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  Part I  |
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 ... continued from Part IAfter Justin guided me through the tough obstacle in 2 wheel drive, the trail straightened out before us was a loose rock mountain side which the rest of the group was slowly driving up towards the crest of the pass. Although it didn’t look that difficult, I could hear Jeff Jones tell us on the CB, that it was really steep, and there was a place where the trail went between two boulder outcroppings at the start of the climb which you really had to be careful to keep from bouncing your truck into it as it would definitely create body damage. This is where Robert Waters’s FJ40 stalled on this steep section, which was about 10,000ft elevation. Dave Rising’s FJ80 passed Robert, and proceeded up to the top of the crest without any difficulty. When I got up to Robert’s FJ40, I could tell it wasn’t getting fuel delivery, as his AISIN carb site glass didn’t have any fuel in it. I suspected fuel pump problems, rather than the carburetor jetting, which Robert had previously suspected earlier in the week. By this time, everyone in the group was waiting for us (Robert, Me, and Justin), to get up to the top. Since we couldn’t proceed and just leave Robert, we radioed the group, and Jeff Jones drove back down to help us. Since Robert left his spare fuel pump back at camp, Jeff wired in an electrical fuel pump he carried as a spare. Here’s a picture I snapped showing Jeff, Robert, and Justin making the repair. Notice the steepness of Jeff’s FJ80. It sits at the beginning of the long, loose rock climb to the top.  We got Robert’s FJ40 running, but it was way too tricky to operate by hand. Since Jeff didn’t have a pressure regulator, so it was rigged where Robert manually operated the current flow to the pump. Rather than risking problems on this loose section facing us, Jeff decided to tow Robert to the top. When I followed, and began to get into the really loose, step rock (and right between the two big boulders!), I couldn’t precede any further. Again, my 4 wheel low range lever was popping out, so I only had one rear wheel helping me in these loose rocks. Justin saw I was having problems, so he volunteered to tow me to the top, but he somehow had to get around me. We thought there might be room for him to navigate his FJ40 (actually he was driving Jeff Jone’s FJ40 - Justin was borrowing it for the week) between the boulder on my driver side, and my FJ60. I was behind my FJ60, and when he was even, I noticed the FJ40 was sliding towards my FJ60, and that if he proceeded, his spare tire would take off my driver side view mirror! I told him to stop, and slowly back up. When he did, the fender of the FJ40 kissed my front driver side door! The damage was minor, and I was more concerned about the scratch on pristine paint job on Jeff’s FJ40. When Jeff finished towing Robert, he came back down to help me up to the top. He wasn’t bothered by the minor paint scratch on his fender, and he hooked me up, and towed me to the top! What a cool dude! When we all got to the top, everyone was bunched up. Gary said that the trail he had intended to take us into Animas Forks (California Gulch), had been closed by the Forest Service. We could either continue to take the very difficult Poughkeepsie gulch route, which was even tougher at the top, or turn around, go back where we had just come through, and link back up with Engineer Pass (Where the jeep lady had advised me), and go back that way. This would obviously take much longer, but, given our troubles (My 4wd problem, and Robert’s fuel delivery problem), we decided it was a safer route to take. While we were discussing what to do, Justin used a ratchet strap to lock my 4 wheel drive lever in 4 low. This little trick worked nicely by keeping it in 4 wheel drive the rest of the trip that day. The group turned around, and we all went back down. We got past the loose rock section. I was following Jeff Jones, and he went over a big boulder, and radioed me that I could follow his patch. Since I was worried about quarter panel damage, and realizing that Jeff was driving a lifted FJ40 with oversized tires, I decided to take a side route around that big boulder. This was kind of scary, as it seemed like I might tip my FJ60 right into the boulder I was bypassing, but I got through without any problems. We made good progress back to the intersection of where Poughkeepsie and Engineer pass route met, and we all began the trip up Engineer. This was pretty slow going the first few miles, in part due to the switchback road with tight turns, oncoming vehicles which caused us to pull over and let them pass, and Robert’s FJ40 not running correctly. Finally, after further efforts to solve the problems with Robert’s FJ40, Jeff decided to tow Robert to the top of the pass, where Robert could then drive his FJ40 down back to town. It was beginning to get late, and as the group went over the pass, I noticed quite a few mule deer coming out to eat. Justin dropped behind me in the FJ40 and took a number of pictures of wildlife, and wonderful views of the mountains as the sunset came in. We finally got back to Silverton around 8:00pm. I went and had another Buffalo Burger at Handlebars with Don Pennington, his son, and his Colorado wheeling buddy, Jim, as my table company. What a fine ending to a long day! Wednesday On Wednesday morning, Robert took off his old fuel pump, and you could clearly see the worn lever where it rode against the camshaft. He put in his new fuel pump, and his FJ40 ran perfectly. His fuel delivery problems were solved for good now! Gary Coberly, and several other people in our group, wanted to take the Durango to Silverton train. This was pretty much an all day event, and