"The July Long Adventure"

Got to our usual camping spot Thursday evening. We were all quite anxious to go wheeling the next morning. Got started around noon on Friday. We thought we'd try Margaret Lake but before getting on the trail tried a nice skeg field near Johnston's mud pit. Both the knight and wolf played and got stuck in the midst of a hail storm (typical Waiparous). We then headed out on the trail. The knight's rear tires got to experience some air along the way, an interesting feeling :). Got to drive the wolf for a good part of the rest of the day. Very nice. Felt so smooth. What awesome flex. Love watching it do its thing.( I see front and rear coils as an upcoming mod for the knight ) Finished the day by going to the falls. It was a fun day. The next morning, the wolf and company headed out to Mountain Air Lodge with the stampeders. We hung out for a while and decided to head out to do meadow Creek with Deejay picking up a couple of jeeps along the way. We were almost at the pit when deejay's truck died. His fuel pump went. That was too bad. We were looking forward to playing in the pit with him (engine sounds really nice). Towed him back to camp. This was a short wheeling day for us. The adventure now begins. Next morning we decided to do pretty rock with wolf, Dave, hatboy, scott and some of the stampeders. A more appropriate name for this trail would be carnage rock as far as I'm concerned.:)
We went up the backside. Dave drove the knight and he did a great job. As Tim put it he went in a boy and came out a man. Went up with no problem. Hit some small skeg along the way. Got to the top and I must say the scenery is gorgeous. Had lunch and it was time to head back down the other side. As we were taking off we noticed we had no left steering, This was going to be an interesting ride down or in Robin's words "we're in deep shit". Got to the very deep rutted area of the very long way down and we thought that this didn't look so bad as long as there weren't too many left turns :). We started down and had to keep backing up the steep hill so that we could align the tires to get the right line. Doing okay for a bit until a bogger hooked nicely on one of the ruts. Couldn't back up much. The front tires were completely turned to the left. It didn't look too nice when we heard an echoing, "snap". Okay, what did we break? The front left axle, outer stub shaft and 1480 u-joint were toast. Dave tried to straitened the truck out so we could have a better look at it when the front drive shaft went next. We knew it was going to be an interesting trip but I guess now we made sure of that. The guys maguivered the front springs (they decided to find a new home) with a come along and the winch. Took the front drive shaft off and got winched down the steep part to a flat area. Still with no left steering we proceeded in two wheel drive. This was only 5 minutes into a long way back. We were doing not too bad with Dave driving and Robin being co-pilot. They had to work together to keep the truck straight as the left side had a mind of it's own. I'd have to say the knight has not seen this much "air" as it got itself into some very precarious positions. Got to the top of one hill and ran out of gas. It was a much longer drive then anticipated. Thanks to Tom for having that jerry can in the back of his jeep. We were about half way through and so on we go when we got into a small mud hole. As we tried to get out of it in two wheel drive we heard another echoing, "snap". Ah yes, the rear axles decided it was their time to go. Now we're down to once again no left steering and no wheel drive. The wolf hooked himself up to the knight and started to pull us along. The cruiser worked hard to get us up the hills and work it's way around the corners. We got very friendly with some trees along the way. We took a break and as we were ready to head off once again, the knight's fuel pump gave out. Now we have no engine. We were about 10 hours into the trail ride and were a little apprehensive to ask what would be next. Checked the relays and was able to get the fuel pump back. Finally made it back to the stampeders camp after a 12 hour trail ride. We were happy we made it out of the bush.

To keep in sink with history either the knight or the wolf has always been taken out of commission on long weekends. This time around it was the knight. The wolf escaped with no breakage.

Got home 6;00 PM tonight and as of then the carnage assessed is;

2 rear axles
1 rear power lock
1 front axle, outer stub shaft, 1480 u joint.
1 front drive shaft
1 damaged front passenger fender
No steering

I'm sure we'll find some more once we start working on the truck.

Want to say thanks to everyone that helped especially Tim and the wolf.
All in all , it was a fun weekend.


Here are some of the pics. Thought I might have had some of the off camber stuff but I don't. I couldn't get out of the truck at those particular moments :)