well I been back from my Colorado trip for a couple days now just been super busy with other things work and tryin to get some sleep back I been missin for the last month I put around 2000 miles on the Jeep of hiway miles trail miles and just plain ass kickin miles! I was with some of the best people a guy could ask for! and met a new one and he happins to be a Ford guy I was gone from Aug 10-18 and saw alot of towns and forgot alot of them! I shoulda wrote a log along the way we were in sterling Colorado the first day after sterling we headed towards Estes park Colorado this is where the Jeep did its best Economy 25 MPG! GOTTA love a cummins! the MTS is where the diese l really shined where the gassers struggles and droped many gears I rarely hit third usually droped down to 4th but if noone was in front of me it pulled 5th ok once in Estes park we headed to our first trail we got started on a trail and found the campsite and set up camp camped there for the nite then went out on the trail the next morn and that took about 2 hours we also got out and sight saw and took pics then headed back to camp and packed up and headed on to the next adventure which was over my Georgetown Colorado so far casualties were a toyotas rear diff was venting gear oil and also needed some more fender trimming for the 40 inch tires and the explores was havin a lil over heating issues and after the 1st trail run the rear end ring gear bolts were trying to find their way out of the diff throught the cover luckily we got lucky and it didnt hurt too much and ford dont use special bolts to hold ring gear on so a hardware store had the bolts we needed and a lil silicone sealed the lil pinholes the bolts put in the cover when they were tryin to leave that took about 2 hours and of corse it rained on us while we worked on it didnt have really any issues on the way to Georgetown just some steep ass grades I forgot the name of the trail by Georgetown but let me tell u it was Steep! and had some hellacious dropoff ledges! we camped on that trail cause it was gettin late and there was a clearing for a campsite and with shear dropoffs we didnt chance it at night wheeling the next morn we got up made some breakfast and packed up gear and headin out on trail alot of tight switchbacks! and very bumpy rock covered roads towards the end it started t orain which turned t oice pellets wich then later turned to a downpour! some atvers told on the lower part of trail was impassable by us due to a rock stickin out on trail we poundered a bit then walked th trail and dint see a big issue so we continued and finnished the trail alot of switchbacks! we left that trail and headed to the town of georgetown and ate a 12 dollar hamburger! we left there and hit interstate 70 again headin west and went through Eisnhower tunnel! wish i had a pic of Jeep in that we entered the tunel on a nice day and exited in a rainstorm! and surrounded by DUMBASSES!! the was a semiwreck goin east bound fro mthere we headed to HOLY Cross trail which I cant remember the town it was by but it was in the boonies! we set up camp there it was gettin dark we went t osleep we woke up t oice on out tents gear and rigs to top that off Iforgot to unplug the inverter on the Jeep Iturned the Key on and it showed 10 volts! Iunpluged inverter and tried startin the cold Cummins with 10 Volts she wasnt happy but she fired after a few cranks! Gotta love the cummins and thats with no heater grids or cold starting aids! we went out to trail and the Ford Explorer was the first victome it suffered bent spring perches and the rear rocked and bound the rear ujoint and broke the joint and the driveshaft ear so he brought another one put it in and headed back to camp we finnished the trail we also picked up another wheeler wit ha fullsize chevy it was too big t ogo up the rest of the way so he turned around and headed to camp in doin so he ran his driveshaft on a rock and dented it badly we made it t oholy cross city and got out and took pics its a old mining comunity that is now defunked we made it to the end and turned around and headed back down the trail made it to camp and found out that the explorer headed to the next town to get its spring perches fixed so we packed up aired up and headed for the next town which was leadville Colorado it was abot 30 - 40 miles of winding roads we made it there wit ha 6.2 Non turbo chevy diesel leaving a smoke clound that noone could see us goin down the road! we made it to the town with no issues other then the chevy had a big driveshaft vibration from the shaft bein caved in we went and got a motel room and cleaned up after a cpl days without a shower then