Tiny rally car in a huge desert. Back in 2017, that was what drew me in. I was spat out several days later, eyes wizened, mind broadened, shoes full of sand. This was the fearlessly amateur Tuareg Rally, seven days of belting around Morocco, a learning curve steeper than any dune. The Jimny, a 12-year-old £1,400 eBay purchase rally prepped by MaxTraction, was wonderfully approximate in its handling – a match, then, for its driver’s knowledge.
Follow the camel poo. That pearl of wisdom from John Cockburn will stay with me always. Camels don’t want to walk in soft sand, so follow their poo. Stands to reason. The trouble was I took the rest of team manager John’s dune driving crash course far too literally. Misjudging a dune edge, I…