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Well I managed to get away for a couple of days to the Otways with a mate of mine between the xmas/new year break. Had a great time there, a good mix of easy to semi-tough tracks, and still a fair bit of mud for the middle of summer. Managed to get a little bit of surfing in at Wye River, managed to somehow find a campspot and at the end of it all my car had to be towed!
Mate I went with has an 80 series, bullbar, winch, 2" lift and thats about it. His tyres weren't the best though, which he figured out soon enough.
I'll explain more with the pics...
The first little bit of mud we came across, seemed innocent enough at the start so my mate went through and got stuck, had no traction.
Prado: 1 Cruiser: 0. We have a deal where if one has to pull the other out, he owes him a beer, so I earnt a nice Peroni here.
This isn't me avoiding the bit he got stuck in, this is me getting around him after he got stuck in the same ruts again. Call this Prado: 2, Cruiser: 0
And this is me easily getting through where he was stuck, cementing the prado in as a superior vehicle =P
His front right was spinning a fair bit, giving him a nice shade of brown
Stopped here at Wye River for a nice lunch and quick surf
Going through some of the tracks we'd occasionally stumble across a nice little view like this one
And this one overlooking the Great Ocean Road
Another view
Mud tyres aren't mud tyres unless they're caked in...
Just pulled over here on the side of the road to check the maps and have a quick bite to eat the next day, a couple of backpackers from Holland came across us here and were completely and utterly lost so we guided them back to a paved road, much to their relief!
Found this beauty of a bog hole on the side of a road, so, boys being boys we went through. My mates stuck here at this stage...
After about 10 minutes of forward... reverse... forward... reverse... repeat, he got himself out.
His car started changing colour...
Mine was already dirty enough without having gone through it yet
But I had to do it to prove that mine could do it with ease.
Yes, technically it did get through easily, however upon exiting this the car stalled... turns out that prado's don't like their airboxes filling up with muddy water and sucking it into the engine :| Opened it all up and was beyond my mechanical expertise so we had to tow it out with his car (which took about 45 mins to go a few km to get to a main rd)
Both cars standing nice and muddy before we started towing.
And this is where we waited for the RACV tow for about an hour, took it to Colac and was ready the next day after a $300 lesson learnt. Could have been much worse, so I was quite thankful. Ironic thing is... it was booked in to have a snorkel fitted literally the week after, see the following pic for the fitted snorkel.
And possibly my favourite mod I've done so far, custom 4" Stainless steel snorkel made up by Millweld (highly recommended). Good thing is its 4" from tip of snorkel right into the airbox, nice and free flowing!
So all up, a great trip unfortunately cut short. Will be heading back there at some stage in the near future, this time armed with a snorkel!
-Rob
Mate I went with has an 80 series, bullbar, winch, 2" lift and thats about it. His tyres weren't the best though, which he figured out soon enough.
I'll explain more with the pics...
The first little bit of mud we came across, seemed innocent enough at the start so my mate went through and got stuck, had no traction.
Prado: 1 Cruiser: 0. We have a deal where if one has to pull the other out, he owes him a beer, so I earnt a nice Peroni here.
This isn't me avoiding the bit he got stuck in, this is me getting around him after he got stuck in the same ruts again. Call this Prado: 2, Cruiser: 0
And this is me easily getting through where he was stuck, cementing the prado in as a superior vehicle =P
His front right was spinning a fair bit, giving him a nice shade of brown
Stopped here at Wye River for a nice lunch and quick surf
Going through some of the tracks we'd occasionally stumble across a nice little view like this one
And this one overlooking the Great Ocean Road
Another view
Mud tyres aren't mud tyres unless they're caked in...
Just pulled over here on the side of the road to check the maps and have a quick bite to eat the next day, a couple of backpackers from Holland came across us here and were completely and utterly lost so we guided them back to a paved road, much to their relief!
Found this beauty of a bog hole on the side of a road, so, boys being boys we went through. My mates stuck here at this stage...
After about 10 minutes of forward... reverse... forward... reverse... repeat, he got himself out.
His car started changing colour...
Mine was already dirty enough without having gone through it yet
But I had to do it to prove that mine could do it with ease.
Yes, technically it did get through easily, however upon exiting this the car stalled... turns out that prado's don't like their airboxes filling up with muddy water and sucking it into the engine :| Opened it all up and was beyond my mechanical expertise so we had to tow it out with his car (which took about 45 mins to go a few km to get to a main rd)
Both cars standing nice and muddy before we started towing.
And this is where we waited for the RACV tow for about an hour, took it to Colac and was ready the next day after a $300 lesson learnt. Could have been much worse, so I was quite thankful. Ironic thing is... it was booked in to have a snorkel fitted literally the week after, see the following pic for the fitted snorkel.
And possibly my favourite mod I've done so far, custom 4" Stainless steel snorkel made up by Millweld (highly recommended). Good thing is its 4" from tip of snorkel right into the airbox, nice and free flowing!
So all up, a great trip unfortunately cut short. Will be heading back there at some stage in the near future, this time armed with a snorkel!
-Rob
Snaga
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