This all started friday. Packed up the jeep with camping gear, tools, and a full tank of gas. We met up with a friend of mine in town, then we hit the freeway for a few hours. The day started to get dark and the jeeps started to slow as we hit traffic. :?
Picked different lanes to see who's lane would move better.
We passed each other a few times and when that game got boring. We decided to chat over the cb. Traffic opened up after an hour of a little over crawling speeds. Climbed up over the mountains and ended up cruising comfortably at 80 on a highway in the desert.
I like that.
We pulled in late friday night. Found our group(MJR). Ran around like a bunch of idiots pitching our tent in the headlights of our jeep. Then we just slept like little baby's. More jeeps arrived in the morning including my brother.
At the start of the trail. There is a section called dorans entrance. Basically, its a bunch of big rocks with a big hole in the middle that will swallow rigs that dont hit it just right. First up is our buddy in his Tj. He was locked up with arb's. Crawls up pretty good.
Has to back up a few times to get his rear tire to climb out. He gets through with no damage. Next jeep is a Zj.
Now I thought this was going to be a problem. He had the stock dana 35 with a detroit and 33's. Hmmm, sounds like this could get interesting really fast. :lol:
Some carefully placed rocks, good spotting, and lots of tire spinning. He makes it up to the most difficult part.
This is where it gets fun, for both spectators and te driver. He goes at it a few times until his sidewalls finally catch and pull him up. Trys to crawl the rest of the way but no go, just spinning tires. He gets on it and just drops into the hole. On the way down the rocks grabbed his front right fender. Stopping him from going all the way into the hole.
Just a little body damage nothing more. Examined the damage then finished the entrance. My dad decided to give it a whirl. He got up the first part alright. Gets to the hard part. This is where I get out and start snapping pics. Plus my seat belt locked up. And there aint no way I am riding up like that. Before I got out I told him that I wouldnt use the thumb throttle on this section and just rely on the gearing to pull you up, avoid winding up the motor if you dont make it. And just have fun. He sets the thumb throttle, motor begins to stall, and he gives it some gas. :roll: Then when he starts climbing over he lets off but the thrumb throttle keeps the rpm's up and keeps him going. He bounces around long enough to get sideways on the entrance.
Winch from the front and the back and guys on the right side with straps on the roll bar.
Front winch pulls him around enough for him to back down. Unhook the winch and he begins backing down. Slides off the rock and crunches his rear corner panel.
Now that he is on the right line he goes up and finishes the entrance.
Next representing the jeep girls in her Red Tj and lockers.
She makes it up the first part good.
Hit the hard part and gets sucked into the hole. Sideways!
After winching, pushing, and some more manuevering she is free and climbs out. Sorry, I didnt get pics of her sideways.
The rest of the trail is rocky with shelves and lose rocks everywhere. We had about 15 or 20 jeeps. Big group if you ask me. Everyone is doing fine except for a few parts where some hang up their diffs and drag rocks. Came to this shelf and our stocker in the group decided to turn back. Everyone gets over this shelf pretty easily except for one rubicon that had a little trouble and needed a quich tug.
Then we see some idiots driving all over this one hillside in their bronco's ad land cruisers. TREAD LIGHTY!
We left those guys behind and ate lunch at some mines. Came down into oddessa canyon.
Everyone did fine in here too. Except chris who always gets stuck. Not because he is a bad driver or his jeep isnt prepaired. He just drives over things that you really shouldnt. :lol: He suposedly cracked his bell housing, but nothing leaked. Must be empty I thought. 8)
Finished the rest of the trail and just kicked back around the fire late at night. Went to sleep, packed the jeep, and cruised home much faster than when we drove up. jeep drove straight as an arrow which was suprising after what we did with it.
All in all this trip was alot of fun. I got to meet alot of really cool people, see some nice body damage and random trail carnage, plus I got to get some driving in. This is all just more encouragement to finish my jeep. The sooner the better, I can't wait much longer!
:roll: 
