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The vehicles rolled off one by one around the parking lot and onto the highway. It must have been quite a sight from the sidelines, eighteen Rangers, eight Explorer Sport Tracs, five F-150s and two Expeditions in formation. A few kilometers later, the convoy broke off from the highway onto the Megadike. The Megadike is a wall about 56 km long and 6-8 meters wide at the top. It was built in 1996 to the tune of PHP1.4 billion (USD 26 million) to protect southern Pampanga from being buried by Mt. Pinatubo’s lahar, a mix of mud and volcanic debris that could easily plow through anything in its path. Think of a river of steaming-hot concrete, including debris from stones to 10-meter boulders, flowing at up to 60 km/h and you’ll have a pretty accurate idea of what lahar can do to the landscape. The top of the Megadike doubled as a road, in the same way that a pile of boulders could be termed a footpath. Actually, the road surface was pockmarked with rocks, bumps and deep ruts. We plowed along at about 30-50 km/h, avoiding the deeper holes, but traversing the shallower dips with ease. We switched the Ranger to 4x4 high mode. The pickup held steady and was nimble enough to dodge the bigger holes. Soon it became impossible to avoid all of them, as there were oncoming trucks in the other lane. We were not about to drive over the craters slowly, or we would lose sight of the vehicle ahead and break the convoy. So we rode the holes like a speedboat would crest the waves. The Ranger was utterly obedient to commands to change direction. Thankfully so, because the alternative would have been a 6-meter plunge down the edge of the wall. Fist-sized rocks pummeled the Ranger’s wheel-wells and floorpan. No car-derived SUV, no matter how tough it may look, would have survived even this first section. We would have considered thirty minutes of rock-surfing a sufficient dose of offroading, but it was merely a preview. Part two was a descent from the Megadike to a river bed. The vehicles ground to a halt at the end of the dike, and we were instructed to switch to 4x4 low mode. We needed to traverse some large boulders that formed a staircase of sorts down to the river bed; these rocks would be pulling each of the Ranger’s tires in different directions. The correct way is to keep the vehicle parallel to the line of descent—that is, pointing straight down. It may seem like a steeper plunge from the driver's seat, but the vehicle will be more stable because it will descend along its longer axis. If one attempts to take it in a diagonal path, the truck has good chance of rolling over. There was a frightening moment when a white F-150 Lariat took the descent slightly diagonally. The marshals shouted at the driver to keep it straight. Once the huge pickup was correctly aimed, it rolled down without incident. The riverbed itself was not too deep and we traversed easily, the water rushing by just below the truck’s floor. At the far bank was some soft sand which the Ranger climbed easily. We ascended a 30-degree hillside—funny how quickly we begin to take things for granted—then roared off along what passed for a road in these parts—a hardened lahar path leading to the Porac river.
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