Nature Reserve outside Tzaneen. We entered the Molototsi at S23.514256 E30.419219 and exited at S23.656989 E30.893278. We entered the Klein Letaba at S23.487361 E31.014972 and left it just before Giyani at S23.343333 E30.728222. WILL A 4X2 BAKKIE SUFFICE? Definitely not. This is hard-core 4x4 country and 4x4, low range, a differential lock and good ground clearance are essential. Take as much precaution as you can to protect your vehicle, because there are a lot of rocks here. A bash plate and rock sliders will come in handy. WHAT TIME OF THE YEAR CAN I DRIVE HERE? The river becomes impassable in the summer when it rains. The best time to go is…

1 BE QUICK. If you have to take something out of the fridge, do it quickly. Only open it for a few seconds so that all the cold air doesn't rush out. 2 FREEZE BEFORE YOU PACK. Freeze your food at home. It will help to keep the other items cold and lessen the strain on the fridge. 3 BUILD A PUZZLE. Try packing things that are square or rectangular. The less open spaces between items, the more effectively the fridge will work. 4 TAKE A WINGMAN. Use a cooler box with frozen blue ice bricks (that you can freeze overnight in the fridge) to keep your cold drinks cold during the day. This way you also open the fridge less often. 5 MAKE A MENU. Plan your meals in…

The faces behind the stories What is your first travel memory? On the school bus in 1960, lunch box in hand, on my way to the Johannesburg Zoo. It was an unforgettable trip for a Grade 1 boy from Viljoenskroon. Favourite place in the bush? My wife and I recently went to the Mokala National Park. The highlight was a performance by Chris Chameleon deep in the bush, with a background of veld, stars and the sounds of the bush at night. Best travel advice ever? Never pass an ablution block if you have small kids. Do you organise your trips or just go with the flow? I do a lot of planning, especially for our final destination. We’re real busybodies when we tour. Which places in Southern Africa would…

I have given new life to an old 12 volt cordless drill of mine, that hasn’t worked for at least three years now and whose battery was completely dead. In order to do this, I used a piece of wire of about 6m (2 mm x 1 mm) and connected two connection points to the positive and negative sides, as indicated on the battery. On the other side of the wire, I attached a Brad Harrison plug, but one could probably use crocodile clips and connect it directly to your battery. Now it permanently lives in my vehicle. Thus I don’t need to drive around with a heavy 220V drill anymore.…

Here’s some advice on water crossings from Gerrie van Eeden, a Drive Out features editor and qualified 4x4 instructor: DAM SAFE. Standing water is seldom life-threatening. If your vehicle gets stuck or sinks, it’s usually fairly easy for passengers to escape – as long as they weren’t wearing their safety belts and kept the windows down. COUNT TO 10. If you have to cross a river, take a few minutes and check if the water level is subsiding. Many vehicles that have been swept away could have passed safely if their drivers waited half an hour or so. HIGH AND DRY. Running water should never get higher than the lowest point of your vehicle’s body. If running water starts to press against the bottom of the doors, for example, you…

WHAT DID YOU DRIVE? A Toyota Fortuner 3.0 D4D 4x4. DO I NEED 4X4? Only if you plan on doing 4x4 routes. There’s a network of gravel roads in the area, but stay away from roads through plantations marked with signs from Komatiland, Sappi or York Timbers. WHAT SHOULD I VISIT? Stop by Pilgrim’s Rest before it becomes more run down. Sabie has its own big five – the Fraser, Horseshoe, Bridal Veil, Sabie and Mac-Mac waterfalls. Swing by Kaapsehoop, Mariepskop and God’s Window for amazing views. WHERE CAN I STAY? A self-catering chalet at the Bohemian Garden Cottage in Kaapsehoop is R275 per person per night and children under 12 are half price. Contact: 013734 4545, 076 764 7625, bohemian@groovecafe.co.za. A self-catering chalet (max 4 people) at Bananien lodge…

HOW COOL IS THIS? For the next test we put four 1litre milk bottles filled with water in each fridge. The sensor of the thermometer was inside one of the bottles. The aim was to measure how long it takes for the water to freeze completely and also to measure which fridge’s compartment gets the coldest. We also measured how fast they reached freezing point. The fridges were then left to freeze for three days after which we turned them off. The aim of this was to see which takes the longest before its temperature starts to rise. One last piece of data that we measured was the drop in temperature – from the starting temperature to the lowest temperature that the fridge could reach.…

ON THE TRAIL How long are the routes from the camp site? Route 1: Kortgeut – 8 km, 1 hour (Grade 2) Route 2: Bushman Paintings – 5 km, 30 mins (Grade 1) Route 3: Boshoek – 11 km, 1,5 hrs (Grade 3) Route 4: Groenkop – 6 km, 30 mins (Grade 3) Route 5: Kareedouw via Graskop, 78 km, 4-5 hrs (Grade 2) Route 6: Bosrug, 18 km, 3 hrs (Grade 3) Maximum number of vehicles? 10 Do I get a map? No, but there’s a map at the camp site. Will my car get scratched? No. Should I take the running boards off? No. Must I take a compressor? Yes. Can we have a braai en route? No Will I see wildlife? Yes, we saw lots of kudus.…

No one will seriously try to convince anyone that rusks from a box are the ultimate taste experience. If your wife regularly bakes the delicious fresh stuff, then good for you – hold on to her! Unfortunately, nowadays couples both have challenging careers which pay for the children’s school fees, the house and the hopefully not-too-rare 4x4 excursion. So time is limited and convenience is becoming king. This explains why we so often dash to the supermarket and buy a box or two of ready-made rusks. Bearing this in mind, we went and bought 12 different types of rusks that are widely available in supermarkets across South Africa. Yes, we are sure that somewhere in the bushveld or Namaqualand there’s a tannie that bakes “The Best Rusks in the Universe”.…

