Jessica My Little B...tch

[JoeLAW]

After swapping the tire out, the sun started coming down rather quickly so it was time to keep on trucking! I checked how far away I was from Bisbee on google maps, and it said 30mins, however I was on a dirt road that I had never been on before, and I wasn't sure about the conditions on it.

 

Like I said before, middle of nowhere...

 

As I was driving further down the rd, all of a sudden I spotted this couch just sitting there, as if people would go there and hang out, but there was nothing there to see or do.. So of course I stopped and snapped a couple of quick pics. But right after it was time to head on out of there because I wanted to get to Bisbee before sundown.

 

 

After that I kept on trucking towards Bisbee, but not before stopping by Lowell, AZ which was actually featured in the 1st episode of Roadkill. It was kind of funny that I was trying to replicate what they did in that 1st episode but backwards and from Tucson, AZ back home. Specially since I had just attended and event by then and had just met the guys.

 

 

Well I got to Lowell, AZ, and man is that town something else, all in all it's just one street really but I felt like I was in the "Back to the Future" movie when Marty goes back to the 50s era. The whole town is filled with a bunch of americana, old cars parked on both sides of the street restored and unrestored, and a bunch of shoppes decorated with period correct artifacts and motorcycles, an d even some vintage gas pumps set up on the sidewalk for a cool photo op.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right next to Lowell, is the "Lavender Pit" which used to be one of the biggest open pit copper mines back in the day, in reality the whole reason why both Bisbee and Lowell exist. The pit on its own is quite impressive, very very big, with a bunch of water at the bottom. 

 

 

From there, it was on to Bisbee, which is a mere 5-10mins away.. Bisbee on its own is a very cool town, there's a whole lot of different types of architecture all through town, and since it's nestled within the hills and mountain sides theres the way the streets run through town is not as you would expect. I got to downtown Bisbee parked and then waled over to the local bar where I had some dinner and a beer then I took a little timelapse video of driving through the main street all the way to the end of it. And where it ended I took a nice pic of the full moon with Jessica in between.

 

 

 

 

I remember that there was gonna be a Lunar eclipse that day, so I drove back to the Lavender Pit since it was a very wide and open area to check it out. Afterwards I headed down to Douglas, AZ to spend the night at a hotel. Since all the rooms in Bisbee were booked, and I didn't really plan to spend the night there. I wanted to camp out since I had all my gear with me, but I wasn't sure where it would've been ok to camp at, without being in a private property or just somewhere I shouldn't be.

 

 

 

 

[JoeLAW]

Allrighty, on to the next and final day of this trek. I woke up early and took off from Douglas, AZ to Lowell, AZ to grab breakfast at the Bisbee Breakfast Club, and guys the breakfast was amazing, those pancakes fluffy and humongous! From there, I wanted to take a last stroll through town and then start heading east back home.

 

 Bisbee Breakfast Club, highly recommend it!

 

Once I was done with breakfast I started heading back up to Bisbee, and on this timelapse video you can see how close Lowell is from the Lavender pit, and from Bisbee. Lowel, AZ is actually known as "Erie St." still in Bisbee. I drove straight through town to get this video right, and halfway up the road a backhoe got in front of me, of course heading up slower than traffic, and Jessica's temp started climbing. Since it was January, I was running just 1 fan on the ignition switch but since the temp was rising, I stopped and re-installed the fuse por my other fan. 

 

 

 

After that, the temp got controlled and then started climbing again, so I turned my 3rd fan on and stopped on the side of the road to take a quick pic and let it cool off.

 

 

From there, I kept on climbing till I got on the top of the tunnel from when you head into Bisbee from Tombstone.

 

 

There you can varely see the HWY in front of the front bumper, then from there I saw a dirt road that kep on heading up, so of course I had to check it out!

 

 

 

This is the video of me driving to the top, it was a lot longer than this though, and again Jessicas temp started rising, so I stopped there and opened the hood to let it cool off. From there, it was time to head back down. And here's the video of that!

 

 

 

On this little video I got down from the Antennas and got all the way down to the major HWY to pass through the tunnel, and start heading back home. Once back on the HWY I started playing "East bound and down" and kept on trucking! It was a bit breezy and the tumbleweeds started tumbling! There was soo many, that thankfully I was able to snap a pic of them crossing the road in front of me

 

 

 

 

 

 

[JoeLAW]

I ended up taking HWY 9 heading back east towards home instead of I-10, and I stopped at a couple of interesting points, but nothing too exciting really. One of them was were Geronimo surrendered, and the other one was were Pancho Villa attacked the US, there's a museum there as well, but it was closed by the time I got there. 

 

 

 

I did however find another really short dirt road that got you out of the hwy then merged again a bit further east, and right by the Continental Divide, so.. without even thinking about it I took it 

 

 

 

 

"It's just a desert!" But it's beautiful country.. 

 

 

And this is where the Pancho Villa State Park and little museum are at in Columbus, NM, about 1-1.5hrs away from home. Bringing this trip to an end, It's kind of hard to believe how much stuff I squeezed and was able to do in a 4 day weekend, hopefully this inspires someone to head out there and explore, you never know what can be close by, or even happening close to your home town. Whatever it might be get out there and do it!

[JoeLAW]

Well, after that trip there was nothing really exciting happening with Jessica. She was just being a reliable daily driver taking me to and from work about a 60mile round trip, and getting me out to ride the dirtbike on the weekends. Until one Sunday afternoon I get a call from a real good friend of mine (the one that spotted me while crawling those islands at Elephant Butte, NM). That he had gone to the Dona Ana mtns/trail system with him and a buddy both on side x sides, and that they got lost and got to a point where they could not get out, and one of them was about to rollover.

 

They needed a winch to get them out from where they were and since I was the only one he knew that knew the area and had a winch he called me, so there I went. Hauling @$$ on the FWY to get to them ASAP . Once I get to the entrance of the trail system out there, I start taking the dirt roads and trails to get to them, since he had sent me approximate coordinates of where they were at. Since it was the afternoon the sun started to come down, which would make things harder fro everyone, so I didn't even stop to airdown my tires.

 

Eventually I get to the coordinates he had sent me, and it was a very very steep hill, but I couldn't see them anywhere. I called him and thankfully he had reception he picks up and tells me that they're on the other side of the mountain where I was at. And basically in order for me to get to that side I had to go almost all the way back and then take different routes in other to get to them..  Oh well, you gotta do what you gotta do right, as I'm walking back towards Jessica I see that it's leaking oil from the rear part of the bed, which I found rather funny. I touched it and it was warm, and red, so right away I knew it was ATF. I started looking around for a leak from the tranny or cooler lines, only to find out on of the cooler lines at the cooler in the front behind the grill was rubbing against it and did a pinhole on it, leaking a bunch of oil... and since the hil was so steep, it was running all the way down the pass side frame rail to the rear bumper then dropping right at the back. 

