Words by Angela Royston, pictures by Kevin Royston

Saturday morning saw the group assemble in the car park outside Baskerville Hall Hotel for a pre-event briefing and general catch-up with this being the first club event of 2005. Quite a few familiar faces were on show and we were joined by several first timers to a J33P event with Greg & Amanda Haynes and Mick Harvey from Birty Dastards along with Paul Adlam aka Tragic of Bucks Jeep Club and John Bastable, Mark Clegg and Philip Lewis to make up the group. Everyone gave a very warm welcome to Phil Weedon, the new editor of Jeep World magazine had come along to find out all about J33P, its events and membership. Phil initially sat in with Andy Harman who was only too pleased to offer a spare seat. A few of us decided to tackle one of the difficult climbs early on in the day and all Jeeps that tried failed miserably even with the assistance of Simex’s and air lockers. Rich Sims then put all to shame in his Disco making it look all too easy climbing the hill, only trouble was he was on his own at the top !

It was inevitable that many of the group would find their way to check the river bed. The decision was made and Andy bravely went first followed by Rich in the disco, Will, myself, Phil and Philip in his disco watched by a few of the others who probably thought we were all mad. To start with all seemed very easy but a fallen tree soon needed the attention of gadget boy and his mini chainsaw. At the half way point, the large rock previously to be avoided was squarely in the middle of the river bed and nothing would move past it without major damage. Out came the winches and after a bit of help from Cuffy wielding a big stick we were able to move the rock out of the way and continue.

At the waterfall, Andy moved over passing the wheel to Phil Weedon – not the best of times to take over – leaving him to drive down the waterfall and out of the river. Well done, Phil. Rich was next in the Disco and showed that a long wheelbase can tackle this with ease which was just as well as Philip was further back beyond the point of no return in his Disco ! Will and I then followed suit. It took Phil and Philip longer to navigate as one of the low lying trees had to be winched out of the way for Phil to get underneath it. Shortly after, Tony Wilson then tackled the river bed lowering himself on the rear winch from higher up than the drive-in entry point - Mick, Lee and Neil watched the proceedings but decided not to follow at that point.

Most of the group met for lunch and questions were asked about what had happened to Simon and Paul. Very quickly it was established that Simon had experienced a problem loosing 4 wheel drive giving Daz another of those engineering challenges. Ever resourceful, Daz managed to build something out of nothing and repair the Jeep to join in the fun, albeit gingerly to start with, in the afternoon. To read more about their adventure, check out Bucks Jeep Club site. Lunch gave chance for everyone to chat and share experiences.

The afternoon saw the group split up again trying out different parts of the site and finding some new runs to try out. On a tricky run downhill, Andy managed to throw a front tyre leading to the first tyre change of the day in the gloopy mud – a photo opportunity for Phil Weedon and maybe a forthcoming Jeep World article, you never know. Next we had bodywork modifications to watch out for. Rich was soon seen with a slightly concave back quarter. My vote on modified bodywork has to go to Paul caving in the drivers side door of his YJ such that he could only get out of the passenger door (Alison never did that when she owned it !). Simon, who had led Paul astray, also did not come out unscathed. Thankfully, no other body work mods that I can remember.

Mid afternoon Phil decided that the river bed had to be conquered going up as well as down so off he went followed by Will and yours truly. After a bit of tricky negotiation to get in, Phil winched over the waterfall modifying the lip in the process. Will duly followed without major difficulty. I however decided to wimp out at this point remembering many other “end of day” moments. Phil successfully negotiated past the half way point with some good work on the winch and was then able to drive the rest of the way up to the top. Will followed and was not quite so lucky with one scary moment of the vehicle trying to stand up. Then disaster struck when Will managed to break the rear diff and could only move forward with a lot of metallic noises coming from the rear of his vehicle. The decision was made to recover Will out of the river rather than risk more damage using a combination of Will’s front and rear winches plus support from Richard’s disco. A masterful recovery seeing Will out with no further damage and able to make his way slowly back to the hotel.

The group met up in the car park again for those on their way home to wash down their vehicles. There was a very sorry looking Andy who had lost a second tyre but this time to a 5” cut in the sidewall. Luckily Andy was able to refit the spare albeit covered in mud but he decided to not run the risk of taking part the following day.

19 of those staying over met for an evening meal in the Baskerville Arms Hotel, many thanks to Phil and Lyn at the hotel for laying on an excellent meal. The intrepid amongst us (they know who they are), then ventured off to the disco….

The group was much depleted for Sunday leaving just 8 vehicles to enjoy the site. Sunday started very cold with a light covering of snow of the vehicles and ice on top of the tracks. Tony decided to winch up the river bed and having done that to his satisfaction, went down again giving himself plenty of winching practice on the way.

The others in the group went up to the top of the site trying out the long runs comparing the attributes of tyre and vehicle combinations. Rich had needed his winch to complete the run and so the challenge was on amongst the Jeeps to do a clear round. Kevin went first showing how it could be done with Simex power. Shep was encouraged to follow next on BFG’s, acquitting himself very well after a slow start. Next came Simon with leaf springs and did not let the side down. Philip bowed out early on with the standard disco not having enough ground clearance to make it through. Last but not least came Paul who gave his all almost making it through the biggest bomb hole but the 4 banger just didn’t have enough height so he bowed out gracefully.

As it was getting very cold by this time, some vehicles decided to head home the others moved down the site to keep going for a while longer. Simon and crew decided that bacon sandwiches were in order to keep out the cold but even that was not enough after a while. In all, a fantastic weekend for many both on and off road and a good day out several others.