upcruiser
Perpetual Transient
Guess I am overdue for an update! Have been reducing my internet footprint lately so no forum time at all but I thought I would do an update of our trip. Since I don't put together trip reports anymore, figured I would do a little trip recap in this thread.
So, this past May we took the Burb on its first big trip outside of the region. It ended up being about 5,000 miles in total. Leading up to the trip we did a shock upgrade to the Bilstein 5100's and installed an onboard compressor to aid in adjusting tire pressures since we would be towing our camper along and using it to basecamp and explore off the beaten path. The ability to air down a bit in conjunction with the shocks transformed the ride quality completely and made time in the dirt much more enjoyable.
We departed late April and our original route was going to be southern across Kansas and southern Colorado over to Hurricane, Utah. There was an outbreak of severe weather for most of a week covering almost all of the midwest and mountains of the west however. We followed the weather reports right up till the day we departed and decided to take a northern route instead since severe Thunderstorms and tornados were forecast for prettty much everywhere south of South Dakota. With the intention of burning some miles and getting west as fast as possible, we took to the road and crossed Wisconsin, Minnesota, and into South Dakota. We ended up taking a very indirect route north of the Black Hills, then diving south as we crossed into Wyoming to hit Rawlins. We were threading the needle between snow storms here hoping to avoid towing a camper on snow covered roads. We succeeded for the most part, about 15 miles from Rawlins we hit heavy snow and snow covered roads but they didn't seem to present a problem to us. We rolled into Rawlins and spent the night in the Wallmart parking lot, along with a bunch of other trucks and campers seeking refuge.
Since we are pretty new to towing a camper and this was our first trip out of the midwest with it, I was a bit worried about how much of a pain it would be. It ended up being amazing. Especially having to little children..... Whenever we were hungry or the kids needed a break from their car seats, we would just pull off, vitually anywhere and hop in the camper, fire up the furnace (it was cold for most of the drive out), then cook up a meal, relax a it, maybe take a shower before continuing on. I can't state how great this was. Made the drive super comfortable and we didn't have to eat crappy food along the way. The Burb rocked the towing. We had huge winds including crosswinds and headwinds. Even with semi's along the freeway stretches we did, the truck and camper were very stable and virtually no sway whatsover. I figured the semi's would blow us all over the road as we passed them but it wasn't the case at all. The towing prowess of this platform is totally justified. So yeah, we were camped out at a Wallmart parking lot, this was a first for us too. Sounds awful.... but it was AMAZING. Snow was whipping around outside, yet we were inside, blinds drawn, heater keeping us comfy, listening to good music, eating good food. Camper= cozy home wherever you are parked, awesome.
Our first stop was at a friend's place in Park City. We spent a couple of days relaxing and catching up before pushing on to Hurricane.
They had a great view of Mt Timpanogos when the clouds lifted. This was the first good weather we had the entire drive so far.
Perhaps a bit of a Mormon stereotype but we spotted this 6 door Burb driving through Provo, crazy.
We hit Hurricane and set up at the KOA for a couple of days in order to have hookups in case we needed AC with the forecasted 90 degree weather. We took turns mountain biking and doing some day trip explorations. This is looking across to Gooseberry Mesa while scouting out some potential good places for our dispersed camping with the camper.
Most of our adventures with the burb were dirt roads but this was a steep rocky trail we took to catch the sunset one evening. The truck did great, plenty of traction and no issues other than it took some care on a couple of tight, steep switchbacks. The turning radius in 4lo is pretty wide, but is to be expected with 130" of wheelbase.
view from the top
Driving up to the top of Zion on a hot day. 95 in the valley but 50's up at 7,000 feet.
continued...
So, this past May we took the Burb on its first big trip outside of the region. It ended up being about 5,000 miles in total. Leading up to the trip we did a shock upgrade to the Bilstein 5100's and installed an onboard compressor to aid in adjusting tire pressures since we would be towing our camper along and using it to basecamp and explore off the beaten path. The ability to air down a bit in conjunction with the shocks transformed the ride quality completely and made time in the dirt much more enjoyable.
We departed late April and our original route was going to be southern across Kansas and southern Colorado over to Hurricane, Utah. There was an outbreak of severe weather for most of a week covering almost all of the midwest and mountains of the west however. We followed the weather reports right up till the day we departed and decided to take a northern route instead since severe Thunderstorms and tornados were forecast for prettty much everywhere south of South Dakota. With the intention of burning some miles and getting west as fast as possible, we took to the road and crossed Wisconsin, Minnesota, and into South Dakota. We ended up taking a very indirect route north of the Black Hills, then diving south as we crossed into Wyoming to hit Rawlins. We were threading the needle between snow storms here hoping to avoid towing a camper on snow covered roads. We succeeded for the most part, about 15 miles from Rawlins we hit heavy snow and snow covered roads but they didn't seem to present a problem to us. We rolled into Rawlins and spent the night in the Wallmart parking lot, along with a bunch of other trucks and campers seeking refuge.
Since we are pretty new to towing a camper and this was our first trip out of the midwest with it, I was a bit worried about how much of a pain it would be. It ended up being amazing. Especially having to little children..... Whenever we were hungry or the kids needed a break from their car seats, we would just pull off, vitually anywhere and hop in the camper, fire up the furnace (it was cold for most of the drive out), then cook up a meal, relax a it, maybe take a shower before continuing on. I can't state how great this was. Made the drive super comfortable and we didn't have to eat crappy food along the way. The Burb rocked the towing. We had huge winds including crosswinds and headwinds. Even with semi's along the freeway stretches we did, the truck and camper were very stable and virtually no sway whatsover. I figured the semi's would blow us all over the road as we passed them but it wasn't the case at all. The towing prowess of this platform is totally justified. So yeah, we were camped out at a Wallmart parking lot, this was a first for us too. Sounds awful.... but it was AMAZING. Snow was whipping around outside, yet we were inside, blinds drawn, heater keeping us comfy, listening to good music, eating good food. Camper= cozy home wherever you are parked, awesome.
Our first stop was at a friend's place in Park City. We spent a couple of days relaxing and catching up before pushing on to Hurricane.
They had a great view of Mt Timpanogos when the clouds lifted. This was the first good weather we had the entire drive so far.
Perhaps a bit of a Mormon stereotype but we spotted this 6 door Burb driving through Provo, crazy.
We hit Hurricane and set up at the KOA for a couple of days in order to have hookups in case we needed AC with the forecasted 90 degree weather. We took turns mountain biking and doing some day trip explorations. This is looking across to Gooseberry Mesa while scouting out some potential good places for our dispersed camping with the camper.
Most of our adventures with the burb were dirt roads but this was a steep rocky trail we took to catch the sunset one evening. The truck did great, plenty of traction and no issues other than it took some care on a couple of tight, steep switchbacks. The turning radius in 4lo is pretty wide, but is to be expected with 130" of wheelbase.
view from the top
Driving up to the top of Zion on a hot day. 95 in the valley but 50's up at 7,000 feet.
continued...
