2013 Tundra "Clifford" Entirely possibly overboard

[Dblack]

Changed out the bfgoodrich ko2 for a slightly larger toyo open country at2 extreme. 285/74r17.

34" tire and that's about as big as I can get without some creative trimming. I get just a hair of touch against the mud flaps on a hard turn, but not enough to worry about.

Everyone else seems to love the ko2's but mine didn't balance worth a damn after about 50,000km. Hopefully I'm just lucky, but these open country's should be ok. Time will tell.

 

[Dblack]

Slapped together a water system... For lack of a better term. 2 Blue Scepter water cans from princess auto, some hose and hose clamps and this should do us for a week at most.

 

[Dblack]

Toured around Swan Hills, AB a bit this past weekend. Got snowed on, Day one was a mud day, and day 2 was a snow day.

Nice view up in the hills. A bit socked in and chilly.

So I went up the Grizzly Highway (33) to The Grizzly capital of Alberta (Swan Hills), headed north west to the grizzly range and... Of course we saw this guy. Had lunch while we watched him grazing. Very cool.



Camped for the night

The road the next day had a lot of water across it. Soft in a lot of places. The tracks in the slush on the water are from determined Ducks swimming around.
Muskeg falls?

Below is Jim's hill in the distance. Local legend has it that Jim was climbing it in a water truck when he got stuck and started to slide backwards. Brakes wouldn't hold so he bailed, and the truck ran over him. Brutal. Safety first! You can still see where the truck plowed a path into the trees half way down.

Clifford gained 500lbs of ice.

Cool little trappers cabin near the Freeman river:

 

[Dblack]

 

[Dblack]

Headed out for a day cruise to the Limestone Mt. Area with my parents, and an Aunt. Together they're pushing 240 years of experience. :-0


Saw some wild ponies in the area. 2 different herds, and a VERY new born. Cute little guy could barely stand on his own.

Was making good time up Limestone Mt. when we started to hit some snow.


The progress came to a halt with a trail obstacle. Some nice jeeper guys that were having some troubles. I Helped this guy out a little with some shoveling and pushing. He had slid off the tracks and had a devil of a time getting straight.



The black jeep got up the hill over the next rise when he slid off the trail again. Trying to follow Side by side tracks in the snow was not working out for him and the snow was only getting deeper.

The black jeep in the front was up to his doors in snow, so the blue jeep behind him rolled his winch out to pull him out... No go. Didn't have enough battery to run the winch. Plus the housing of the winch was cracked, and smoking for some bad reason... Apparently these things don't work so good once he let the smoke out. Oops.

No problem, I turned around in the trail, backed in, and pulled them both up the hill a little bit. Sometimes being a little fat and heavy on the trails comes in handy.



It was clear I wasn't going to make Limestone summit, so I went to see another area to the north that's been on my radar. I wanted to see a cross country exit and see if I could fit a truck through it, and hit a different peak to the north of Limestone.

This is Limestone from the north, and the road is a 25% grade. Too much fun.


Nice views up there too.

 

[Dblack]

The North exit of that valley will have some water crossings and the water is pretty high now, but not too bad. I think it's very doable in the summer.



Next time I'll check to see where this goes. Closed off road but on the maps looks like it heads into another valley west of Limestone. They took the bridges out, but left the road... Challenge accepted.

 

[zidaro]

Nice touring, great territory to be able to explore

 

[Dblack]

Nice touring, great territory to be able to explore

It is nice to explore the area. And funny that you mention that. I watch you guys exploring the deserts around you and think how nice it would be to be able to explore it.

Oh. Btw. I totally used your build thread as a template building mine.

 

[Dalko43]

The more I read your thread, the more I find myself liking the Tundra as an overlanding platform. It seems to offer a good compromise between a mid-sized truck or SUV and a 3/4 ton pickup. Now if Toyota would just find it in them to put a diesel into that thing, I would be sold.

 

[Dblack]

After tearing a mudflap off a couple times I tweaked the tie back to a double chain.

Stickers, stickers, stickers!!! Who doesn't love stickers!?!

Well, I don't like stickers. But I like Canada so I'll and an exception for these.