Dr. Marneaus
Station Wagoneer
Well, It's story time. I'm sure y'all know how I like to tell the tales of my trips I take....so, here goes.
A little back story. You may remember about 13 months ago I loaded up my girl, and my camping gear into the waggy and headed north for Ely, NV on a hot weekend to get out of the desert. Well ,the truck fought me the entire way form the minute I set tire on the highway, it died several times in various places for various reasons (mostly fuel system issues, heat issues etc), and I kinda put the truck away for a few months after that trip, but then did a ton of work over the winter/spring to eliminate the issues.
You've also seen that I recently acquired an old pop up camper, cleaned it up, painted it, lifted it, new tires, etc. After that, and several recent 'trial' trips in the truck....it was time to get out of the city for real!
...It was time for MY JEEP to kick the ROAD's Butt!
So, like I just said, this was the exact same trip that was a huge PITA last year....and this was the first time I've ever towed for any distance with the truck too. I was a bit nervous going in....but stayed confident.
We made plans to replicate the trip exactly, and loaded out geat, then headed off pointed north!
We had a total of 4 vehicles going up in the end, but they were spread out over a while. My buddy (with his rubi and M101/RTT combo) and I left the city around noon, on friday.
He had a wonderful view (of my fat ******** jeep and trailer) for the 4.5 hour ride up north. Kinda neat to see my rear end traveling through different elevations of desert, over the course of the day.
I was also using my little action video camera to capture a bunch of stills and video (im still working on a movie) of the trip. Kinda neat with the fish-eye
We were enjoying the ride!
So, we kept it to 60mph and I squeezed out a wonderful 10mpg on the 250 mile trip up there! Arrived at the camp site, it was empty.
So, the first leg of the trip went off without a hitch, everybody eventually rolled up the the camp site and we had a good night. I couldnt get the heater to fire in my camper though (i'm assuming the thermocouple is bad) but i had brought my portable heater, so all was well.
The next day ,we woke up for breakfast, and headed out for a day trip that I was unable to tackle last time we were up here. Thr Success Loop is a 30ish mile long road that goes up into the mountains behjind Cave Lake state park. Its literally just a dirt road in the summer, but is unmaintained in the winter. Luckily, it's still summer!
We were climbing, climbing, climbing....
Ely itself is at about 6500' elevation. Our campsite was at about 7000'. We peaked out at 9072' at the top of success, and the jeep was still purring like a kitten! Now THATS successful!
Beautiful scenery on the way down, took some pics in the aspens.
Headed back to town, met up with a guy from jeepforum for lunch, then headed back to the campsite for the night.
View from the campsite:
The charcoal Ovens:
Did a little hike the next morning, then loaded everything up for the return trip.
Uneventful ride home, but we stopped at the sign for the E.T. Highway and my buddy grabbed a good pic.
So, another 100 miles on the road, and I pulled back into the city of Las Vegas on a sunday afternoon. All in all....good trip.
A little back story. You may remember about 13 months ago I loaded up my girl, and my camping gear into the waggy and headed north for Ely, NV on a hot weekend to get out of the desert. Well ,the truck fought me the entire way form the minute I set tire on the highway, it died several times in various places for various reasons (mostly fuel system issues, heat issues etc), and I kinda put the truck away for a few months after that trip, but then did a ton of work over the winter/spring to eliminate the issues.
You've also seen that I recently acquired an old pop up camper, cleaned it up, painted it, lifted it, new tires, etc. After that, and several recent 'trial' trips in the truck....it was time to get out of the city for real!
...It was time for MY JEEP to kick the ROAD's Butt!
So, like I just said, this was the exact same trip that was a huge PITA last year....and this was the first time I've ever towed for any distance with the truck too. I was a bit nervous going in....but stayed confident.
We made plans to replicate the trip exactly, and loaded out geat, then headed off pointed north!
We had a total of 4 vehicles going up in the end, but they were spread out over a while. My buddy (with his rubi and M101/RTT combo) and I left the city around noon, on friday.
He had a wonderful view (of my fat ******** jeep and trailer) for the 4.5 hour ride up north. Kinda neat to see my rear end traveling through different elevations of desert, over the course of the day.
I was also using my little action video camera to capture a bunch of stills and video (im still working on a movie) of the trip. Kinda neat with the fish-eye
We were enjoying the ride!
So, we kept it to 60mph and I squeezed out a wonderful 10mpg on the 250 mile trip up there! Arrived at the camp site, it was empty.
So, the first leg of the trip went off without a hitch, everybody eventually rolled up the the camp site and we had a good night. I couldnt get the heater to fire in my camper though (i'm assuming the thermocouple is bad) but i had brought my portable heater, so all was well.
The next day ,we woke up for breakfast, and headed out for a day trip that I was unable to tackle last time we were up here. Thr Success Loop is a 30ish mile long road that goes up into the mountains behjind Cave Lake state park. Its literally just a dirt road in the summer, but is unmaintained in the winter. Luckily, it's still summer!
We were climbing, climbing, climbing....
Ely itself is at about 6500' elevation. Our campsite was at about 7000'. We peaked out at 9072' at the top of success, and the jeep was still purring like a kitten! Now THATS successful!
Beautiful scenery on the way down, took some pics in the aspens.
Headed back to town, met up with a guy from jeepforum for lunch, then headed back to the campsite for the night.
View from the campsite:
The charcoal Ovens:
Did a little hike the next morning, then loaded everything up for the return trip.
Uneventful ride home, but we stopped at the sign for the E.T. Highway and my buddy grabbed a good pic.
So, another 100 miles on the road, and I pulled back into the city of Las Vegas on a sunday afternoon. All in all....good trip.
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Glad you didn't. You stuck through and now its paying off and thats got to be more than gradifiying. 
