Flat six in the sticks: going off-grid in the Porsche 911 Dakar

“While some will enjoy the challenge and beauty of camping in winter, for others it may be a case of physical and mental endurance.”

So reads the advice of Mountaineering Scotland, the arbiter of such things north of the border. Conversely, my own camping expertise starts and ends with watching Bravo Two Zero on VHS circa 1999.

But at least photographer Max Edleston and I won’t be wanting for kit on our wander into the wilds, starting our journey as we do at the Decathlon outdoor store on the outskirts of Edinburgh.

Mountaineering department manager Roksana helpfully recommends some snug-fitting 0deg C-rated sleeping bags, mini pillows for comfort, thermal base layers for PJs, a rechargeable lantern, a cooking set and a tiny gas stove for the task ahead. This confirms (a) that warmth and sustenance will be paramount, and (b) that there is little dignity in trying a sleeping bag for size in public.

What we don’t pick up is a tent, because we already have one in a box outside that, agreeably, has a Porsche 911 clamped to its underside. But this is no ordinary 911.

Ostensibly, the £173,000 Porsche 911 Dakar is a tribute to 1984’s 7500-mile Paris-Dakar Rally, where Frenchman René Metge took victory in the new ‘953’ – a rally-prepped 911 Carrera 3.2 with four-wheel drive produced specifically for the race.

But to us, it is a new breed of production 911: one based on the Carrera 4 GTS but claimed to have the off-road chops we’ll be needing as we forego manicured campsites in favour of that ‘wild camping’ experience.

As Metge diced with Range Rovers, Mitsubishi Pajero Evos, MAN trucks and off-road motorcycles, we’ll be leaving the blacktop for trails usually driven in Land Rover Defenders, Mitsubishi L200s and commercial log-luggers.

We won’t be skimming over sun-scorched dunes or have access to our own gravel special stage, so I’m relieved our Dakar isn’t wearing the Rothmans-style Rallye Design Package. Hackles are already up for exotic cars on Highland roads, let alone off them, and we won’t be troubling the 106mph this car can manage on its maximum ride height setting, so pale green paintwork will do fine.

In fact, even before it is hydraulically boosted to that 191mm of clearance, the 161mm the Dakar normally sits at, along with the thick body cladding and sober shade, lends the car a pragmatic stance I really quite enjoy.

On the undemanding, three-hour slog into the heart of the Cairngorms National Park, I wish that pragmatism extended to the exhaust tone and gearbox mapping.

We have both in their most relaxed settings, but the on-throttle drone of the former and the occasional over-eagerness of the latter to hold ratios are early but lasting bugbears when it comes to these workaday miles, of which there will surely be plenty when owners are chugging between metropolitan base and rural hideaway.

And while the carbonfibre bucket seats holster your body beautifully, they do nothing to dampen the exhaust’s resonance.

That’s all right, though – you can choose Sports Seats Plus (plush, heated and fully electrically adjustable) instead at no cost. I’d also forfeit the £2846 Rallye Sport Package’s rear roll-cage to allow easier use of the otherwise empty space behind the two solitary seats.

We’re riding on all-terrain Pirelli Scorpion tyres – chunky, purposeful and deep-treaded – which might explain a little fidgeting on the motorway, and there’s a gentle whistle from above as our tent box cuts through the air at 70mph, but we engage cruise control and let the A9 roll beneath our wheels happily enough.

The road may be dull but, increasingly, the scenery isn’t. We’re on the cusp of winter, and the sunlit woods flanking the road near Pitlochry are all variations on green, brown and yellow. Then a huge, treeless vista opens up to our left, where wind-whipped Loch Garry sprawls into the hazy Munros beyond.

Within an hour we’re in the Cairngorms and revisiting Inshriach Estate, where manager and gin distiller Walter Micklethwait hosted us in a Land Rover Defender back in 2020.

He has generously given us the run of his 200 acres, so we switch the Dakar into Off-road mode for the first time, giving maximum clearance, defaulting the multi-plate clutch between the axles to a more even torque split and raising the idle speed for greater throttle control.

A stony trail leads us across fields then through juniper bushes and silver birch to the bank of the famous River Spey, bulging after recent storms.

The Dakar is roundly unfazed, the terrain testing neither its ground clearance nor traction – unless you force the issue via rear-biased Rallye mode, when there’s easily controlled breakaway available on demand. We nestle the car right by the river, where it looks barely less congruous than Land Rover’s Defender did.

It’s a lovely spot, and one that other 911s simply couldn’t access, but we’re in search of bigger challenges, and Micklethwait has secured permission for us to access some private forestry nearby.

So a few minutes up the road and we’re jacking the chassis up once more to tackle a slittery uphill track that’s hemmed in by rusting ferns and studded with chunky stones.

Traction remains immutable as we clamber up, the mini boulders leaving the Dakar’s belly untickled.

Unlike tackling the momentum-hungry dunes of the Sahel, this is a slow, technical climb, and the pinpoint throttle control on offer – commendable for a 149mph car – combines with automatic hill-hold and sympathetic gearbox mapping to let you focus on plotting a course, while there’s none of the blancmange-tower wobble you get when creeping a high-rise 4x4 over rocks.

Rear-wheel steer tightens the turns, too, and while the surround-view cameras might intend to prevent you maiming an alloy against the precipitous kerbs of Edinburgh’s Georgian New Town, they also let you track each wheel’s progress twixt obstacles out here in the boonies.

The gradient momentarily settles as we enter the treeline and pick up the pace through a mix of ancient woodland and forestry, where ubiquitous pine straw looks like a carpet of All-Bran.

There are boggy patches in the mud beneath, but the Dakar pounds on. Our only significant impediments are the sharply dipping water breaks that channel tiny burns across the path, and Edleston gets out to act as banksman.

Fully extended, we have 80% of the maximum clearance of a Porsche Cayenne on air suspension and no less than 90% of a steel-sprung example’s.

But our issue is in the approach and departure angles, where the 911’s athletic silhouette yields only 16deg and 18deg respectively. For context, a previous-generation Defender 90 offers 47deg at each end.

We’re soon climbing again as a newly driven track spears up towards the summit. The water breaks are more severe here, and we need to lay slabs of stone to see the nose over a couple.

Even then, though, the third one we encounter is too extreme: we’re about 30mm short of clearance at the bow.