Well, maybe they were off road experts (yeah right!) but ON road his
driving really sucks........
John and Muddy
Rick Grant wrote:
>
> This has nothing to do specifically with Land-Rovers per se but it is about
> SUV's and driving ability.
>
> This morning in southern Alberta is was about -20 when we took our Subaru
> out to the foothills for no good reason other than to go for a drive and
> give the Border Collies a good run somewhere. The roads were snow covered
> and in places there were hard packed patches of polished snow, far far from
> the ubiquitous black ice of eastern north america. We spent several hours
> on back roads just enjoying the mountains.
>
> Anyway, about noon I rejoined the Trans Canada with the idea of heading for
> Banff and lunch. Same road conditions but the sun had melted a lot of snow
> down to wet pavement. There was little traffic, and apart from patches of
> hard pack there was nothing to be concerned about.
>
> Just as we entered the mountains we were following a Lincoln
> Navigator. The two of us clipped along at 130 km/hr until we hit the
> curves through Entrance Pass at Exshaw.
>
> For those of you who don't know it, the drive from Calgary to Banff is
> along a four lane divided highway. Just as you enter the mountains proper
> there are a series of serious S curves which are notable for the sudden
> side winds they often get, and for the fact that they are the first curves
> a motorist has hit since leaving western Ontario. The posted speed of 110
> km/hr drops to 90 through the curves but if the road is dry a modern
> vehicle can sail through at 130+ without complaint.
>
> Since we were in no hurry, the sun was shining, there was no wind, and I
> just didn't feel like blasting past the Navigator I tooled along at 120
> into the curves behind him.
>
> I was a good 100 meters behind this guy when about a third way through this
> first curve, the one without the cliff edge to instant doom, drives onto a
> patch of polished hard pack. This is snow, it is not ice. Slippery but
> not a give-up -all hope situation.
>
> He hits the brakes!
>
> It really was like watching some child take a Hot Wheels Car and fling it
> across a room. To see some two tonnes of car leave the road and cavort
> through the air is really something.
>
> When I finished slogging through the snow to get to his vehicle I find an
> upside down driver in the footwell and a hysterical wife, who, unlike him,
> was wearing a seat belt, all screaming like they'd had their bowels cut
> out. The two of them were convinced they were going to be incinerated at
> any moment in a Hollywood car explosion.
>
> There were no injuries to speak of, but the Navigator was a well rolled mess.
>
> The comments I got from the driver/owner told the story. It wasn't just
> one pithy remark, rather a series of linked commentaries, spiced with
> expletives, that went on for about 20 minutes until the Mounties showed up
> and I could escape.
>
> This guy, and his wife, both were convinced that there had been a design
> flaw in the Navigator because there was no way that such an expensive
> vehicle could possibly have gone off the road.
>
> At one point I tried to point out that braking on a suspect surface in
> sharp curve, or braking at all given the nature of those Banff curves, was
> not a good idea.
>
> I will never ever forget what the man's wife said to me. "We know
> offroading. We're experts." Apparently the dealer had given both of them
> two hours of instruction.
>
> Three hours later, after the Border Collies had had a good run at the Banff
> airstrip, and after Catherine and I had had a good meal in town, we passed
> a rather crumpled Navigator at the side of the road but no sign of two self
> proclaimed accomplished offroaders.
>
> Rick Grant
>
> International Strategic Communications and Media Relations
> Calgary Alberta
> www.rickgrant.com
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