Reverse, reverse, reverse

I had a great time learning how to 4WD yesterday. My department does a course that teaches you the maximum limits that the vehicles are capable of. It was fun, stressful and exhausting. I knew the toughest part for me was going to be reversing through a curvy lane that was staked out. I had to reverse, reverse, reverse, cause I struggled with it more than anyone. I kept overcompensating and ran over numerous stakes. How I can be so terrible at reversing, yet great at parallel parking and backing up a boat trailer, is beyond me! The funnest part was going through lots of rough holes that they would continue digging out making them deeper so that you would lose traction of 1 or even 2 wheels. After mastering going forward through the rough bit, then you had to reverse through it. I decided I prefer the Toyota Hilux for the rough bit, but it sucks for reversing cause it has small mirrors, the Holden Rodeo had the nice large mirrors that made it easier to reverse with. Then we learned how to go up a steep hill and how to do an emergency back down if you started to slip. Then up the hill, turn around and back down. Then reverse up the hill, turn around and reverse back down. Then onto a side slope, forward, then reverse again. So far all these things had been staked out, so you had to follow the course exactly...did I mention how many stakes I reversed over??!!! We had to do each of these things until you could do it perfectly. After all that we had to drive around the hills and test our new skills. Why I volunteered to go first and in the truck that I hate the mirrors on is beyond me! I ended up going along a path that was over grown with gorse bushes and was scratching the truck. After sometime, my instructor finally tells me it's only going to get worse, what should I do now? Bugger! Now I have to reverse along this overgrown path with the bushes scraping the sides of the truck making that horrific high pitched noise of fingernails on a chalkboard. After much over-compensating and having to pull forward to re-align over and over again...during which the scraping noise is horrible and now making me anxious, we finally get back to the path where we came up the hill, which is much of a drop off! I managed to do it...scarily! Cynthia in the back seat says "Kristin that didn't feel too good back here!" I said "It didn't feel good up here either!" And asked the instructor if I could have done it any better and he said no, I did good. Phew! Time to get the hell out and let someone else have a go! Cynthia didn't ride along on the next test, which was a good thing, cause Doug had to reverse it over that same "cliff" I had just drove down. And when he did so, the front end dropped down into the gorse bushes off the path and I kinda let out a scream! F?#%! I thought I had it stressful! Last was Cynthia's turn, she had to maneuvere around a boggy area. Finally, a refresher on how to use the radios to call for help and how to change a tire. Then back to the department to scrub the trucks clean! I was exhausted, and happy to know that more than likely I'll never need to use most of those things I learned today because you wouldn't normally be in those situations!