Page updated: 05/05/2001 05:58 PM
I'm Talkin' Road Trip...From Hell!This is Part III in a four-part series. The story is this: A bunch of Kentucky freaks drove to Colorado, Moab, then Phoenix, and back to Kentucky. All of which somewhere between 7-10 days! Holy cow. I managed to meet them in Phoenix for some fun. Clicking the links below will take you from one day to the next. The same menu is at the bottom of each page. Enjoy! [ Part I | Part II |
Part
III | Part IV ] This section written by: Al Bsharah
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DAY 3 (4/12) - Thursday
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 Windshield
down with the new cage... |
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 The
trailhead for Upper Woodpecker. |
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 These
guys doin' a little playin' before hitting the trails... |
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 The
first obstacle was a tight lean into a wall. Had to take it just right
to not hit your cage or top... |
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 Greg's
Panel Wagon. This obstacle is called "Fire Hole" and was
pretty fun. Essentially just a big ol' crack. Everyone made it
up fairly uneventfully... |
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 John's
TJ |
 Flash's
TJ. |
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 Workin'
the narrow wheel-base! |
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 Brett
to Al: Hey, did you want to put that tire on...Jeep to Al: CLUNK! |
 Essentially,
I decided I wanted to go the hard way on this one and managed to miss the
rock for my right front tire, which is why I fell in the hole that you see
in the previous picture. This shot is after getting lined up better. |
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 First
real trail break (errr, bend...) Head's tie rod took a little hit. |
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 Second
trail break. Greg's t-case crossmember took a crap. One of my
tie-straps seemed to do the trick for the rest of the day. |
 Jack
Daniels |
 Someone
email Head and tell him not to
change the color of his bitchin' silver roll cage! |
 Hang
on! |
 Good
thing it's a fuzzy shot or we'd be stuck looking at a cheesy smile! |
 This
obstacle was a big rock with a bigger rock to the side of it! Was
tough not to hit it. |
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 Lee
managed to munch his right-front fender on this one...TJ apparently didn't
see that coming from his vantage point! Too many beers I guess (he was
a JAFO at this point) |
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 Highway
to Hell, baby. The
entrance sign is a trip...ring gears, axle shafts, miscellaneous parts, all
welded together to form a skull and crossbones. Classic! |
 It
was about 5pm when we got to the start of this trail. A quick vote
said, "Let's go!" Little did we know...
<grin> Every single one of us were virgins to this trail and
what laid ahead. |
 This
first set of obstacles consisted of three small ones. Here you see me
on the second one...the first of which is a narrow squeeze. |
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 Attempting
to make my way up the third obstacle (a major step) was difficult.
While trying to climb the step, the rear would slide around a rock and point
you towards where the camera man was in this picture. |
 Carnage
#3. Boy that shackle looks funny (you could see it coming in some of
the day two pictures, but I never noticed). Broke the mount...had to
winch the spring over and chain it down. I say that I never noticed...
Well... <laugh> Tom came over earlier in the day saying
something about a "trick shackle mount" that I had. We all
looked at it and said, "HUH? You musta seen something
funny." Ironically, he DID see something funny! Too bad we
didn't take him serously enough to really look at the mount ahead of time! |
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 This
is Kerry going up the third obstacle |
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 Check
out the flex on that 1/4-elliptical! Bitchin' setup... |
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 Kerry
made a nearly flawless attempt at it all, showing me up once again! |
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 SCOOBY!
Givin' it up for the crowd! |
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 Rusty
(owner/operator of Kentucky Offroad)
and the rest of the crew had Scooby up and running in relatively quick
order. |
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 This
was Scooby's best "I broke!" face. For the record: both front leaf spring bent to hell, all four shocks
bent including front steering shock, both steering rods bent, shattered middle shaft in the
Dana 30 front end, two u-bolts broken, rear drive shaft, and a driver side front
axle. Holy shit, dude! Scooby had a rough day... |
 Hey,
don't scratch my Jeep! |
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 I
broke! (continued) Blown bead too. |
 Closer
shot of my blown shackle mount. |
 Since
the shackle mount was broken it's possible my right-front would droop
forever, so they boys slapped together a home-made
limiting strap so I wouldn't pull a break line if the chain gave way. |
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 Unfortunately,
Rusty had some engine difficulties again and was hung up here for some time
while the guys figured out what the problem was. |
 Meanwhile
- Darrel, Kerry, Brett and I trudged forward to see exactly how far this
trail ran. We Jeep'd it for a while until we came to a point that
looked as if it might be a winch-only set of obstacles. We wanted to
walk it to see if it was going to be worth the effort to continue on or
back. As it turns out, the trail was MUCH longer and pretty
wicked! We would have been on this trail all night, especially
considering the amount of carnage we had thus far. We were all pretty
tired and decided it would be best to turn around and head home. You
have no idea how difficult a decision that was for the four of us! We
will definitely be back to conquer this trail. |
Right about as we got back, Rusty's engine fired up <phew>! |
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 Re-doing
the chain 'cause it broke free. |
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 I
broke! (continuted... AGAIN) Some kind of brake problem. |
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 Maybe
this choice of driver would have soothed the carnage gods? |
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DAY 4 (4/13) - Friday
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 I
can't believe we're still awake. |
 I'm
sober. |
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 My Jeep looks so small... |
 Your
neighbor's love us, TJ. I about died when that one lady was taking her
morning walk and said "Looks like you guys are having a lot of
fun!" I'm surprised someone didn't call the police... |
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 10am
was our final bed-time... |
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That is the end of Part III. Clicking the links
below will let you continue on with the rest of the story...
[ Part I | Part II |
Part
III | Part IV ] 