Hi Debath,
Were you in low or high range? Soft sand is
really hard work for a vehicle, so I'd suggest low range if you weren't already using it.
If you were in high range, there's a couple of things that might impact your experience:
Selecting sand/mud is theoretically supposed to allow the wheels more slip before traction control/etc kicks in, but it only partially disables the stability and traction control. In sand/mud, the wheels will spin and the vehicle will slide around as you progress. Traction and stability control systems work by applying brakes and to stop wheels spinning and vehicles sliding around. Not your friend in sand! There's a button on the dashboard to turn traction/stability control off completely.
Also, I think in high range sand/mud, it's still shuffling power front to rear depending on traction, whereas low range locks front:rear power distribution 50:50. Selecting low range also disables the traction/stability control, from memory. The rear diff lock is your friend in soft sand, too, ensuring constant power delivery to both rear wheels.
There's a couple of really good vids on youtube that demonstrate:
High range, without diff locked:
Low range, with diff locked:
Re the mud flaps - I just used smallish screws into the inside of the plastic mouldings around the wheel arches (inside of the flares, the actual lining of the wheel well itself is pretty flimsy. Only takes small screws though, it doesn't take much to hold mudflaps on, and if you happen to catch them on something off road you want them to come off without too much grief, not tear parts of the car off with them...