 

 

 

This was after getting down from that steep hill, I had to get up on the side, because there was another vehicle passing through.

 

Thankfully I always carry a small roll of tranny cooler rubber hose, along with a spare radiator hose and much other misc stuff.. So I called my friend back and told him what was happening, to be patient but now I had to fix it if not, then we were all gonna be stranded out there. Well I got back to his truck and trailer, and then I realized I had no ATF with me, I had gear oil, anti-freeze, motor oil, but no ATF. So I decided to head all the way back to the closest gas station (Which thankfully is not that far away from where he had his trailer) in hopes that they would have some ATF on hand. Thankfully they did have 2 quarts which I bought, and headed back to his truck and trailer in order to get the job done..

 

 

 

That was after I parked the truck on top. So now it was teardown time, I took off the grill and header panel all together in order to ease the access to it.

 

 

 

 

And here you can see how much it had actually leaked and splatered back along the whole underside of the truck.. yuck!

 

 

On this pic you can clearly see where the tranny cooler line was rubbing against the grill.. I've since routed the hoses differently to avoid this type of problems... 

 

As far as my buddy and his friend, eventually someone else ran into them and helped them get out with no major downs, nothing but scratches. So basically this little outing helped me in finding out this weakness in Jessica.. No worries we've al been there for each other before.

 

 

[JoeLAW]

Since that outing, another friend of mine had told me he wanted to take me out to a new spot, which I had never been on, so there we went! I liked the fact that it was really close to home, and the scenery there was just rad!

 

 

 

This was on the dirt road to get in, which was pretty smooth. I stopped here because I just liked the way the ground looked, nothing but dirt, not a single rock in 40ft or so. 

 

 

 

And this was pretty much on the ridgeline of the mountains. You can clearly see I-10 from there and a lot further west. these mountains are north of Anthony, NM. From there we descended on to the other side of the mountains and headed back home

 

 

 

Those were the 3 little rigs that got out that day... I wish I would've taken more pics of that outing, because the scenery was pretty bitchin. 

 

 

[JoeLAW]

Well, after that I noticed that my K&N air filter was leaving the slightest film of dust on the inside of the intake tube, so I decided to order a UNI foam style filter, just like the one I use on my dirtbike to get cleaner air into the engine. 

 

 

This is a foam filter that you saturate with oil, and it was 3 foams in it, the red external foam that slides on to the main filter, then the main filter which is a finer foam, and another layer of even finer foam that is just lined on the inside of it. After installing it, of course I had to go test it out and where else but the dustiest trail/spot we have close to home. Killbournes Hole. Nothing but silt all over the place. So I invited my buddy that took me on top of the mountain a couple of weeks prior since he had never been there before, and I picked up my older friend that helps me out with a lot of welding on most of my ideas and off we went!

 

 

There we are at the hole itself, from there we took the rim trail of the hole, which is pretty sandy 3/4 of the way through it, then it gets a little rocky and then just silty.

 

 

 

From there we went back to the entrance to crawl/climb a couple of small ledges and have a little bit of fun.

 

 

 

 

After playing around on those ledges me and my older friend took off towards the Aden Lava flow, which is pretty neat because you do not expect for it to be there at all.

 

 

 

 

There's a bunch of ranches close to the lava flow, that are still in use to this day. However I couldn't imagine how much of a pain it would be to try and herd the cattle in such rugged terrain. Eventually, we ended up crossing the railroad tracks from the one that goes all the way to California, and then we got out through Chamberino, NM just a little town/village in the valley in between El Paso and Las Cruces

 

 

I took off the filter afterwards, and after all that silty dust not a single spec came out after I wiped the inside of the intake tube with a kleenex. I really do recommend it, specially since it's lighter less bulky and flows a lot better. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[JoeLAW]

Well, I had talked to a Body Shop across the border in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua Mexico. To get the upper part (Black) repainted on the truck, and also a couple of small cracks had started forming on the cab at all 4 corners of the rear window. So I asked them if they could repair that and get it welded. I had told him to let me know when he would be ready to receive the truck since he has a pretty small shop and is usually busy all the time. (Like most if not all body shops)

 

So, in the summer of 2019 it he was ready for the truck and it was time to get her ready and drop her off. Also, a couple of months before I had inherited a 2001 2WD XJ that used to be my little sisters. We got it for her to learn how to drive on and do basic maintenance and care, but she was now getting a new car so I got it and since I can't leave things alone, I had lifted it 2.5" and had snatched a set of 16" original Moab wheels with 31" tires. So I had the steelie stockers sitting around with the original size teenie weenie tires on it, and I decided to take my 33" KO2s off and slap the stockers on to make it easier on the shop and make the truck sit lower. I also removed the front bumper, for easier access for them and to finally replace the motor on my Warn winch, since it went out one time I was side pulling a buddys F-150 on the loose sand in order to keep it from sliding off and pretty much dropping off from top of a small mountain... Anyways on to the transformation into an ugly duckling!

 

 

I was eager to do it all in a day, so I started on an early Saturday by getting the stockers from a friends yard, then hauling butt to the friend that was gonna be giving me a ride back from the shop. So I started with the rear tires first and worked my way up front.

 

 

By this point the bumper and winch were off, which was honestly less of a hassle than I thought it would be, specially since it attaches all the way back with the steering box bolts. 

 

 

Look at that skateboard looking truck!  But it was all gonna be for the better..

 

 

The moment I dropped it off at the little body shop, crazy how tight and very oldschool labor intensive techniques they did there, but far better work than any other shop that was willing to take on this project on my town on the states. As you can see in the background, this shop really specializes in classic cars, and custom cars too. He also has a couple of very high profile clients with newer cars that are the only ones he makes an exception to work on. 

 

 

Not gonna lie, I was a little skeptical of just dropping Jessica off there, but then I saw he was working on a recent model Rolls Royce, and after seeing that I was very relieved, because in my way of thinking if they were gonna try and steal a car from there mine was the least attractive or valuable! 

 

 

 

These are a couple of progress pics that he sent me, we had agreed on a 2 week time period for him to have the truck finished, but as it goes with any shop, it took longer than that. Thankfully I didn't mind since I had my now daily XJ with ice cold AC, so there was no rush on my side, but you know how it goes with mosts shops, if you don't put pressure, they will put it on the back burner.

