Swartzy On Death Valley.........

[Bitsamissin]

Well if he can't blow up our 2.85 t/case gears no-one else ain't............

Upon reaching the end of our long cross peaks travel on the Pleasent Canyon loop extension, a whole bunch of different roads came into view below us, including a connection to the main part of Death Valley to our left. Despite the Desert Closure Act, and Center for Bio Disgrace lawsuits,(re-openings are coming soon) Death Valley is still a fourwheelers National Park, and the connectivity is only exceeded by Canyonlands national Park units. We passed another " free to passerby" type cabin and stopped in a huge meadow to make a descision...What way....Looks like straight out of Middle Park Meadow, but just as I start to move Dat comes up to consult, and points out some very sound reasoning on the topo map why we should continue over the next ridge into the next canyon. I bought it, hook, line and sinker. Now, understand, our loop is to use Middle Park Canyon, closed 2 years prior by a rockslide, known as still closed by someone in our group more recently, so this adds to the confusion. How overgrown is it now? Is it open yet? As it turns out we should have turned and nearly an hour later we were looking at a very hardcore, decending canyon that continued to peater out. When it got hardcore we hiked a short distance ahead to find a 30ft cliff! No more Dat short cuts! All part of the adventure, along with all that firewood still crashing around on my roof that we picked up. We returned to Middle Park Meadow and proceded down what was to be the right trail, and as we turned nervous corner, after nervous corner not wanting to even stop for some very cool mines we finally came to an obvious slide area, with a 45' tilt toward oblivion on what appeared to be freshly stacked and staked rock fill. A short walk ahead found only a few day old asphalt patch next to a rickity old wooden bridge on a cliff. The trail must be open! Yeh! No 6 hr back track. This despite my guidebook placed the rock slide on the other side of the bridge, oh well, no ones perfect. After a slow, scary, pucker around the old slide we found ourselves at yet 2 more " Free " cabins, at an old mine, in the middle of the desert, with decks, lights, hot showers, stoves, furniture, you name it. One even had a urinal on the deck! Now thats a mans cabin! The other had a LAWN with sprinkler system even! We all looked at each other and said " Next Thanksgiving we WILL BE HERE!" We even agreed on who
would bring the propane and Turkey Smoker, ect. Count Death Valley as a for sure trip next Thanksgiving! After this the road becomes an easy, graded dirt road....but wait, why leave such a nice canyon now? So instead we took an optional more difficult(but not real hard), and very scenic slot type canyon out, which let out onto another shelf road with switch backs, just about the time it got dark. After winding slowly down the mountain for a few switch backs I noticed something and slammed on the brakes...a break in the dirt berm used as a gard rail and a trail headed STRAIGHT down the side of the mountain I said " I got to" as my girlfriend jumped out of the car screaming asking for me to get her daughter out as well(she could not see the trail below). Eventually she got in, and I plunged off the side, with crys of " What the Hell are you doing over the CB" Quite something to see my tail lights plunge off switchbacks on the side of the mountain at night I understand But we all survived the trip back to camp, and a great dinner and campfire time.