it runs about $50 for the ticket. Not wanting to go on that trip, but instead preferring to see more of the area, a small group of us (Randy Underwood, Robert Waters, Dave Rising, Dave Accosta and Myself) decided to take a short "guided trip" up to see clear lake, as well as several waterfalls, just a few miles west/southwest of Silverton. Dave Surface and his wife volunteered ride with me and guide us up into this area. We got to the first waterfall, which can be seen from the county road. It was very impressive. The falls had carved out a ten foot deep pool in the solid rock basin. The water was painfully cold, and just above freezing. We got quite a few good pictures, then decided to move on to some better, more secluded waterfalls that Dave knew about. These second set of waterfalls were much larger, and more difficult to get close too, due to the steep valley they were in. The falls were also about two hundred yards off the main road, secluded by tall timber. Here’s a picture of the main waterfall.  After an hour or so of messing around at these waterfalls, the group went back down the gravel road towards Silverton. However, we still wanted to se clear lake, which was at the top of a mountain bowl. There was a 4 wheel drive switchback road leading up to the lakes, so we drove up this road. When we were almost to the summit area, we noted the thunderstorms building over the river valley where we were just at. I took this picture (we were at about 10,000ft elevation), showing the storm building, and heading towards us. The rainshafts in this picture are falling down in the area of the waterfalls.  As we got closer to the summit, and the lakes, the storm was just about on us, and we were seeing a lot of lightning strikes. We got up to the lakes, which were naturally formed and pristine, and large enough for fishing. We couldn’t stay long, however, because of the bad weather, so we headed back down. By the time we were halfway down mountain, it was pouring sleet on us. My FJ60’s hood was covered in about 1 inch of wet sleet!  We got back to Silverton about 3:00pm. The Thunderstorm had blown our tents around a little bit, so I adjusted mine. I just goofed around there in the camp the rest of the afternoon, and that evening, Randy and his wife, Ellen, Dave and his two young children, Robert, and myself, went out to a Mexican food restaurant there in Silverton. The food there was pretty darn good! That evening, we went to Randy’s cabin, and watched a four wheel drive show which covered many of the trails we had been driving on. It was pretty interesting, and we gathered a big group. We even had a couple of jeepers from California come up to the cabin, and join us in the viewing. We made some new friends! Thursday This was the day we decided to go to Telluride, either via Black Bear pass, or Ophir pass. Most of the group decided to take the Black Bear route. Since I was pushing my luck with my FJ60, I decided to ride with Robert. I also left my camera in the FJ60, hence, no pictures for this trip. Randy, Robert, Dave, and our new California Jeep buddies, Dale, and his son, joined our group. We decided to take the Ophir pass into Telluride, have lunch, and take Immogene pass back. Ophir was not much of a challenge. In fact, it looked more like a county road for most of the route. It was wide route, and only narrowed to one lane as it went over the crest of the pass, and for the first half mile on the west side of the pass as it descended towards the settlement of Ophir. There was also quite a bit of traffic, as less capable vehicles could drive this pass. I even saw a ford Taurus pass going east. It was bouncing on the rocks and gravel, and its muffler was loose and hanging, but wasn’t having any problems. We went through Ophir, then took the highway into Telluride, where we eventually found a place to park, then walk down to main street where we eventually found a place for lunch, after spotting a pristine FJ55 sitting a block off of main street. By the time we finished lunch, it was raining outside, but we just had to go check out that FJ55. We had to wait a little bit until the rain passed, then, we walked over to the FJ55, which was parked behind a business. It was really sweet and stock looking from the outside, with a nice new OEM paint job, but I think it had a V-8 in it, rather than the original I-6! When we got done looking at the FJ55, we got back to Main Street, and we saw most of the other guys rolling down mainstreet coming in from their Black Bear pass trip. We waved at them, went back to our vehicles and loaded back up, and then found the route which took us to Immogene pass. There seemed to be a lot of motor cycle and jeep touring vehicles going up this road as we left Telluride behind us, but as we went on, I came to realize why it was so popular. This route passes a number of abandoned famous mining sites, including the legendary Tomboy mine. We stooped at just about every mining site which had a parking area pulloff. Dave was having a field day with all the geological formations which could be seen on this trip. He was explaining why the area became such a good location for finding precious metals such as gold and silver. After a short visit at the actual Tomboy mine location (which was actually a very large site, with immense ruins), Robert and I took off to head up to the top of the pass. When we got to the top, we had a short visit with some California based offroad motorcylists (the old man and his old lady actually rode a motorcycle with a sidecar- they looked like they were from a Mad Max movie!), then we took a few pictures of Robert’s FJ40 backdropped against Red Mountain. The weather was becoming much colder because of lack of the cloudy conditions and the elevation, and because it was becoming late in