 

 

 

 

He had someone remove and re-install the rear window. I told him to be real careful, since it's real hard to get replcements and I had also read the nightmares that people had gone through in removing the rear glass. And as you can see in the pics, he fixed the corners on the cab. (Or so I thought..) The rest of the body work looked great!

 

 

Another progress pic he sent me after wet sanding it getting it ready for polishing. At this time I was very eager to get it back, but patience always pays off in the end.

 

 

 

 

And there's the finished work, 2 weeks after the deadline we had agreed upon, which in all honesty was not bad and I was expecting worse. And the work was great! It looked pretty bitching all around, he did polish the whole truck and I waxed it after using for a bit and washed it for the 1st time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[JoeLAW]

Well the day after I got it I went to my older friend's house the older gent that helps me out with all the welding projects and more on this truck and other vehicles as well. Anyways I went to get the new motor on the winch installed, and the original winch plate painted since I had never painted it since I installed it, because at the time I was in a rush to put the truck back together since the next day I had to use it for my commute. I also took advantage of the time the truck was being re-painted to splatter another coat of spray on bedliner in a can on the front bumper to re-fresh it. 

 

 

Unfortunately I only have pictures of the new motor, but the old one was pretty fried, and the contacts for the brushes were very worn. I'm pretty sure I kept it and I probably have it laying around somewhere in a box, thinking one of these days I would take it down to Juarez to get it re-built.. 

 

 

Then it was on to remove, clean, prep and paint the custom winch plate my friend had made for me yeeeears ago. 

 

 

 

Finally back on her shoes! Still looking funny without the front bumper but better nonetheless. 

 

 

 

Out with the old, and in with the new! Also at the time, another friend of mine, the one with the black LJ had acquired a Warn Power Plant winch that came with the regular steel cable, and he replaced it with synthetic line. So he gave me the "used" cable which looked pretty brand new to me. So I took advantage of everything being apart and replaced my old winch cable with that newer one. (Hence why there's no cable on the winch at this time)

 

 

 

And finally after a full Saturday's day of work the bumper and winch were back on the truck, ready for me to install the new cable on the winch, and then ready for new adventures!

[JoeLAW]

It din't take long before I took it out, it was the following Sunday  We just went to our local trail called "Juando Pass" in Anthony, TX nothing too challenging on the trail, but there's a pretty big optional waterfall at the end of it, and a couple of pretty big ledges hidden in the back part of it if you want to play around. The cool part about it though, is when you go to the back part, you can hit a small trail on the ridgeline of the little mountains back to the end of the trail, which usually has great views specially at sunset.

 

 

This is on the backside of the trail, most of the people that run this trail don't come up here, a lot do, just not most.

 

 

Right to the passenger side of Jessica is where the 2 big ledges are at, this is when you're heading up towards the little ridge trail. This trail is a pretty short kinda scenic trail (if you end up going to the ridgeline trail) because you have great view of the Franklin Mountains to the East, and amazing sunsets to the West, overlooking I-10 and the Valley were the Rio Grande flows.

 

 

This is that little Ridgeline trail I was telling you guys about.

 

 

 

Funny I ended up leading the trail, with a bunch if well built big rigs behind me. Right behind me is one of my best friends, he was the 2nd one in our little group that did the 1ton swap, then all the way in the back is his Dad, which was the 3rd one to get his swap done, and had had it ready for about a year or so.

 

 

And this is the group back at the "end" of the trail. You see those tires on the blue JK, they're under Jessica now, I would've never though those tires would end up under it.. Goes to show ya, you think you plan for even your project truck, and things change. Don't get stuck planning too much, before you know it you'll ran out of time to enjoy the moments your project will give you.

 

 

And me and my bud flexing on a rock, 33s, next to 42s.. 

[JoeLAW]

Well, time for another side post, this time of the XJ I inherited. Like I said before, we bought this XJ for my little sister to learn how to drive on and do basic maintenance. Athen she got a new car, and we tried selling this one but had no bites at all so I decided to keep it, and since I can't leave things alone, I started fixing it up.

 

 

This is a pic of when we first got it.

 

I first started with a set of 16" Moab OEM Rubi wheels that already had 31" tires mounted on them, then added a small lift consisting of spacers up front, and then an add-a-leaf on the rear.

 

 

The wheels were painted, but they had done a really bad job painting them, so I decided to strip them..

 

 

Once the wheels were clean, not only were they Moabs, but the brushed aluminum ones which I think might be rarer, Who knows..  And they look nice in the picture, but they wad a bunch of scrathes along with curb rash. They were also scratched on the actual spokes of the wheel.. So I decided to get them painted again.

 

 

 

This was after the wheels were painted, and I had installed the spacer lift up front.

 

 

And here a pic of both of them together, I named the XJ Merlina.. After having the Trucklite LED headlights on Jessica, I needed a better light for Merlina, and since I like the way the truck lites looked and performed I decided to order the Amazon(China) version of them.

 

 

Man, what an improvement that was! Also, those lights behaved smoother and brighter than the Truck Lites

 

 

 

 

After that I decided to get it re-painted, at the same shop in Juarez, I also asked him if he could color match all the plastic pieces from the flares to the bumper end caps, I did tell him to take all the trim off and just leave it "shaved". They did take a loooot longer than I expected, but the Holidays got in the way, which was the main reason why they took so long. It was 4 months total. 

 

 

 

 

However the end result came out bitchin! Now I had people asking me to sell it to them, but I told them it was now too late. I really liked the way this turned out, plus it was very reliable, had ice cold A/C never overheated, it was a great little suv.

 

 

 

 

 

Not long after I got it back from the shop, I installed a hitch I got for it in order to put my dirtbike and bike racks.

 

 

 

After a while I wanted to install some fog lights, and I found a set of flush mounted ones on Facebook Marketplace, so I bought them ordered some amber tint, stuck that on the lense and pluged it all in for it to work. The end result was great and it worked surprisingly well on very dusty conditions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And since I had the MJ on 33s and about a 4.5-5" lift, I had to take some side x side pics for comparison, crazy how close they are in lift height, but yet how far they are in length.

 

 

 

 

I ended up driving it all the way to Glamis, CA with my dirtbike in the back, no issues what so ever on the way there. Hell we even took it on some mellow sand trails just by airing down the tires, and keeping momentum we did not get stuck at all, remember this is a 2WD model. On the way back however it overheated on me really bad right by Yuma, AZ but thankfully my friends from Holtville, CA (The guys I met on the Roadkill Ziptie Drags) rescued me right away, we ended up changing the water pump, thermostat, and rad cap, and I was on my way home afterwards.

