Random round up...
The home away from home...
Well OzTent have been on a new product bonanza the last few months. Several new tents and a swag. This seems the pick of the bunch to me, the Oxley 5 lite (also available in the larger 7 size for those who have kids/need more room).
Made of lighter material than the traditional OzTent, with a different frame system. It may not have the almost instant set up claim of the original (for the basic shelter that is), however these guys know their market, so I can’t see this thing being too much of a hassle. Main plus point? A much smaller packed size than the original design, quite a bit less expensive too. Should make it appeal to a larger customer base. Whilst being a much better option than many traditional ‘family’ tents.
I haven’t seen one in person yet, but I’ll be keen to check it out when they start to hit our camping stores. Available in the US? Not as yet it would seem, but I guess if it goes well here....
Weighty matters...
Interestingly (for me) Andrew’s Cruiser weighs the same as mine with only half (or less) of his kit in it, as opposed to the 105 (almost) completely loaded for a big trip.
Even though he doesn’t admit it on camera, he is already at or slightly above GVM when fully loaded. I’ll be interested to see how he tackles that, adding another spare wheel, etc.
Makes me feel a bit better about my fully loaded weight. Having said that I am still keen to get the weight down wherever possible.
So, I unloaded the Cruiser today in anticipation of turning it into a 7 seater for the first time since I bought it (and promptly took the seats out). I found a good few hundred grams of outback detritus once I took out the flappy thing (correct technical official Toyota name) that covers the gap between tailgate and load bay (also watching the ASPW video once again reinforced how good the split tailgate is. Whereas poor 70-series owners have to bolt fold-down tables to their vehicles, all us split guys can lord it over them with our factory installed versions. Suckers...).
Topographic addiction...
As part of this general unload/sort out/minimising/purge, I have been taking as much as possible to the thrift shop, etc. Realising that we basically have another complete ‘house & contents’ in the truck most of the time. That whenever I unload it into our actual house, means it takes up room pretty quickly (it’s not a particularly big house, two adults, two rats, how much room do you need?). So I’ve been clearing out stuff that isn’t really relevant to our lives now, this has included a lot of books. Painful, but necessary. I have kept pretty much every paper map I have ever bought, and as I was about to consign this collection to the recycling, as with advances in technology makes many of these (although not by any means the paper map itself) redundant. Until I realised that this was a record of our travel and exploration of the last few years
So, I’ll keep these and the rest. I guess you have to hang onto a few things for old times sake.
Malle Moto...
Rest day for the Dakar today, so nothing to report, right? Well a mention of elite rider Olivier Pain switching to Malle Moto for this year piqued my interest...
If you thought doing Dakar on a bike was the ultimate? I urge you to give up an hour of your time to understand the ‘marathon/original’ class. Rider, bike, two spares and a box of bits. That’s it.
Lyndon is the guy I highlighted in the last Dakar post. A true overlander, and affirmation for anyone who is wondering if going to work on Monday in the cubicle is as good as it gets...?