Turner's Torque - Difficult Decisions

by Damian Turner

A while back I was chatting to Russ from Ardventures, he regularly takes folk on off-road tours, both in the UK from coast to coast weekenders to longer trips to Croatia and Morocco. His current steed is a Land Rover Defender 90 - the new model, and at just under 12 months old he’s covered a staggering 39,000 trouble-free miles. My point here is that he has to be clever in what he takes with him on tours, not just to keep the weight down, but space, too.

With this in mind he gave me his unused 24-piece Front Runner Camp Utensil Kitchen set, and although a great set, it was simply over the top for his needs, as just a knife, fork and spoon is sufficient.

I’m in a fortunate position in that I get quite a bit of off road and camping kit sent to me to review. As a consequence it means that I have a lot of products here at Muddy Towers doing nothing mainly because newer, shinier kit arrives for me to review - it’s a vicious circle.

Amusingly, I can spend a good hour looking at all the different stoves, pots and pans trying to decide which to take with me on a trip.

Do I really need 6 BBQs and 8 fire pits?

Probably not. Of course I’m not complaining, but it does mean that our modest 2-up-2 down terrace is bursting at the seams, so I reckon it’s time to be ruthless and sell some stuff. After all, they do say that a clear home creates a clear mind.

The other week Muddy Madam created a spreadsheet of all the products we have stored in the house, I went through it and ticked around 90% that I wanted to keep - “Not good enough.” she told me. She’s right, of course. (Can I have that in writing! - Muddy Madam)

So I’ve made another list that reads ‘things I have that I haven’t used in a while’ and ‘things I need, but I don’t have.’ Essentially, if we haven’t used a product during 3 overnight camping trips or green-laning days then it has to go. Obviously that doesn’t mean recovery gear!

Not only does this mean that we can plan quicker escapes, but we’ll also carry less kit, and consequently we should get better mpg from Deux Smurf!

I don't really want to get rid of any of it, but I just need to make space for all the new stuff, oh and stay married! Therefore at some point in the very near future we will be offering up loads of great stuff at brilliant prices, that have either been hardly used or have loads of life left to go. Our wonderful Ko-fi supporters (https://ko-fi.com/mudlifemag) will get first pick, after that we'll offer them up to anyone who subscribes to the mag (https://www.themudlife.co.uk/themudlifemagazine-sign-up), and then I'll open up the page to the general public.