 

This little XJ was great, the only drawback was that the heator core was leaking, but since I live in the desert, I could live with no heater for most of the year. Well, unfortunately one day it got stolen.. with all of my tools and even my MTBike inside. I had left it parked at a friends business that's close to the border crossing but not really where it wouldn't be safe, or so I thought... I left it there because we had to fly out of Juarez for a vacation fro Thanksgiving, and it's quite the hassle when you drive your car to Mexico, because to get back into the states you have to do a pretty long line that usually takes about 1hr, but since it was Thanksgiving weekend it would've probably taken us 2-3hrs since everyone travels on those dates, so it's better to park close to the crossing and walk over, you save a lot more time and get some excersize in. Well, when I came back Merlina was no longer were I had parked it.. At first I though no biggie, maybe somebody moved it, but then once I didn't find any news from anyone, I decided to file the police report with hopes that it was still on this side of the border.

 

2 Days later I get a call from the Police, telling me that the XJ had been involved in a hit n run accident on I-10. At first I though the worse, and started asking questions to see if somebody had gotten seriously injured or even killed, and they told me that it did not involve anyone else, so I was relieved. They told me it had a whole lot of tools inside and even a bike, and that made me ecstatic! I seriously couldn't believe those words, but, because of all the stuff that was still inside, they thought it was suspicious and that I was trying to pull a fast one on them. Thankfully I had all evidence that I wasn't even in the country, the moment that accident happened. To make this long story a bit shorter, it took them about 2 weeks for them to let me get all the stuff from the car. And then another 2 weeks for them to release it to me, and that was a whole other ordeal.. But anyways I was finally able to get her back and when I did, man it was long gone... completely totaled. And at the time, I only had liability insurance, learned my leason on that one. Anyways, at least I was able to get all my stuff back, and the rest I sold in parts and even gave some away until I finally called someone to pic it up and get rid of it.

 

 

This was the day they finally let me get all my stuff back. Man she took a hard hit, and since it was centered I though I was still salvageable, but boy was I wrong..

 

 

The moment I picked it up

 

 

 

 

And once I had it back in my possesion, I took of the Moab wheels (Duh!) And sold them dirt cheap to a friend that had a Liberty(which he then totaled, and I got one of the wheels back, the rest were trashed..) I took off as much parts as I thought I would need in the future, cleaned it up, and sent it to the junkyard.. Now, I know what most of y'all are thinking, it doesn't look that bad, but both front sections of the unibody were very tweaked, the motor had a hole in the block, and the front axle was badly bent, after I saw those 3 major flaws that's when I called it and looked no further to try and get it re-built... Anyways guys, back on to more MJ stuff with Jessica!

 

[neohic]

Keep it coming, Joe! I really enjoy your blog style story time updates. 

[JoeLAW]

Thanks man, trying to take advantage of the holiday break to try and get this thread finally updated! Funny thing, I started reading yours when I don't have a chance to be working on this. lol 

Anyways, on to more updating!

[JoeLAW]

Well, after that outing to our local trail there was an Overlanding group on Facebook that I had just joined not too long ago, "Overland New Mexico". And they had organized a weekend outing towards Chloride, NM and the general area around the Cibola and Gila National Forests. So, as per usual I took off Friday night after work fully loaded with all my camping gear, and coolers with food and drinks. The plan was to meet a couple of gents at a spot were they had camped before in the middle of nowhere but close to the little hwy right before Winston, NM. I ended up getting there right before or around 10PM (Again as per usual) meet the guys set up camp and went to bed.

 

 

This was the camp spot were we met the night before, pretty nice, pretty melow and not that hot.

 

 

This is what was behind the trees, simply beautiful and we hadn't event started yet.

 

The next morning started out kind of early, we woke up at around 6AM, and the gents started getting coffee ready and cooking up breakfast. We had agreed to meet at the Winston General store at 9AM, for the rest of the people coming. This was gonna be the last spot to get ICE and whatever last minute stuff you might've forgotten to get before, yes even gas. From there we drove over to Chloride, NM which is a mere 10mins away if that and did a bit of sight seeing there which was pretty interesting. There was a lot of mining history throughout this whole area, and it was shown by the several different old equipment displayed throughout the town's square. 

 

 

This whole area of Winston is very popular with hunting, as you can tell by the antlers they have decorating the exterior of the store.

 

 

It did however sell both gas and diesel through very oldschool I want to say 70s era/style pumps. Which can be that blessing for someone that did not prepare accordingly before heading out.

 

 

The whole store is very hunter oriented or supportive per say. And it was very general, from your regular treats and eats you find at any other gas station, to automotive supplies and tools, clothes, self care products, hats, boots and even ammo!

 

 

This is the "town square" of Chloride, which includes a café, a bar/saloon and a museum, all of which were closed when we were there.. Maybe it was too early, or maybe they just didn't open that day. Still even with them being closed there was a bunch of cool stuff to see and get educated on.

 

 

 

Very "old westy" style buildings and just general vibe in the little town.

 

 

 

They had this display of how they used to haul equipment into the mine shafts and extract the ore. We've all seen those looney tunes cartoons of when they get into a mine persecuting someone, well this was the equipment they actually used for that back in the day.

 

 

Neat old Caterpillar Dozer, it was a "Fifteen" model, from the late 20s early 30s

 

 

This cabin was the last cabin standing from a mining town that was deserted, and in the mid 70s the City of Las Cruces, NM got it, restored it and displayed it in Cruces, then in 2006 it was in the way of a city project so they re-located to here.

 

Well, a couple more rigs caught up to us in Chloride, and then it was time to set sail and get into the forest! At first as always it was a pretty nicely graded road, with great scenery all around. We passed a couple of ranches, and saw what was pretty much a preview per say of what we were in for. Also everything was very green, almost anywhere you looked I know for a lot of you that's normal, but me being a desert rat I'm not used to all this green stuff. From there we got to the mine or quarry but I'm pretty sure it's a mine because the area on the ground was not that big like quarries. And then it was time to start getting deep into the forest.

 

 

 

 

 

Everything was super green, which I was not expecting, because it was pretty dry. Still beautiful sights everywhere you looked though.

 

 

 

As we started driving further and further down the road, you started seeing of what was to come.

 

 

In all honesty, it didn't even feel like we were in New Mexico at times, and as I've always said, that's why they call it "The Land of Enchantment" you just gotta go look for it, it won't be readily available on the side of the road like in Utah or other states.

 

 

 

Well, we got to the mine, which was working. Most of the material that comes out of here ends up in kitty litter, and you guessed it, the absorbent material used for soaking up the spilled oil most of our rigs leak. lol

 

 

 

As soon as we passed the mine things started to get a bit more interesting, it got pretty narrow and then we had to go up and then down a small but steep drop-off. Were I wondered how the Range Rover and F-150 were gonna do, but they passed through it with no issues, maybe a bit of scraping on the underbody but nothing major. 

