Hi guys !
I am “der typ” Pascal you are talking about a little here. Sorry to use the English language, but my 2 years of German I took at school are too far away to be of any use here. I used an on-line translator to understand what was in German in this thread.
First let me thank you for your nice comments on our pictures. We are no pros, only amateurs, but with the best Nikon gears. We also don’t spend so much time in Africa, though we are extremely lucky to go there 2 or 3 times a year, 3 or 4 weeks each time. Our main point is to try to find the same animals trip after trip, and we sometimes succeed in this (who knows Skinny the cheetah here?).
I think it might be useful to clear up a few things about the 4x4 story.
When we decided to make this trip to the CKGR, we knew it could be difficult in the rainy season. The fact is it was even more rainy this year than usual. However I believe we got stuck because I had a spark plug problem, the engine was running on 5 out of 69 cylinders, knocking most of the time. The little loss of power at the worst time got us stuck, even though maybe I would have been stuck without the plug problem, who knows?
About what I did to recover the car, well… I think it is more spectacular on the videos than it was in reality. I don’t mean it was not dangerous, but I was conscious of what I was doing. When you see me keeping on lifting up the car while the jack is leaning a lot, you should know that my point was to move the car to the side, out of the grooves the wheels dug. That is why I kept on Jacking sideways. In my opinion, the only thing that could happen was that the jack would skid sideways suddenly, and it is precisely what happened. I may be wrong, but I don’t think it was really dangerous. At one point I was scared, and it was when I lifted the car very high and I saw the jack bending under the weight of the car… but it resisted! The point I agree with, is that we were far away from any hospital, so in case of accident I would have been in serious trouble. But so it is if I am beaten by a snake or anything similar… I know going there alone is a bit more risky than going to Saint-Tropez. I think I red that somebody thought I should not have carried on with the flooded trails, and go around (if the translation was good). Well, there is no go around there, and the trails can be good one day then bad the next if the it rained a lot during the night. The next question is: should anybody go there during the rainy season? I think the answer is yes, as long as you have a sat phone with you, or if there is at least one other car with you and somebody with experience. I am a beginner with the 4x4, but I learn. I am afraid this incident did not deter me from going again under the rain, but I will do it with a better equipment, that will, hopefully, enable me to get the car out of such a situation by myself (ground anchor etc., I am still studying the question).
I am ready to answer your questions, should you have some. Maybe French could be more appropriate on a Swiss forum?
Have fun!