The Defender Camp (video link below)
It had been on my list for a long time…… Self-supported overnight camping on a mountain. Simple idea and easy to execute! To make this mini adventure a little better, the decision was made to do it in a rooftop tent, drive up the mountain with a big 4×4, spend the night and bang down on the MTB early the next morning.
After some googling I came across steel-brothers.co.uk, the company for hiring Landrover Defenders to make wonderful adventures a reality.
The weekend I can get away from my normal daytime job, there was luckily still a Defender for rent with double roof tent. The defender was packed with a lot of cool camping gear that is also sold through the website urbansandindians.nl.
From the Netherlands, it is difficult to determine exactly where to go, what are good spots and where it is allowed at all. Erik from MTBverbier.com was able to help me with that, in fact; he liked the idea so much that he decided to come along!
Getting rid of 890 kilometres with a Defender takes some of your patience, a distance that takes me just under 8 hours in my own car now takes over 10.5 hours. So after some slight annoyance, I arrived at the beautiful chalet of MTBverbier at the end of the afternoon, Erik throws his gear and bike in the defender, groceries I had quickly done on the way and hop up that mountain!
My 4×4 experience is not very great, but fortunately the dirt tracks are rock hard and require absolutely 0 experience this weekend. After a ride of about 45 minutes we reach the top, we park the car and we decide to climb a bit further by bike first. We could do with a nice descent!!!
Back at the car, we quickly load up and drive to the spot where we unfold the roof tents and wait for the breathtaking sunset. Truly not normally beautiful! Using the Wood Stove G3300 in combination with the BBQ grill – GoGrill, we grill our burgers and sausages ready on small wood. The temperature drops like crazy at this altitude in the mountains and soon, with several layers of clothing and a campfire in front of the mountain hut, we try to keep ourselves warm in the harsh wind and a temperature of -4 degrees.
The next morning again offers a beautiful scene, the cloud cover lies like a blanket over the valley, the sun rising quietly and falling over us like a warm blanket when it reaches our defender. First, a cup of coffee, piece of baguette and fried eggs with bacon. It may be back to basics, but with this defender and camping gear, it’s wonderfully comfortable! After breakfast, Erik drops me off at the top of that mountain so I can ride all the way down from there.
The variety is wonderful, the format is genius and recommended to everyone. Independent of a lift and without having to climb for hours you get everywhere you want, it doesn’t get any better than this! And of course, to top off the weekend, we did go lift supported into Verbier’s bike park 😀