 

Continued on next post

[JoeLAW]

 

We took a little break there, and I thought it was the perfect time and place to start airing down my tires. 

 

From that point on, we started getting deeper and deeper into the Gila National Forest, passing through pretty bitchin scenery at the same time. We went to a couple of spots that anyone else would miss just by staying true to a designated route, but the guys I had camped with the night before were very knowledgeable of the area and took us there. 

 

 

We got going again, and the mountain formations were so unique I was taking pics with one hand, and holding the steering wheel with the other one.

 

 

Just beautiful rock formations, this forest always reminds me of the general area around the Copper Canyon in southwestern Chihuahua, from the town of Creel Chihuahua, to a lot of the rural communities around there, the terrain there is rocky, mountainous, and just different than anything I've personally experienced in the states side, but this was a good reminder of it.

 

 

 

I saw this rock formation from the pic previous to this one, and though man that is so cool, I wish we could get closer, and all of a sudden we started climbing up the hill.

 

 

So much green!

 

 

We got up to a little open area/valley that lead to a flooded mine, that's why you see a little pond on this picture. I honestly can't remember if the mine got flooded on purpose or by accident, and then to top it off someone dumped a bunch of goldfish in the little pond, and they prevailed! 

 

 

 

You can barely see a goldfish on this pic, but there was a bunch of them, more than 20 easily.

 

 

And the flooded mine, you can spot another goldfish on this pic.

 

 

Once there, I climbed to the top of the entrance of the mine to take a quick pic of almost the whole group. There was still a couple of rigs missing from this pic.

 

 

Well, it was time to take off from there, and keep on heading deep into the forest, passing through a bunch of abandoned mines, and forgotten ranches.

 

 

 

 

 

This was pretty much the entrance to the Gila National Forest, once we passed there, everything started to look more "remote" and forest like.

 

 

 

 

I took this pic, because I found it a bit funny how we're in the forst, but there was still desert style plants scattered throughout.

 

 

 

 

Then all of a sudden there was some cave paintings right next to the road we were driving on, and a small cave right after, who knows how old these are, but as I was told they are real and not painted by someone that is trying to attract people.

 

 

Right after passing those paintings the road opened up quite a bit, perfect for us to park up and out of the way of anyone else, and have a quick lunch, while other peeps from the group walked back to check the paintings up close and personal.

 

 

As we kept driving further and deeper into the forest, the trees started getting taller, and the hills steeper. However I think I only shifted into 4L once in the whole day and that was because I did not want to force the tranny too much on a pretty steep hill. I want to say I was a little disappointed because I was expecting a bit more 4wheeling action rather than just driving on dirt roads, but the scenery made it all worthwhile.

 

 

This is the part where it's the "Overlander Dream" or time to shine, we got to the spot were we were gonna camp I want to say at around 4PM with plenty of light still, a thing I'm not used to when wheeling and camping. So since I was part of the group and everyone was setting camp. I decided to pull my chair out and relax for a bit, then one of the "Overlander" guys came over and asked where I was going to sleep or if I was gonna set up camp at all.. And I told him, yeah but I can set my tent up fully equipped with either my Milwaukee M18 fan or a bunch of blankets in less than 20mins, so I had plenty of time till the sun went out. However he did make me more observant of my surroundings and I started paying more attention to everyone else that was setting up. And man were they having a hard time, trying to level out their vehicles with anything they could find, because their traction boards did not provide enough height to level them out so their rooftop tents where in an awkward angle. Trying to set up their awnings and struggling to again extend the legs of them since we were in a slope. Man I'm sorry if you're reading this and you're an "Overlander" but man I wanted to laugh out loud so bad, because the whole point of all those accessories is to make it easier for the user to set up camp, and here I was noticing that the moment you throw a curve ball of a small slope, you just messed with their whole setup. So that experience right there made me a believer that RTTs (Roff-Top-Tents) on any vehicle makes it basically an RV.. they need to be in a perfectly or close to perfect level surface in order for them to be comfortable. I kid you not, I took this picture I want to say at around 7:40PM or so and I hadn't set my tent up yet, just because I was to entertained by the circus trying to set up their stuff. After this pic I set my tent up, and I looked over, and there was 1 guy still not finished.. that's just torture!

 

 

Anyways we started the campfire, I turned on my bluetooth speaker and started playing some blues, and the vibes were good, we were all enjoying ourselves and having different conversations about our different adventures and trips.

 

 

One of the peeps brought stuff to make some s'mores, I brought a bunch of hot dogs and skewers to grill them and have a nice little snack before hitting the pillow. We kicked it till about 10PM or so, and went to bed. Later the full moon popped out, and the forest was lit up by it, perfect temperature and a quiet night made for a great night sleep in the middle of nowhere.

 

Continued on next post

[JoeLAW]

Well, the next morning got real bright real quick, but it was a really pretty sunrise. 

 

 

 

Couple of pics I took from the tent, since that's a thing I like to do, because sometimes I catch real good sunrises.

 

 

And a pic of the campground after taking a leak, because who doesn't take a leak 1st thing in the morning! 

 

After a little while everyone else woke up, and started cooking up breakfast, we maybe ended up leaving the campground at around 9:30ish or so, and unfortunately for me it would end up being nothing more than regular dirt roads for the rest of the trip.. Oh well at least I got to explore a new area were I had never been at before.

 

 

 

Again, mainly regular dirt roads, but super nice scenery and weather.

 

 

We then ran into this cabin that is being preserved, and supposedly there was plans for it to be restored to it's original stage, but who knows what might've happened.

 

 

This was the only obstable in the whole trip, you could easily go around it, but I had to at least put a tire on it.

 

 

After all that dirt road, we spit out on Highway 59, we aired up right before hitting the HWY and started heading back to Winston, NM, and back home. I decided to go to Caballo Lake State Park afterwards to take a quick shower, and then start heading back home through the back roads. And when I got there I noticed Jessica's handling was a bit weird and bouncing too much in the rear end. So I decided to check it out, well turns out somewhere in the Gila, I lost my rear driver side shock bolt, and I knew I had to have something that would allow me to get it re-attached. Well, I ended up not having the right bolt needed to put it back together, but I had a longer bolt that was the right diameter for the shock bushing. So I had some 3/8" hose that I always carry a bit of spare hose, and some hose clamps and got it running again! It lasted like that for about a week or so till I got the right bolt and slapped it in. 

 

 

Pic of the missing hardware, thankfully the relief cuts held it in place instead of letting it dangle.