the afternoon, Robert and I picked up our pace to try and get back before dark. We passed a guy walking up the pass (he said he blew his rear main seal in his truck we had just passed parked on the side), then spoke to a guy in a jeep going up to the pass. He said Immogene was his favorite pass in the area, and this was the third time he had driven it that week! As we got down to more level terrain where the treeline began, we noticed a few mule deer coming out to feed. Their was a spring, and creek, and the area was very lush with vegetation. We tried to radio Dave, and Randy, and we picked them up as they come to the top of the pass. We could just barely see their vehicles. We finally came out on the Yankee Boy Basin shelf road, which traverses above the active Camp Bird gold mine in the valley below. This was an impressive view, particularly when we looked back where we just came and could see some old mine shafts in the cliff face, with wooden ladders still hanging down the cliff face for access. We proceeded quickly into Ouray, then back to Silverton up U.S. 550, arriving well past dark. I was really impressed with the scenic views, old mine sites, and wildlife we saw on the Immogene pass route, and it was clearly my favorite during the whole trip. Friday On Friday, we decided to kind of take it easy, get ready to head back home, and see a few of the local tourist sites. John Winstead, his son, and Justin Ward, packed up and started their trip to Texas that morning. Dave Surface and his wife also started their trip back home that morning, after saying goodbye. I finally got around to taking these pictures of a really sweet, basically rust free, 1966 or 1967 FJ40 which was just a couple of blocks north of the campground.   Randy, Ellen and I went over to the local museum to check it out, and purchased tickets to see the mine tour, and the old gold mill, just outside of town towards Animas Forks. We had lunch downtown near the train depot, and just beat the arrival of several hundred train riders. We then went up to Gold Mine (flagged down Robert on our way), met Dave and his kids, and we all loaded up in the mine carts for the mine tour, which lasted a couple of hours. The tour guide was an actual miner who had worked at the mine in the 1970s, and was quite colorful and entertaining, and made the tour well worth it. After we got back to the main entrance, Dave and kids, Randy and Ellen tried to pan some gold. It looked like muddy water to me, so Robert and I decided to go to the next attraction, which was the Gold Mill. We were the only people there, besides the attendant and his two large dogs, but this was kind of fun because it was self guided. You could actually run some of the equipment, by hitting the power buttons. We got back to camp about 4:30pm, and Robert and I decided to pull up camp while the tent was dry, and prepare to sleep in the back of our trucks, so that we could get a good start the next morning on our trip back home. Saturday Randy and Ellen left early Saturday morning, and took the south route home. Robert, Dave, and I decided to take the north route, go up to Montrose to connect to US 50, then take it over through Salida (with a side trip Classic cruisers), and then through Pueblo, all the way out to La Junta, where we would angle down through back roads through the Oklahoma Panhandle, then on down to Amarillo to spend the night. Most of the trip was uneventful. We did see a very nice FJ55 pass us going the opposite direction into Ouray, and a early 70s sky blue FJ40 sitting in a farmers field near the highway with a for sale sign on it (no we didn’t’ stop), near Ridgway. Since our trucks were filthy, we all went through a carwash to clean some the mud/dust from the vehicles, there in Ridgway. When we got to Salida, we had lunch, and then followed Dave to Classic Cruisers. This was just north of town, along the Arkansas River. It was a huge yard with probably 200 junked cruisers in it. The office was closed, so we couldn’t see any of the restorations they were working on. Dave got a few pictures, then we headed back. When we crossed the Arkansas River, I noticed I had a couple of exposures left, so I took this picture of the river as I drove across the bridge, looking downstream towards Pueblo.  And this picture looking upstream.  When we got back on US 50 we followed the Arkansas River. There were a lot of fisherman, and rafters along this river. It was running quite full, and had some impressive rapids. We eventually passed the entrance to the Royal Gorge, which had a lot of touristy businesses located along the highway, and a lot of traffic. We finally came out of the mountains into Cannon City, then went on over to Pueblo, where we filled up with fuel, and stretched our legs. Dave and I check our mileage (we both used BG44 fuel additive in Montrose), and he got 20 mpg, and I was around 18 mpg. We got back on US 50, and followed it east along the Arkansas River. The area was mainly farmland (corn, alfalfa), and there wasn’t much traffic on the highway (compared to Salida to Pueblo). When we got to LaJunta, we exited south to begin our zig zag through southeast Colorado to connect to US 287. This was very desolate terrain, but we made good time as there was minimal traffic, which were mainly cattle trucks. Robert ran out of gas between Boise City and Dumas, because his fuel gauge wasn’t ready correctly due to his plastic gas tank. Fortunately, he had a spare jerry can of gas, so he put it in, and we went in to Dumas for fuel and supper, before arriving at our hotel in Amarillo around 10:00pm. What a day! Everyone got back safely on Sunday. I was tired, but it was a great trip, and I’m looking forward to doing it again in 2004! Back to Part I ... |
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