The Test Drive

After much consideration of different makes and models I managed to get myself a new vehicle – a Nissan Xtrail, three years old and low km.  And there it was, in the driveway. Maybe, I thought, I should try it on some dirt to see how it goes.

Lake Eildon National Park was the selected location for the test. A quick run around some of the easier four wheel drive tracks. The plan was to drive Taylors Creek Track from the Eildon–Jamieson Road to Jerusalem Creek with a side trip to The Pinnacles. 

We headed down Eildon–Jamieson Road and left the bitumen and continued on Taylors Creek Track in 2wd without any problems to the Pinnacle Track intersection where we headed up to the peak. Pinnacle Track is a steeper, rougher track so I had to put the car into 4wd mode. We made it easily to the top without a problem, riding over the bumps and up the short, steeper sections. Once at the peak, I looked at the track descending the other side and thought “Nope”. It looked like it had been avoided by pretty much everyone else who had been up there and I thought I would do the same. I was happy with the test I had done – the vehicle made it up without any issues and I didn’t feel the need to push it any harder and so headed back down the way we came up to Taylors Creek Track. 

Taylors Creek Track wanders around on a fairly even, easy path and we continued on in 2wd, checking the views over the lake and back towards The Pinnacles and the adjacent Rocky Peak. 

The view along the way

The new car - with The Pinnacle in the background

I have driven this track before and was cruising along without too much thought where we were going when we came to a rather steep section that I didn’t remember from previous trips. It was a while ago and I reasoned that the track must have deteriorated a bit.  I put the car into 4wd, engaged the descent control, and carefully descended an eroded section of loose rock, glad I was heading downhill and not trying to drive up. We soon came to another downhill section, also in need of some work. This was heavily eroded with deep ruts, the kind that if your wheels fall into you find yourself sitting on your belly and going nowhere. I was thankful we started at the southern end of the track and didn’t have to drive up these hills. 

Then we came to the shore of the lake. The lake? What?

It seems I had made a wrong turn at an intersection I didn’t even notice. We had to head back. And I knew that the intersection must be somewhere on the other side of those two @##$% hills.

I stopped at the bottom of the first hill and looked at its eroded surface. The gullies were a good half a metre deep and would definitely see us ‘beached as’ if the wheels fell into them. I checked our recovery gear – winch, rope, radio, snatch strap – we had nothing! I worked out a line and went for it. Three quarters of the way up our forward movement ceased and we rocked backwards slightly to the sound of gravel grinding on the undercarriage. I used a driving technique called pushing the accelerator to the floor. We moved forward, the car extracted itself and we continued to the top. 

Hill number two was a mess of loose shale with a couple of lumps to be avoided along the way. Easy enough coming down but going up? With road tyres? I picked a line – head up the right hand side and veer left just before hitting a small Red Box tree – and engaged a driving technique involving yelling as I drove.  Once again, we did fine until about three-quarters of the way up, when I had to veer left. A bit of wheel spin at the back was countered with louder yelling. It worked and we were soon up.

The rest of the trip was uneventful. The car performed like a dream. I wished I had videoed the two ascents – they would have made a good ad for Nissan. The car seemed undamaged, except for a new noise which may or may not have be the car as it resembled a thumping heart and faded as my nerves calmed.