 

 

And a pic of the MacGyvered new hardware to keep everything in place. I took this pic as soon as I got home, to make sure everything was still there.

 

 

 

A couple of poser shots at Caballo Lake, because they let you get all the way down to the beach, so why not!

 

 

And while driving through the back roads, I stopped in Mesilla, NM to grab a quick bite to eat, and drive the last haul home.

 

This trip taught me that, sometimes dirt roads while unassumingly innocent, they can be more deceitful than any other type of trail because of the constant vibrations from the washboard. And can literally rattle loose anything, so now almost everytime after traveling for a long period of time, I look over the vehicle for anything obvious missing before hitting the HWY again.

 

Also, I took a lot more pictures of this trip, if you want to check those out here's a link to that Album 

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/8bjq1f869dameMd68

[JoeLAW]

Well, on to a bit more tech stuff now, right before that Overlanding trip, my flowkooler water pump had developed a leak, so I ordered a new one, but replaced it with an over the counter replacement from the auto parts store in order to go on that rip. Needless to say I was less than satisfied with the OEM replacement, it was running hotter than I liked, and when on the 2hr drive up on the HWY the temp just kept climbing even with my 3 E-Fans on. So a couple of days after that trip the new flowkooler pump arrived and I got straight to swapping mode. Also, I had ordered a set of brown dog motor mounts, since my Daystar Poly OEM style ones had deformed quite badly. More so on the drivers side than the pass side, but both were pretty deformed, and I want to say the main cause was the heat.

 

 

I know it's not necessary to take the radiator out in order to replace the water pump, but I decided to get it cleaned up before installing it again since, I wasn't sure when the next time to crack open the cooling system would be so I figured why not. Also at the time I took advantage of having all the access and adjusted my steering gearbox, and replaced my belt.

 

 

 

New flowkooler pump installed! Does not look like anything fancy on the outside, but the impeller is anodized in blue, and has a waaaay different design than the OEM style one.

 

 

Driver side motor mount installed, and I took this pic right before I covered the entire thing with DEI reflective tape to help as a heat shield, and I think it has after all this years the tape is still there and the motor mount is good.

 

 

And the motor mount on the pass side. That side motor plate my buddy fabbed for me was and is still holding strong! 

I was doing all these maintenance work, and changed the motor mounts because I was preparing for something special, here's a hint..

 

 

More on the next post!

[JoeLAW]

Well, it was time! I decided that I was going to the 2019 MJ Takeover in Moab Utah, I didn't know what to expect, and honestly did not plan all that well, kind of really just went for it, not reserving any spots at any place to stay thinking I would just camp out somewhere and go with the flow. So on an early Thursday morning I took off from home at around 4AM and started trucking North!

 

 

The weather was great just a tad bit cool, and almost 0 traffic at the start of the trip. I then saw the full moon setting and snapped this pic while I could.

 

 

Then right after snapping this pic, I (again) tried to see what top speed I could reach on Jessica, and on a downhill with a tailwind and the pedal to the metal I was able to reach 100MPH! The tough part was trying to get the screenshot for it since I knew I was only gonna be able for a couple of seconds, but then after this screenshot I went all the way to 102MPH. Now I think of it, and just think of how stupid of me, but where I did it I was the only vehicle and since I had just done a complet checkup on the truck I was feeling very confident. From there, I was right in rush hour through Albuquerque, NM (didn't plan real good) and after passing through all that traffic, and finally getting out of there it was smooth sailing all the way till I hit Colorado, since they were doing a bunch of work through there and in Utah from Monticello, almost all the way to Moab. But I was able to make it by 2PM and meet up with some of the peeps that were already there. And we all decided to hit up the "Fins and Things" trail at the Sand Flats Recreational Area.

 

 

As soon as we started the trail one of the Comanches (this one belonging to Brian Busby from Delta, CO) started overheating a bit, (Shocker right..) Well we opened the hood and turns out the electrical fan was not turning on, quick fix.  While he got to fixing we got to chilling and knowing each other better.

 

 

And that's when I met Tyler Geehreng, he's originally from somewhere out in the East Coast, but was living in Grand Junction, CO at the time. Very talented welder and patient guy overall, his multicolored MJ was attacked by serious rust issues throughout, hence the multi colored parts all around. However it had a rear LSD and a bunch of odds and ends pieced together that made it work real well.

 

 

We stopped at one of many dirt road crossings and out the phones came to take more pics of Comanches together.

 

 

That truck you see behind me belongs to Chuy, who also made the trek all the way from Texas, unlike me though from the Central part Killeen, TX to be exact. To help put into perspective, in order for me to get to Killeen, it's about a 8-9hr drive, from my house to Moab it's a 10hr drive. Crazy how big Texas is.. Anyways, back to Chuy, he started his trek up north on Sunday or maybe even a week before because he wanted to hit a bunch of trails and passes in Colorado. He had just finished putting together his comanche with gears, 35s, long arms up front, and an Iron Fab rear 4 link kit along with a bunch of other performance stuff done to the drivetrain. He had quite an adventure just trying to get up to Colorado with issues with his front gears, and I forgot what else, in the end he did end up making it though.

 

 

Oh the Moab grip, it's just something else, here you can see me and Bryan climbing up on a fin.

 

 

More MJ pics! You can see in the background Chuy climbing the same pretty steep climb me and Bryan did before which you find all over the place on the 2nd half of the trail.

 

 

More MJ Poser Pics! A little further down from the previous spot there was this "Mini Crack" were I decided to park for a poser shot, and Tyler and Dave decided to follow, the more the merrier!

 

 

Now on to the MJ with fibergalss pre-runner fenders and bedsides. This is David Minton's MJ from the Denver, CO area he built it with a bunch of leftover parts he and a bunch of his buddies had laying around and just made it work, I think the only new parts he ended up ordering was the bedsides  everything else was leftover parts from this and that, it also helped that he is friends and helps a team that races out in King of the Hammers. What I liked more about his truck was the fact that the whole back half was pretty much custom made, and he tucked the bedsides in for them not to be in the way of obstacles on the trails. His rear suspension was pretty much of a Ford Raptor inlcuding shocks and leaf springs sitting atop JK axles, and the truck worked really well. 

 

This rounded up day 1 of the Takeover for that year, afterwards we all went back to Canyolands Campground (Name of it at the time, now it's Sun Outdoors) right behind the Texaco Gas Station were I crashed right next to Dave and Kelly's (His Wife) campground.

 

 

 

Day 2 Consisted of everyone meeting at the City Market at 9AM in order to head out to Hells Revenge, so we rounded up the MJs and other Jeeps that tagged along and headed back up to the Sand Flats area. 

