Hi,

Myself and Marcus (1 horsepower!) have been deep in the Transylvanian forests and mountains for the past three days exploring tracks on oziexplorer using very old maps. Many of the tracks shown have not been used for years and are often blocked by fallen trees and or overgrown. We have opened a few up but there are so many we could do with a bit of help. If anyone is up for it, I can provide a summerhouse for accommodation? It is a lot of fun but hard work. We are also in bear and wolf country so the peace of mind of a second vehicle would be great as more often than not there is no phone signal.



Marcus is still gutted that he is off the road, but will be working abroad on a contract soon and will then return to the UK to pick up a donor Disco. So for much of this season I will working alone. Therefore any help with this route mapping would be great.

I am near to Romania and it will be a plasure for me to make such a trip !!! But I am rebuilding now my DEF and I am waiting for parts...
Transilvania has a wild character---VERY BEAUTIFUL--

Hi Paul wouldnt mind helping at least over a couple of weekends as i'm in Bucharest where abouts in Transilvania are you based and/ working on these routes. Might even be able to rally a bit of support from the local LR fraternity in Bucharest too

James

Thanks James and ebdesignDEFENDER,

We have been checking routes in Covasna, Harghita and Bacau counties. We even managed to cross through all 3 counties by forest and tracks only. There are literally hundreds of routes to explore. Many lead to dead ends but others go on for tens of miles along very little used tracks. Some have not been used in years and are blocked. With some work they could be reopened, but it is too much for the two of us. Any help would be appreciated. We are going to establish a more up to date database of what is available as everything we have found is dated.

Here are a couple more photos from two days ago.

Cheers,

Paul

It was a nice week up there. The summer house was very comfortable and I had the best nights sleep I've had for months. Maybe thats got somthing to do with me being Pauls winch bitch for a week and being so knackared that a bed of nails would have been apealing at the end of each day... lol

Paul has a saw but anyone who might come out to help might want to bring a little petrol chain saw since some of the fallen trees are fairly big. also if you have sand ladders/waffels it would be helpful. There is some real extream off roading out there if you want it Most of the dead ends paul talks about are not so much dead ends, but places where the route got so bad that it wouldnt be wise to go on our own with just one vehicle.

I'm not sure when I will be available for helping out since as paul said, my landrover is off the road, I dont know how long I will be overseas working and when I come back its going to take a couple of weeks to get the landrover back on the road.

If anyone who wants to come over to help out with Paul, and wants to make the trip as cheap as possible, they could arrange and drive over here in the donar Disco (Of course I will send the money for buying it). I would also pay for all fuel costs incured driving over here. If anyone is interested in that it would help both me and paul out at the same time. I also want a set of Insa Turbo Special track tyres buying so you could stick them on the disco and use it for the track clearances with Paul if I am not back in time to be there.

Its all possibilities so just let us know if you are interested.

What are really the minimum vehicle requirements in terms of being able to sucessful explore the tracks?
Pete

A standard landover with Mud terrain Tyres will be fine. Paul has a decent winch, front and rear diff lockers and some other recovery equipment so you will be in good stead. As I said in the previous post, If somone drove a disco over and put on the MT tyres that I would ask them to fetch too then they would be fine.

You might not want to drive all the way here with MTs on though. Its about 1600 miles from the UK to Transilvania and apart from the extra fuel consumption you will take alot of wear off them with all the motorway distance.

Also if you bring me a disco you get a free trip here and you dont have to be affraid of braking it becuase all the body and chassis is going to get scrapped when I do the engine change anyway

See the pics... Me working hard and Paul taking it easy

scotian, what would the driving time be to deliver the disco for you, im not working at the moment so im giving it some thought, some other questions as well. say someone brings said disco over, how much financial outlay would be needed, i,e return travel home as well as getting to the disco in the first place. im sure members in the uk would help out in a lift here or there but its nice to know before hand. if you see what i mean, how much time would you need someone to help you guys out for, a week or two, a month? . maybe there is someone here that might be interested in the trip if they were sharing the driving.? what does anyone else think? im giving it some thought is there anyone else thinking about giving a fellow member a hand in his time of need?

Nice photo's Paul, good to see the 110 being used for it's intended purpose

Thanks Ralph,

All that preparation has really paid off. A big thanks to rejo as he put in a lot of hours to get me up and running. The funny thing is I spend more time off road here rather than on. On one of the recces myself and Marcus spent 10 hours bouncing around off road before reaching tarmac. In the UK you look forward to the weekends to get some off road time in, so it was funny to feel relieved to hit some asphalt!

Cheers,

Paul