Saturday dawned a beautiful day, and with the fantastic trails of the day before we were ready for a challenge. After gassing up in Trona since the gas station was closed when we arrived on Thanksgiving I picked Isham Canyon, an optional loop off the Fish Canyon " Escape Trail" where the first settlers to escape Death Valley coined the name, Death Valley. " Goodbye Death Valley" My guide book made a little mention of it, but its used for Panamint Valley Days, and I had an internet printing of a story a guy in a built FourRunner did. Now, its funny, the major obsticles appear to have tons of rocks stacked in his photos, and big ones. Although he did mention one nearly impossible obsticle, where he did alot of body damage. All the rocks were gone lets just say, whether removed by weather, or rock buggy yahoos(more likely). It started out mild enough, but progressed, culmilating in very hard waterfalls, and the first of many storage shed size buildings rocks that must be scampered around while riding a cliff at a 45' angle leaning into the boulder, and the only way not to rub is to stack hundreds of rocks. Tube buggys could just rub there tubes on the boulders. At this point we realized it was not just a tough trail for a LWB, but impossible. Sean decided to turn around and go around to the other side and meet us, and after a long arduous attempt we found Justices 95 SR just to big to get through at all, and he went around as well. Up next was the same sort of scenario, followed by a waterfall, then 90' turn across the canyon, and imediate 90' turn back. How did we get Dats Sport through? I am really not sure but there was body damage! More humongous pinch boulders plagued us, each taking an hour or more of rock stacking, and the hardcore obsticles generally passing easily in between. Then we reached the grand daddy of them all near sunset, a 40ft climb in 40ft, up a 4ft wide slot canyon with vertical wall on one side and 75' angle on the other and a 45' turn 2/3 the way up. Verdict? Nearly impossible without winching to keep from rolling over, even in a flexy rig is my guess, and rubbing portions of your body are required. Luckilly my rear rock bumper end ubsorbed all but one small hit and I ground the rock away as I winched and drove up( the wall had hundreds of slices from this method). Dats long wheelbase nescesitated a far more tedious process and with rear bumper/ quarter panel protection, body damage was spectacular. At some point people started asking me, " Is the hardest trail you have ever done?", " have you ever stacked this many rocks?", and the answer to the second question is without a doubt yes. As to the first, I have struggled more before on extreme trails, but those were with far less equipment, or were first passages. After thinking it over, yes, I believe its the hardest trail I have ever done, and cannot even compare to any of the very few extreme trails we have ever done as a club. I give the trail a X4, with X4.5-5 being 38"+rock buggy only, and 5.5 impassible to all motorized traffic. This is over and beyond the standard 1-4+ or 1-10 scales! Someone commented, we must be earning our " Night Crawlers " reputation, and I said, it does not count unless we are out after midnight. Try 2:30am! After the big one,hardcore obsticles rolled by, with only one to stack rocks, and one Dat needed a serious extracation off of. We were approaching the final hill climb when a boulder I was on moved, and I became stuck. Dat dragged me back, my truck stood on end, came violently crashing to the ground as a boulder as tall as my hood rolled out in front of me! What the F%$%^@$#^%^%@? So, here we are, him above a nasty 10ft waterfall, me 20ft ahead, and an impassible boulder now lodged in the middle of the trail! We dragged it backwards with a strap until I touched Dats bumper, then slowly, ever so slowly used the high lift to jack and meneauver the damn thing out of the way! After stacking some rocks to finally round it in its final postion we screamed yahoo, we are out of here! thats when I tore a sidewall Now, the 1hr+ ordeal of changing a tire in unforgiving territory. Atlast we reached the final hill and saw Seans truck parked above. Now, I never met a straight out hill climb I considered much of a challenge, I mean Potatoe Salad hill in Moab is crawlable to me, or any moggle hill just about. THIS hill was STEEP with baseball to basketball size boulders that fly out from under you as you climb. It took several stops and starts, and runs, full throttle, all tires spinning, jumping 3-4ft off the ground, bouncing of the sides of the trench....you gert the idea, VERY violent. Amazingly I did not break anything. I then rolled out my entire 110ft of cable and 2 straps to hook up Dat where he stopped. But, the wireless remote was acting up, and when I went to plug in the wire remote I shorted it out, by plugging it in wrong in the dark, and being exhausted. I then started dragging him up the hill, stopped, turned hard over and slammed into some small boulders, all at once, snapping my passenger front axle! DAMN! No breakage on the trail, but now at the top my winch is busted and an axle! Soon after Dat found enough purchase to get the rest of teh way up. We then hot wired my winch and got the cable wound back up. We rolled into camp at 2:30am, tired, but happy to be out, and happy with the knowledge we could say we did Isham Canyon, but never would again!

Sunday morning we slowly got up and cooked breakfast, and the option of a short trail ride quickly dissolved as we were so tired from the previous night. So around lunch we all said our goodbyes and drove home to lick our wounds, and plan the next great adventure of the Mitsubishi
Night Crawlers. Thanks to all who helped me and Dat get through Isham Canyon, and I look forward to longer, grander second annual T-Day trip next year!

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902drV6 Auto

[springer]

I'll be F**ked, that is some crazy 4wheelin'