 

 

That's Andy Livermore, from Logan, UT and the truck he is driving is "Slamche" which used to be a drift truck powered by a Mazda Rotary engine. Then he got it and following the motto of its name he swapped 1ton axles under if linked the rear and slapped coilovers at all 4 corners all while maybe adding 2-3" of lift or so keeping a LCG and keeping it slammed with 42" Pitbulls at the time. He also had a freezer in the back of it, and was the official popsicle hander outer lol 

 

 

A lot more Comanches joined us for the 2nd day (Which was Friday) people from Las Vegas, NV more people from Grand Junction, CO, Salt Lake City, UT, Spanish Fork, UT and more that I can't remember.. 

 

 

Just one of the ledges on Hells that has a bunch of optional lines. Hells Revenge is a very fun trail in Moab, top 5 for sure out of all of them specially for it's proximity to town, and everything of it. It's become very popular nowadays, I just hope they keep educating people that go on it to take good care of it so it doesn't get closed.

 

 

Hells Revenge has a bunch of very famous obstacles, one of them being "Hells Gate" I had tried it a year prior on EJS and failed to climb up it by my own, this time I was determined. Specially since I had Trate Daniels spotting me. Anyways, this is the entrance to said obstacle, which is far more challenging than the obstacle itself.

 

 

Here's Chuy dropping in right after me, this part is pretty steep and you have to get to it kind of blind, but as long as you hug the left side you're OK. 

 

 

 

And here's the video of me making it up for the 1st time ever, still with about 4.5-5" of short arm lift, open front diff, stock rear LSD, and 33" tires on 3.55 stock gears. Goes to show you how important a good spotter is.

 

 

And this was almost the full group pic for that year, we were missing 2 MJs Trate's and Andy's which were doing the "Escalator through Hell" obstacle. After that we all got back to the campground and some of us had to do some minor repairs and just overall checkovers of our MJs for the following day. 

 

 

This time I helped out Jeremy Lelah, from Las Vegas, NV he built his MJ with more of a Pre-Runner mindset (Being he lives in the Desert) he put a bed cage housing a couple of 12 or 14" travel FOA shocks, a prerunner style lightbar/nerf bar on top of the original front bumper, a 50" lightbar on top and front fiberglass fenders. In order to bring out the front tires more to fill up those massive fenders he installed some thick wheel spacers, and one of them ended up breaking right before heading to town after hells, right after the steep descents or climbs up to Sand Flats. So I helped him out taking off the other spacer and doing the checkover for our trucks while at his campground. Which brought the end of day 2.

 

And that brings us to the 3rd and final day of the Takeover in 2019, we split into 2 separate groups, one that wanted a bit more challenging stuff, and the other that wanted more mellow stuff. The challenging group decided to run "Steel Bender" while the mellow group decided for "Gemini Bridges", I decided to go on to Steel Bender, since I had been on it the year prior on EJS riding on my buddies LJ and it wasn't bad at all. 

 

 

So, we met up at the Shell Station on Spanish Trail Rd, and headed out to the trail! Once at the trail, the TJ you see in this picture was rocking 1 ton Axles on 40" Tires and a 5.0 V8 out of a Mustang, however his tranny was overheating rather badly. So we were taking popsicle breaks pretty often. 

 

 

On one of the breaks I parked right next to Weston Cook's MJ out of Grand Junction, CO as well, he had recently restored, modified and painted this 88 MJ. He installed a 4" lift and 33s on Aero wheels, I can't remember what he was running as far as drivetrain, but I remember he had 4.56s and an LSD, he also had Dirtbound off road Bumpers, and rocksliders. He fabbed up a custom mid height bed rack where he mounted an RTT. He ended up selling that MJ a year or 2 after this event, and now he drives a pretty bitchin 2005-06 Jeep Liberty which he swaped JK axles under it and did a whole lot of fab work to make it all work. 

 

 

Pic taken right before a small "Wall" climb, which is kind of preparing you for the rest of the trail. (If you're able to complete it)..

 

 

Unfortunately that TJs transmission did not comply.. cutting our trail short. Thankfully there's a bunch of exits/entrances through parts of it making an exit easy for that TJ. We as a group decided to backtrack our way to the entrance of the trail, where we parked to take a bit more pictures.

 

 

This is right after the entrance of the trail, a sort of "Gatekeeper" meaning if you don't make it through there, it's best to turn around. Now on to that blue MJ with the badass hood, that one belongs to non otther than Trate Daniels, from Spanish Fork, UT he's still rocking the original 4.0 from 1988, but don't let that fool ya, this MJ is rocking a 700R4 Tranny, and Dana 44 axles, the front one out of a Wagoneer, and the rear out of an Izusu Amigo, both with lockers and 4.88 gears to turn the 37" Goodyear MTRs at the time. Trate built this MJ with wheeling in his mind, then his family grew, and instead of selling it and getting an XJ or a cookie cutter JKU, instead he cut the bulkhead of the cab and front wall of the bed and installed a bench seat along with a custom cage front to back. This MJ is badass, not only does it look cool and clean, but it also performs great, and Trate is not afraid to take it through some challenging terrain.

 

 

After we took the pics at that spot, we kept on heading out back towards the campground, and 

i took this picture, little did I know what was gonna happen..

 

From there, we got back to the campground and checked our trucks again, because we were gonna be doing a night trail! After a couple of hrs, we took off north, because we were gona be "The Pickle" trail which is a ways north, so we topped off with fuel, and off we went.

 

Once we got off the hwy 191 and got into the desert, we aired down our tires and started heading over to the start of the trail and we were booking. Right at the start of the trail all of a sudden my brake pedal faded..

 

 

So I got off from my truck and started looking for a leak, and bingo! I found the leak, the front pass side line had busted. By that time, people started wondering and asking around what was going on, until I told Trate, and when I was about to pinch the steel line with a pair of vice grips, he stops me and tells me he has a spare line, that he thinks will fit and is maybe even the same length.

 

 

So I waited, by then now a small crowd had formed around Jessica, and when Trate runs back with the spare line, we compare it and test fit it, and it was the perfect size. So I'm about to get down and dirty swapping the line, and without even asking a question, Weston along with a friend of his were already doing it, and then someone else gets inside and starts pumping the pedal in order to bleed it. And I was basically just holding the light in awe, because usually I'm the guy doing the dirty work. In a matter of minutes Jessica was up, running and ready to go! Needless to say I was super pumped and very thankful but ready for whatever was to come.

 

 

And what came was the 1st ledge at the pickle, while tricky it wasn't nearly as bad as it looks to get up it. And it was super fun to do!

