This is the first meetup I went to at a local off-road shop, TEQ Customs- mainly because they were serving pulled pork BBQ and sides for very reasonable prices. The food even managed to get the Spawns to come along.
My takeaways:
- OB, the guy who spent 18 hours making the BBQ, knows what he was doing. It was excellent, and so were the sides. Full marks, bravo!
- Overlanding is a place where you can spend as much money as you want- and more! It's just like racing in that regard.
- I heard of a few spots and events in NC I might want to visit I hadn't heard about before, including a dark-sky event hosted with astronomy/stargazing in mind.
- Among fisherman that drive their rigs on the beach, the one thing everybody seems to agree on is the faster you can wash your rig when you get off of the beach, the better.
- Car people are car people. Everybody was friendly and thrilled to talk about their rigs. I spent a while talking to folks about their lighting, solar, suspension, tires, the gnarly places they've driven and all of the things off-roaders and overlanders like to do. It's no different from talking about engine tuning, suspension, tires and lap times with the racers and autocrossers.
- On the subject of tires, this is just as complicated and divisive a subject as it is in the pavement world.
Some awful photos:
I spoke with the owner of the white Tacoma with the camper in the back for a while. That little camper shell has a pop up sleeping area, sink, fridge, stove, solar and some other stuff. I didn't ask, but I shudder to think how much they paid for that. Overland camping seems to be their number one hobby/activity, so if you view it as entertainment, lodging and transportation, maybe the sticker shock isn't as bad.
It's going to take me a bit to get used to how the newest Land Cruisers look. Also, the FJ in towards the back of the photo was missing some body panels, but that didn't stop them from coming to the meet up.
A tiny workshop on a Tacoma.
One of the fishing rigs, set up for driving down the Outer Banks. They've gone to a higher spring rate to accommodate the extra weight they carry, added air lockers and have lights all over everything. According to them, they've never even gotten close to stuck. The gentleman knows how to weld, and is currently home-building an off-road trailer.
