Tinfoil
I've had RangeRovers but got fed up waiting for tow trucks ! Now it's a battered old Landcruiser.
But for the REAL off roading I use a home built special for serious competition trialling, which is where I've been this weekend, running a three day event at a disused lead mine in Wales.
And it's the greatest distraction and relaxation I have found, it's bloody hard work but it takes me away from my past.
I was just washing the crap off in the shower and thinking how free my weekend had been from flashbacks and fantasies, which was bliss.
Trialling has given me an awful lot, it still scares the shit out of me when I do multiple rolls down a mountainside ( I'll get the hang of it one day ! ) but overcoming the fear to drive flat out up a near vertical wall of loose stones has helped me overcome my other fears.
And becoming involved in a club, I edit / write the newsletter and all manner of other jobs,has given me the confidence to deal with other people and not feel I am about to be shafted by them. To organize this weekend I have dealt with site owners, drivers, toilet rental, catering, stupid spectators, cows on the track and all kinds of crap, ending up today with presenting prizes to the victorious drivers.
All this wasn't possible 10 years ago, I would have hired one toilet and ten catering trucks and driven the cows, and the prizegiving would still be going on now because I stammered so badly.
I put a lot into our club because I get a lot out, insane weekends and my sanity !
PS
I love deserts as well, and I have been lucky enough to have spent two vacations in the SW USA. Off roading based in Moab naturally.
And I have a horror story of wrecking a rental Jeep Cherokee in the desert near Escalante that nearly killed my wife and I, we were only rescued by sheer chance.
This episode also gives me nightmares and flashbacks. So how come I dont see a shrink about them ?
