Irish offroad course grand opening - the story with pics

[syncropaddy]

As Paul reported elsewhere, we have finally got a decent Irish offroad venue. We made our way to the venue which is a good two hour drive from Dublin due west on a brand new motorway. The venue is 350 acres in size and is a premier horse farm/stud/museum and has facilities similar to Mammutpark although not quite as good. This was the first time an off road event had been run there so there are a few things to be ironed out to get it spot on. The organisers are off road fans so they have a good idea of whats needed and were very open to suggestion and ideas to make it a top class venue. We were spoiled with the weather as you can see in the photos. The camping facilities were good with toilets and showers but no hook up facilities yet!
There were some serious modified Suzukis, Land Rovers, Diahatsus and Landcruisers in addition to some well tricked out 'chequebook Land Rovers'!! All of them had one thing in common ............ they were looking forward to seeing a Syncro and seeing what they could do! And then we turned up in two campers and an ambulance !!!
It was explained to us that the course was designed to take a 110 Land Rover but that some of the sections may damaged our vans due to height restrictions in the wooded area. There were trial sections that we could do but vehicle body damage would be an issue as most of these areas were Suzuki/LR 90 territory.
We were taken off road around the perimeter of the site where there were some 'introductory' sections for us to play in and it soon became apparent that standard Japanese 4x4 crewcabs are rubbish. Paul and I played for about an hour and we duly impressed everyone. Some things we heard ........

Q. Is that a camper?
A. Yes.
"You will never get that through there ....! "
"Really.......?"
Q. How did you get that camper through there. Is it four wheel drive?
A. No.

"Hey you cant bring a camper through there"

Q.Are they road tyres on that?
A. Yes.
Jesus !!!

"I dont believe what I've just seen! That fella in that camper just rescued a Land Rover that got stuck and then drove through the section and didnt get stuck!"

Q.You are not going to attempt that are you?
A.Yes on road tyres!

"Those things are unbelievable.... they go anywhere we can go!"
"Yes and we can make tea while we are doing it ........"

"Jeysus yer man in the VW just got through and the Hilux didnt!!!"

"I had to use waffle boards to get my 110 through there ....... you wont stand a chance in there its too difficult!"
(10 minutes later)" FFS I dont believe it!"

All in all everyone was mightily impressed with the Syncros capabilities and some had no idea they existed


This is the perimeter stuff......

Dave in .... (his beautiful non locker Krankenwagen)


Me out .....






Nice view of the site.

[syncropaddy]

More pics form the weekend .....


Paul goes in ......


followed by ....


.... and finally.





At this point the score was Syncro 1, Land Rover 0, and then this happened .....


While everyone passed by .....


It took TWO Land Rovers to pull Paul out!! ( It only took one Syncro to pull one Land Rover out of the same spot)


Paul... its ok, we got it out, you can stop digging!




Those aluminium bash plate things are great for making splashes!


Trails through the woods


The surface is bog and was dry but soft. Different story if it had rained!


We feel that this site would be great for a Syncropendence or just a good venue to start a holiday. We have spoken to a lot of people who are into the off road scene and we could put together a great weeks Syncro-ing. Now we understand that for this year some of us had the expense of Syncro25 and have used up quite a few days from their holidays but we would like to put out the feelers to gauge the interest for and event/meeting in 2010. Bearing in mind that the ferries will cost you the guts of £300 return and LPG stations are few and far between what would the interest be?

Dave and Paul will be on later to post their views and pics.

[axeman]

looks good may be something for next year though, as i personaly am sort of booked up, i think that like you said it would have to be a week thing or like germany a very long weekend, talk to jenny or clive about making it a proper syncronaughts event,

neil

[syncropaddy]

A movie of a trial section

http://s357.photobucket.com/albums/oo19 ... I_2572.flv" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[jed the spread]

jed

[syncrowjoker]

WHS

[jebiga41]

Great weekend had a good chat with the organisers and they force fed me burgers for helping with the clean up, Mrs Doyle style "ah go on, go on, go on ye will .
We didn't manage to go on some of the forest trails due to the fact that they had been cut out for the little suzuki boys and they were too tight. Although some the bits they were on were very soft and boggy and are winching country (found somewhere for you to play Dai and Roger ). However the ones that had been cut out for the landies were very nice technical driving some being tighter than the competition trails at Mammut park (no balls on sticks here just paint scraping trees ) The thing being with such a variety of vehicles they tried to have sections for everyone. The whole course was cut out in 2 days by hand and the perimeter sections done in 2 hours with a JCB ! They said they would develop it further and we were more than welcome to make suggestions and even come down and cut out a specific syncro trail Was an excellent meet and a really nice crowd with some serious vehicles and no brand snobbery. Noone was keeping score apart from you Andrew
The owner also has a 1000 acre estate in another part of the West of Ireland and the possibilty of accessing that is on the cards, some other lads are working on another land owner aswell so there maybe a few more springing up in the next few months I expect. They were delighted we came as I think they are sick of looking at the same landy and suzuki set ups and was good to see something different, I think we may have a few converts When we spoke about the possibility of trying to bring you guys over, they got really excited and was shown various "greenlanes" around Achill Island, told of numerous quarries (with nearby wild camping that we could visit on the way to the site and also informed of a load of different events that may be of interest, navigation courses. more green-laning etc. So I think lots of time is going to spent checking these places out.
Managed to put a few dings in the bumper, a scrape on my door, bent a steel wheel but no worries some vids and pics
http://s482.photobucket.com/albums/rr18 ... _02731.flv" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[jebiga41]

sorry about the quality all done on the iphone have some more bits of vid just need to get them up on photobucket and work doesn't support itunes but will post them up when i get a chance, watch this space

[max.karisma]

From the pics I've seen & info I would definately support an event held here
The fact it is in Ireland is a real plus (for me), hope you can get to arrange a meet and with plenty of notice please for organising hols