 

 

After that you pass through this balancing rock, in order to head up to more ledges.

 

 

After passing through that rock, there was a tight section coming, one that would get your nerves working real good, because you're so close to the walls that you think you're gonna leave half of your body there.

 

 

Here we are, patiently awaiting our turn. 

 

Unfortunately I don't have any pictutes of me going through that spot, but I do have pics of Andy going through it with Slamche.

 

 

Where most of us sneaked right through the middle, he had to put a tire up on the wall while fully flexing her out. Pretty impressive!

 

 

 

After that, came one of the main obstacles, if you thought it was tight before, this one took it up a notch! But not only was it tight, but also tall to climb so much so, that it was more of a 2 in 1 ledge. Very intimidating when you're getting to it, but not as bad once you're doing it. 

 

 

After that climb that most of us walked right up it, we were all parked waiting right after and right before we took off I ran up a side of the sand mound to take this pic. And then we headed to the actual end of the trail which is a steep sandy hill climb. 

 

And with that we conclude with the 2019 Moab MJ Takeover, the next day I woke up earlyish said my last good byes to everyone and took off heading south back home, and with a very cloudy and rainy morning I was bummed, but like everything else that's what makes it so important and enjoyable. If we did it every day it wouldn't feel as special! Thankfully my drive home was pretty eventless, and I got home safe and sound right before sunset. 

 

However this trip was extra special to me, because I went at it with no expectations what so ever, and met so many great people that I now get to call friends, and did many things I never thought I'd be able to do.. So sometimes all you gotta do is get out there and give it your best shot, you never know what will come out of it, and whatever does will be a learning experience for you to take notes on.

 

If you want to take a look at all the pics I took here's a link to that album

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/3jAykhxeA3cEc3wD9

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[JoeLAW]

After that trip, it was a couple of quiet weeks, just alternating Jessica and Merlina between daily driving duties, then came the Chile Challenge event, now being held at Caballo Lake, NM. I signed up for a trail run on Saturday to do the "Scratch" trail, which is a trail that's more on the mellow side of things. However I took off Wednesday night after work to ride with my buddies on their bigger Jeeps that were running bigger trails. 

 

Anyways Saturday came, and me and another good friend of mine had signed up for the same trail so she was running behind me on her Son's TJ she built for him, on a set of D44 and Ford 9" rear axle out of a 70s F-150 with lockers on both ends, chromoly shafts up front and 36" Super Swamper IRoks. 

 

We took off and the roads to the trails were super dusty (As per usual because of all the traffic for the event that week), so any clean car looked like it had just been spectating a Baja race, suuuper dusty. Then we went through a small pond that was supposed to be pretty dry, but the dry crust was just about 1" on top of really thick mud, thankfully we were towards the front of the group, and by the time we passed through there it wasn't as bad as for the guys on the back of the group. 

 

Then the trail, which most trails out here consist of dryed up creek beds which we call "Arroyos" since it's the term in spanish, it started with your regular sandy spots and casual small boulders which then became a tad bit bigger until we hit the main obstable, which was kind of a small waterfall (I want to say if this was ever full of water rapids would form there). On this waterfall, there was a couple of lines, but overconfident me saw the line in the middle which was kind of hard but thought I could make it up no problem, WRONG! . I ended up high centered on my sliders and my front tires had no traction what so ever..   Anyways on to the pics instead.

 

 

This is when things started to get interesting, bigger boulders! (I think hanging out with my buddies with their bigger Jeeps definitely gave me a lot bigger confidence than what I had in equipment ) Also on this pic you can see the TJ I was telling you guys about.

 

 

Pretty much a walk in the park for Jessica, or so I thought..

 

 

This is how the obstacle looked from where I decided to try it, and a little further up from that was when I got it really wedged in there.. In reality I should've tken the line to the right, but c'mon I did not wanna be a sissy...  

 

 

Here's a GIF my friend created of me hitting it, definitely looked doable, and I think if I would've had a front locker it would've been a piece of cake, but oh well, live and learn!

 

 

Here's another GIF my friend made from a different angle, I think this was a 2nd try I gave at it with a little bit different line to try and make it, but came out unsuccessful.

 

 

This was a pretty bitchin pic another good friend of ours took, he was actually leading the trail, and ended up being the anchor for me to winch of off.

 

 

I think right here I was either reversing to give it that 2nd shot, or it was right before I got it real wedged.

 

 

And this is when I was stuck with nowhere to go..

 

 

This is when I got it wedged, all this gents tried pushing me in order for me to make it, but the whole truck slod to the driver side of the obstacle, leaving me spinning like a turtle.

 

 

I finally winched of off my buddies white TJ which you can see at the right of this pic, and was finally able to drive out of this obstacle.. Hey sometimes you're the one that has to give the show for everyone else to enjoy 

 

 

Anyways after that main obstacle the rest of the trail was pretty easy and scenis, going through a bunch of old ranches and corrals. Everything went pretty smooth after that and we all got back to camp with a couple hrs to spare before the sun came down.

 

 

[JoeLAW]

Well, after that again a couple of quiet weeks, however I had done a thing.. I was preparing for an upcoming Glamis California trip sometime during the winter, and I wanted to take Jessica. So I started looking into paddle tires for UTVs, and I found a pretty cheap set on Amazon, that were a size 32x12 R15 and I had the leftover 15" wheels from the 35s I had bough for the CJ-7 so I went ahead and ordered them. I got the wheels and stripped them of the rattle can paint job they had and painted them gray with the leftover paint I had from painting the Moab wheels on Merlina (the maroon XJ). I then went to a tire shop and got them mounted.

 

 

This is how the looked mounted on those wheels, which wasn't that bad looking to be honest.

 

 

I ordered them 32" in height because I was a bit skeptical on how tall the actual paddles would be, and since it said 1" in the description I preferred to go smaller, which would also help with tire spin since I was still with 3.55s on the gear ratios

 

 

Well, I went to our local little dune spot on the far east side of El Paso, and slapped them on to go give them a test drive.

 

 

I got all through here in 2WD, and the rears at around 20PSI or so, the fronts had 30 in them.

 

 

There's just something about paddle tires that make almos anything look bitchin!

 

 

It didn't look that bad, and it did surprisingly well, given that I was pretty much running everything at a high pressure, I later learned that just like if your on you're regular tires I should've aired everything down to 15PSI and I would've been surfing through the little dunes, but like I said before it wasn't bad at all! 

 

 

 

 

Here's a little video a buddy of mine took of me playing around. And here you can really see how the front tires were sinking in the sand and the rears kept on digging.

 

 

Anyways, afterwards I took them off and started my way back home.