Magruder Trip Report

[007]

This was a week long trip to explore the Magruder corridor and Lolo trail which lies in western Montana and Eastern Idaho. It is also called the Nez Pierce trail. as they used it to migrate the rockies and later to evade unwelcome spheres of lead being hurled at them.

Originally we had 4 rigs partaking in this trip, but the U.S. border deemed one of the participants a threat to national security (because of a small mishap 20 years ago!) So he was turned back.

Anyway, myself and two land cruisers had a good time nonetheless

The Magruder and Lolo trail are not technical, but the Helena to Darby section IS! I didn't get many photos through the technical stuff but both LC's picked up some dents. One on th running board and the other in the fender. It was a really tight trail with big boulders

Later we made it to some smoother sailing

August in Montana

This is a lake with a very challenging mess of loose rock to conquer before looking down. The trail up here ended at an old trappers cabin.

Pretty flowers and nice technical trails through this section.

This is the Magruder trail heading into Idaho. It has nice mountain scape's but the trails are all easy for 100's of miles! Fun, but not really spectacular until later on when we get to the rain forests.

Camping with Jan and Kyle, Jan is brilliant and Kyle is hilarious! Jan is CanuckMariner, and I don't know Kyle's handle because he is a portal hermit:sombrero:

Pic of the creek behind our campsite. Jan likes to set up camp early regardless of the spot and I'm a total whiner for the perfect spot so we had some good drama settling on a spot. The best part was that Jan had to talk to me with a CB and Kyle with a 2m all while driving and watching two GPS screens. How he stayed cheery I'll never know!

Magruder massacre site, we were to late to offer any assistance

Endless sea of mountains

Most of them burnt, I like burned forests.

continued...

 

[007]

Start of the Lolo trail, that is CanuckMariner's diesel powered right hand drive jap cruiser. Kyle has a 80 series diesel right hand drive. Jerks :sombrero:

This area had me expecting dinosaurs to come lurking out on the trail, very cool trees and the smell was amazing. The day before we encountered severe monsoon rain like none of us had ever encountered. It was continuous multiple lightning strikes for hours. A rumble that never paused,.

We climbed a fire tower that had been manned by a man and his wife for the last 20 -30 years.

Nice little lake we had lunch at. On the way out we spotted a lightening fire and reported it to the next fire tower we saw. They couldn't care less lol!

Rocks n'junk

Anyone can get luck taking a nice pick

My little donkey :sombrero:

Eventually we parted ways to return home.

I found a remote area of Montana to spend the night. Couple hours after this pic I slid off the road at a sloughed off area and ended up taking a tree through the windshield. It would have messed my passenger up, but thank God I was solo. Some quick chainsaw work and a couple winching events had me back on track. I duct taped the window up for a 6" x 6" viewing area and proceeded home.

 

[idaxj97]

nice trip one of these days ill get my butt up that way and run this trail. glad to hear ur ok after the tree jumped you.

 

[Mamontof]

Wow , what a trip , not many post they trails true Montana

Thanks , any more photo to share ?

 

[ttora4runner]

Nice. :victory:

 

[TangoBlue]

Damn gangsta trees...

Glad you made it out okay. Looks like some epic territory to check out.

 

[Richie]

I miss that part of the country. Beautiful! Thanks for sharing.

 

[007]

Those trees taught me a little lesson. I was trying to drive over one laying out in the trail and could tell that it was slippery. I thought if I got up on it and started to slide I would quickly stop or reverse and attach the winch as an anchor. but...

I got over the tree and it was too high so my frame hit the wet log before my tires hit dirt and I was tony hawking my way down the hillside! The ARB took the brunt with the first tree, but there was another tree above that that clipped the top of the bumper - slid over the hood and smashed through the glass.

I was seat belted in so my attempt to duck was comical, but it didn't come to close to me. The passenger would have most likely been shish ka bobbed as that part of the tree was inches from the head rest.

In hindsight I wished I had grabbed pictures, but I wasn't going to dig through broken glass to grab a camera that would highlight how stupid I was at that point.

Now that I know my truck isn't a skidder I'll be more careful the next time

I really like my new windshield though, its crystal clear!