Your navigation equipment, be it a GPS, smartphone or tablet, are important tools on the road. But these electronic items are also sensitive and expensive. That’s why it’s extremely important to look after your gear on a trip. Here’s how you do it. Avoid load shedding Your navigation gear needs a constant power supply in order to run the whole day. But in a typical family there’s huge competition for the 12V socket. The standard 12V vehicle socket isn’t ideal for recharging either. On corrugated roads, it vibrates, making the connection intermittent. And you only realise a device didn’t charge when it’s already dead! For these reasons, I fitted four dedicated USB sockets in my Defender (two for the back passengers). It’s not a huge job, but be sure to…

It’s simple: If in doubt, leave it out. But if you have to get through ice or heavy snow, do the following: STAY ON TRACK. Look for tracks that have already been cut and stay in them. TAKE IT EASY. Drive slowly, in 4x4, and in low range if you have it. EASY ON THE LOCKERS. Only use the back diff-lock in extreme circumstances. SOFTEN YOUR TYRES. Deflated tyres get further in the snow. Francois suggests 1.6 bar. HANG BACK. Double your following distance. BE A MCGYVER. Francois has made use of objects next to the road, like a steel poll, to anchor vehicles with a rope as they cross the ice. STAND STRAIGHT. Never drive over ice off-camber. AND TALL. If snow touches the chassis, don’t go further. Snow…

A small mistake in one of our workshops recently snowballed into a lot of frustration and disappointment for a vehicle owner – as well as ourselves. It all started abroad when someone put the wrong part number on a shock absorber box. Back here in South Africa, a very enthusiastic four-wheel drive owner ordered one of our suspension upgrade kits for his brand new double cab bakkie. The customer is a farmer and lives 280km from the nearest town. The fitment centre is also 600km from our closest warehouse and they get their stock through an overnight courier. On the day of the suspension upgrade, the farmer got up early, drove the 280km and dropped his vehicle off at the fitment centre. He was told to return at 16:30 to…

My Fortuner story begins back in October 2011. I had planned a trip to Botswana for the upcoming December holiday, but I was having doubts as to whether the 4x4 I owned at the time would survive the trip. Finally, after another frustrating day of breakdowns, I got home and searched online for a Toyota Fortuner D4D 4x4. To my surprise, I found a 2008 D4D, with only 53 000 km on the clock, for sale. As anyone who has searched for a three year old Toyota will tell you, it’s quite hard to come across one that has done less than 100 000 km or one that is well-priced. I was even more surprised to discover that it was a Toyota dealership that was selling the vehicle. I made…

To say that the tension is so thick you could cut it with a knife, is like saying that the sea is somewhat damp. I’m surrounded by the remaining 18 participants of the Ranger Odyssey at the Palmwag camp site in Damaraland, Namibia. It’s time for the second knockout round. And each one of them is scared that maybe it is them who will be climbing on an aeroplane tomorrow, homeward bound with myself and the rest of the journalists. To come so far and not make it to the next round is like stumbling over a loose shoelace 100m before the Comrades finish line. And even though the trip has been a fantastic experience up until now, each one of these 18 contenders wants the chance to be crowned…

In previous tests the power consumption of the fridges was measured to find out which one uses the least power over a period of time. For this test the power consumption was not measured. The variables from fridge to fridge and power source to power source (whether it’s a deep cycle battery or not, etc) are simply too big. Those in the know claim that even if you get six similar batteries that were manufactured on the same day in the same factory, there will still be a difference in power delivery between them. Also consider the fact that the difference in power consumption between fridges with similar capacity is negligible. Most of today’s camping fridges are designed to work on more or less the same amount of power. So…

Naturally, price is one of the biggest considerations when buying new tyres. But do you know what the answer is when someone asks you how big your wheels are? Or how much weight you can carry per tyre? Because let’s be honest – the numbers on the sides of tyres are Greek for most of us. Metric or Imperial? There are two ways that tyre size is indicated. The most common – and also the most confusing – is the metric system, which is on most tyres these days. It combines metric and imperial measurements, as well as percentages, to indicate the tyre size. Metric sizes work like this: The first number indicates the width of the tyre’s tread in millimetres. This is rather straightforward. The last number on the…

While scanning the internet for some travel ideas one day, I came across an interesting website called mountainpassessouthafrica.co.za. The site got the mental gears going and my wife Sheila and a group of friends and I started planning a trip. Naturally, it was a prerequisite that the passes should be gravel. After all, generally our motto is to “go gravel” wherever we can, and we didn’t want to get bored on the black stuff. Thus I began scanning maps, reading articles and studying trip reports.With all our planning done, we took a week off to do a casual drive through many of the well-known passes and poorts of the Western Cape, as well as some lesser-known ones. It would eventually lead us to cover some 20 passes in just 7…

If you love looking at maps as much as I do, you’ve probably also dreamt of putting your photos on a map to see exactly where you took them. Well, this is easy with Adobe Lightroom. STEP 1: Open Adobe Lightroom 5, or one of the programme’s newer versions. If you don’t already have it, download the CC version. It’s brand new and works on a monthly subscription basis ($9,99 per month). If you enjoy taking photos, it’s worth every cent! STEP 2: Choose the gadget or system with which you’re going to record your GPS tracks (A Garmin Nüvi or an app on your smartphone or iPad). MotionX GPS is an excellent app for Apple products and GPS Essentials works well for Android. Now synchronise the time on this…