Sam Watson

So after Oman and testing the Ford Escape in an offroad environment the impetus for buying a Land Rover has increased. The lack of difflock on the Ford is a serious issue that holds back its ability, and this is compounded by poor clearance underneath. The ideal solution of course for me is a Defender…

Just got back from a quick explore of the mountains southwest of Muscat – the Hajjar range. I drove the little Ford Escape down and spent two days there, poking round various tracks through the hills and trying the Ford out offroad. The border crossing between the UAE and Oman proved very straightforward and amiable. With…

Something I haven’t done much work with lately, but which has formed a large part of my adult life, popped back over the horizon yesterday when I did an interview for BBC Three Counties Radio. It covers the phenomenon of big predatory cats at large in the British countryside. During the 1960s and 1970s it became…

Azerbaijan was interesting – Baku nestles on the banks of the Caspian Sea, which was beautiful at dawn. Fringes of palms and other desert trees ring a low-rise city which sits in semidesert. Russian is still widely spoken (mine is so rusty I didn’t use it) along with Azeri, which uses the Latin alphabet with…

So…. midsummer in Britain. The harvest is being gathered around my home in rural Yorkshire and nearby York was thronged with tourists today. Not a great deal of overland interest – I was planning to drive to Albania but circumstances conspired to change my plans (not least of which the fact that the disastrous American…

“Welcome my son, welcome to The Machine” After the failure of my Transamerica trip I was a bit at a loose end as regards transport. Penny the Land Rover languishes in despond in a garage in Decorah, Iowa, and I’m back in Virginia. Enter Land Rover North America, who very kindly lent me a car.…

A thoroughly absorbing and enthusing few days at the Land Rover Muddy Chef Challenge in Connecticut. Land Rover North America lent me a brand new top-spec Range Rover to drive up from Virginia, and what a car it is! I will post separately on the Grey Lady however. Organiser Eric Yohe put a huge amount…

A lot of my time in the US has been spent wild camping or camping on (ugh) managed sites. It’s worth recording some thoughts on decent kit from this trip, as some of it has surprised me and I want to pass on appreciation of some products. Tents – When using my own trucks I…

I like Virginia. In fact I like everything I’ve seen of the US and Canada so far. It’s very apparent why this part of the world was named ‘New England’ by the Colonists – the woodland, the rolling farmland and the green hills are very reminiscent of the UK. I was very much reminded of…

So its midnight 11 in Virginia….. being kindly hosted by two State Dept friends as my buddy who set this US trip in motion had to head west for family business when the trip fell flat due to poor vehicle preparation. Been chatting to several LR guys over here in the US and potentially a…

So…… an eventful trip has come to an unforseen end. The Land Rover was shipped from Cambodia with her original-spec 2.5 litre petrol engine, a lashed-together solution intended to get her out of the shipping container and as far as a garage where a rebuilt v8 could be fitted for our trip. This was necessary…

Apologies for the lack of updates, connectivity hasn’t been great so far. I’ve been in North America a week now, crossing into Canada today. Right now I’m in a cabin in the forests of Quebec, being hosted by Patrick, hugely kind and welcoming stalwart of the Ottawa Valley Land Rover Club, and tomorrow we are…

Really pleasantly taken aback by the huge number of offers of trail advice, hospitality and accommodation I’ve received from hugely friendly US and Canadian Land Rover owners. The brotherhood of the Green Oval is alive and kicking across the Pond and I feel very humbled to be welcomed with such open arms by so many friends…

So having taken the Ford Escape out for a few runs I can see it’s limitations. As with many automatics, it over-revs, which will be an issue in the desert. Despite it passing the Shamil, the local version of the MoT, there is a vibration somewhere I’m not keen on. It feels like a propshaft or a…

So events move along. After a flurry of paperwork yesterday I got my Emirates driving licence. The process was reasonably straightforward, unlike Cairene bureaucracy, which is ludicrous and corrupt. Step one was translating my UK licence into Arabic (fee – £20) at a recognised government translation bureau (I would have had to sit a test…

Getting ready to head to the UK for a couple of days at the end of June before flying to the US to start the cross-continent trip. Found a great map seller on Ebay – mapguys22 is his Ebay shop – huge stock of excellent maps at sensible prices. He is in Washington State but…

A whirl of activity here at the moment. Buying desert kit and mechanical toolkits etc for this Ford Escape here in the UAE (and the Land Rover which will replace it, sooner rather than later I hope), but in the mean time ordering kit online for the trans-North America drive in a month’s time and getting…

So at the mo it’s all about route planning, “coast to coast, sea to shining sea” and beyond. The New World, the Colonies, Across the Pond, and all that. I get into Washington DC on July 2. The Land Rover, Penny, is being shipped into the US from her current base in Cambodia on June…

In the UAE Defenders are crazy money and decent Discoverys (or is the plural DIscoveries?) are hard to find, so in the quest for a reliable 4×4 I’ve sourced a place in nearby Umm Al Qain where a guy has a stockpile of ex-military Series Land Rovers and I’m hoping I can find a halfway…

So I have been given a signed and annotated copy of ‘Long Range Desert Group’ by Bill Kennedy Shaw. I’m trying to work out who wrote the annotations, as the script is different from the author’s signature. Some were written in pencil and have been inked-in afterwards. The book used to be owned by the…

Good to be back in this crazy city as it gets ready for Ramadan. Staying with desert buddy Gregg and catching up with the rest of the desert crowd. Gregg’s given me a lovely old signed first edition of ‘Long Range Desert Group’ by Bill Kennedy Shaw, signed by the author and with all sorts…