Thursday, May 20, 1999

Ed wanted to get out of the city, so I agreed to arrange a newbie/stocker daytrip (twist my rubber arm!). Ray brought his friend Laszlo, with a stock automatic 4Runner, and Mark found the trip posting on my website.

I told the usual Toyota gang that they could meet at Stave Lake at 10:00 am, or at my house at 9:00 am... they chose to meet at my house, so once everyone arrived we headed off for the lake. Gas was cheap in Maple Ridge, so we fueled up and bought Subway sandwiches, and continued on (running a little late now). We arrived at the first west-side parking lot at Stave Lake at 10:20 am, and aired down. No sign of Mark or anyone else who mentioned they might be attending, so we figured they either got tired of waiting and went on ahead, or couldn't make it.

We decided to go to the lookout for lunch, then check out some of the side trails. On the way to the lookout, Shane spotted a lone vehicle out in the mud flats, and Ed confirmed it was a Pathfinder. I decided to check it out, in the event it was Mark, or in case the owner was stuck. It turned out to be Mark and his family, so after some introductions, we continued on to the lookout. Actually, Shane took us in the wrong direction, and after I said "Uh, Shane?" on the VHF, we got turned around in the right direction.

The road to the lookout is a nice graded gravel road (we even saw the grader working); once we got to the fork where the Hydro gate was, the road got a little rockier. We bumped over the rocks towards the top, while Ed mumbled about the flat tire he got there last year. Once at the top, Shane crawled up the rocks to the top of the lookout, followed by me (without lockers; my compressor wouldn't turn on), Ray, and Laszlo (in street tires yet!). I suddenly remembered that I had unplugged my ARB relay while rerouting some wires last week, so I plugged it back in and the compressor fired right up. We ate our lunches, and enjoyed the panoramic view of the snow-capped peak of Mt Robie Reid to the west, the dark blue waters of Alouette Lake and Stave Lake, and the logging roads criss-crossing the lush green forest above Cypress Point on the east side of Stave. This picturesque spot was marred by a bunch of garbage left by irresponsible partiers, and a dense cloud of little biting insects (LBI's [tm]) that made us wish for mosquito netting.

After lunch, we took the short road above Sayres Lake, but were stopped by a large rock from old slide just past the log bridge. We parked our trucks, and Shane discovered that his radiator or aux cooler was leaking from "somewhere". While waiting for the rad to cool down (per the instructions on the bottle of Bar's Stop Leak), we decided to hike down to the lake. Mark told us that he had to leave, so we said goodbye to him and his family. The hike down to the lake was easy, and Laszlo did a few casts with his fishing rod (no bites though). As usual, I was pretty winded when we got back up to the trucks, and after Shane poured the Bar's into his rad, we hid in our vehicles to escape the ravenous hordes of LBI's and talked to each other via VHF. :)

We proceeded down to the next trailhead, and a quick check of Shane's rad showed that the Bar's had done the job and it was no longer leaking (or he was out of fluid!). Mental note to add a bottle to my box-o'-plenty. I snapped some pics of the IFS trucks at the trailhead, as Ed and Laszlo got to experience 3-wheeling for the first time. When Shane drove over the berm, we heard a *bang* as one of the pins of his front swaybar quick-disconnects quickly disconnected on it's own. Shane decided that he should head home while his rad was cooperating, so we said goodbye to him and proceeded up the trail.

The trail was covered with small rocks, and reminded us of Clear Creek. We wound our way up until we hit snow. On the way back down, we took a side road, which turned out to be a nice trail with several side roads, and a couple of obstacles for stock trucks.

The first obstacle was a rocky climb in loose soil. Laszlo tried it first, in Ray's 4Runner. No problem making it up, with the rear locker engaged. After Ray looked inside the 4Runner, he laughingly informed Laszlo that he had engaged the Marlin Crawler instead of the transfer case... so he had made it up in 2wd. I tried it next, no problem taking the harder line since I was locked front and rear. Ed was next; he was unable to make it past a particularly annoying rock which his rear tire kept butting up against. We could see where either more articulation or a rear locker would have helped tremendously. I hopped into Ed's 4Runner, and gave it a try. I took a different line, got past the rock, and almost made it to the top; somehow I slid off to the left side and put the left rear tire over the edge of the road. Oops! :) I got Ed to stay in the 4Runner to apply the brakes, while I ran up to my truck and backed it down to attach the tow rope. I attempted to pull Ed up, but there was no movement from the 4Runner. I think Ed was stressing a bit... I turned my truck around, hooked up the trusty Warn, and winched him up and past the tough section. Laszlo then tried it with his own 4Runner; after a couple attempts he found the correct line and drove up it with only a little bit of tire spin.

We arrived at the next obstacle a short while later. It was a narrow, rocky step, with a stump on one side and a rocky bank on the other, forcing you take the only line possible. Once out of the step, you had to climb an incline of rocks over soft dirt. Ed had a bit of a problem with this section, as he was unable to get traction in the soft dirt. After a few attempts, we told him to air down a bit further, and I pointed out a line I wanted him to take. This got him through on the first try. Laszlo had watched and absorbed all this, and made it up with minimal effort. The locked trucks didn't even spin a tire.

We eventually arrived at the snow line after a few switchbacks, and once the snow got deeper than a foot and a half, we decided to turn around. On the way out, Ray was bullied into egressing though a ditch, and promptly got stuck because his vehicle was too long. He ended up with both bumpers supporting the truck, resting on the banks of the ditch, his tires unable to get traction. I easily winched him out, but not before snapping a pic for posterity.

We stopped to play in the dirt quarry for a bit. Ray had to take off, as it was his fourth wedding anniversary and he was late! (heh-heh, boy are you gonna be in trouble!) So, Ray and Laszlo left for home. I tried to climb the 80-degree hill, but only managed to get the front tires over the lip. I thought about driving down it instead; Ed said "If you drive down that, you're the craziest 4by-er I know!" So of course, I had to do it. :) I managed to break the weld on my muffler hangar when I banged my rear bumper on the lip; I wouldn't have banged the bumper if I was going slow, but my brakes wouldn't hold the truck at that angle, so I descended the hill rather rapidly (the words "free-falling" come to mind).

Ed and I stopped for dinner at the Maple Ridge Boston Pizza before heading home. I think everyone had a great time, and we're all looking forward to the next outing.

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