went out to eat another 20 dollar meal was pretty much raw meat! then went to a bar and got offered weed ha ha ha ha went to sleep in a real bed woke up and watched others work on their rigs damage done? Suzuki samy caved in rear gas tank"leaking" chevy rear driveshaft found different one and put in new joints toyota was fine and my Jeep was fine tho I did take time to grease rear shaft the explorer wasnt fixed yet so he told us to go on to the next town/trail and hed meet up with us so we headed out to Bunavista Colorado we found where we were gonna camp and set up it took forever to get to camp rough ass road! we set up camp and head back out to go to the next trail called Chinamans gultch all I ca nsay is wow! it was the most technical trail we had it was alot of fun alot of big boulders and alot of rough stuff we got back to camp and found some pot smokin hippies took up our spot and told us we could leave if we wanted to otherwise we could party with them we decided the later and left and found a beter spot anyways we set up camp again and had a great night sleep the Explorer caught up with us at camp after the trail the next morn we packed up and headed to breken ridge Colorado a long winding way down a Mountain that took a bit of time we got t otown and got some food and suplies we ate at a Taco bell the cheapest place we ate all week then we headed for the next trail which took a lil time to get to we made it there and set up camp next to a good flowin creek and picked up some souviners then decided to go out and wheel the toyyota stayed back so it was the Jeep the sammy and the Explorer it was a 2wd run till we hit what seemed like a dead end trail but I saw snow damn it and I wanted to touch it the sammy and explorer tried but lost traction/power and spun out I spun out twice but the Mighty cummins didnt have a power issue so the 3rd try was a charm! she was a screamin Jeep was a bouncin and hopin all over but it climbed and climbed and climbed the temp gage peged 250 and the pyro exhaust temp it 1400 and the boost was at 20 PSI!on a flat spot on the MT I stoped and let her idle and cool down a bity then I crawled the rest of the way in 1st gear made it to the top of the MT at 12,509 ft got out of Jeep and on foot crawled down part of MT and touched the snow at 60 degrees! then made 3 snowballs and took em back to Jeep and started to make our way back down thats where we ran into trouble it was steep we lost out trail we took up and started side hilling a Mountain! not a good idea BTW we managed to do ok for a bit then the Jeep just wanted to dig a hole with the driver rear and lift the passenger front so I shut it off an pulled the warn winch cable out and tied it to a tree/bush that helped alot! pulled it stright up the trail were we went up and I just backed down the rest of the way on the way down about 100 yards from where the other rigs were my driver rear tire hit a sharp roc kand put a hole in my tire! I couldnt do anything about it so I just backed it down with a flat tire which I was rewarded with a torn sidewall but yet the tire never lost its bead! at the bottom we changed the tire and headed back to camp we camped which was the worst sleep i had ever been havin a back issure the last month got up made breakfast packed up and went up to the continental divide then down to the next town which we were headin our way back home we drove through Denver and onto the next campsite last of the week at some abandoned state park in eastern COLORADO causualties? the sammy was suffering shit in the tank that we had to change filters and blow the lines out I had to pull over for fuel and the two rigs in front didnt see us turn off so it was me and the sammy we filled up and bout ready to leave and the sammy lost all headlights we figgured out the prob was bad bulbs so we found old truck in back of station and swaped lights and back on road we made it to the campsite way later then the others and decided to sleep in the Jeep that didnt work I just put a blanket on ground and covered up and slept outside we got up at 5 am next morn no breakfast and hit the road for home it was 550 miles till home and we went stright through had no issues other then sammy fuel issues and later we reset the float bowls on sammy we broke away from the sammy and explorer at Beatrice Neb which is a shithole and dont have many diesel fuel stops we headed home with no issues we bade it t from Beatrice t ospencer on 12 gallons of diesel got home at 730 pm sun night Had fun and again thaks t oall the good friends and good times!
Posted on: Wed, 21 Aug 2013 03:06:38 +0000
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