jscusmcvet
Explorer
Well folks, yesterday was my birthday and four great things happened:
1. I met a great new friend named Andy.
2. I became the proud owner (once I pick it up and pay the man) of my first Land Rover - the 1997 Discovery listed here:
http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...-rack-ARB-winch-skid-plate-Hella-s-limb-riser
3. My wife not only agreed, she REALLY liked the vehicle (yes, yes, you are correct, I am a lucky man... which is why for her birthday (today) she is spending the day at the Pinehurst Resort Spa
)
4. I made it to 44 in a realtively healthy manner.
Background: I have been a Jeep guy my whole life, since my older brother brought home his 19something or other Jeep Commando, lifted, half cab.... since then I have been the wagoneer, scrambler, cherokee, TJ Rubicon and TJ sport route. I did all the modification work on those projects myself, and while no mechanic, if I can find a decent write up I can learn and do myself for most things anyway. Got the most out of the Rubicon as my 16 year old and I traveled up and down the east coast, adopting the adventure based lifetsyle, working our way through the best trails we could find. Our favorite was Tellico (RIP)
Now with a new, unexpected, almost 2 year old in the house, we picked up a used pop up camper, which the Jeep pulled ok, but made mee feel a bit uneasy, not too bad, but at this point in time we have a differnt kind of adventure in mind. So we began looking, considered trading my TJ to my older son for his cherokee and eventually found my way to the Land Rover Discovery 1. A family oriented vehicle (room, comfort, but still a truck...) Then, as if it was supposed to be, I spotted Andy's For Sale thread, with him just about 1 hour from home, seemed like we had to look. Truck turned out to be great, well taken care of and Andy turned out to be a guy of similar interests, solid character and remarkably open and honest about the vehicle's history and condition.
SO - here we go. I am feeling as though I have betrayed some of my Jeep heritage but cannot get over the desire to at least give the Rover a shot. Our plan is to finalize some of the basic modifications I deem needed as I begin to understand the vehicle, and then use the truck for our family adventures, camping, trail riding in the LR, Mountain biking, canoeing, trail runs and hiking. I will be looking hard at skid plating and functional mechanical improvements as needed. Not building a rock crawler, but a solid dependable, off the road capable vehicle.
I will also be driving the LR on a regular basis and using it around our 45 acres for general duty such as dragging logs, winching timber as I cut and toting my utility trailer.
We pick it up tomorrow. I am really excited about learning a new (to me) vehicle and planning our own version of adventure.
Thanks Andy and thanks EX. Portal for help in finding it.
John
1. I met a great new friend named Andy.
2. I became the proud owner (once I pick it up and pay the man) of my first Land Rover - the 1997 Discovery listed here:
http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...-rack-ARB-winch-skid-plate-Hella-s-limb-riser
3. My wife not only agreed, she REALLY liked the vehicle (yes, yes, you are correct, I am a lucky man... which is why for her birthday (today) she is spending the day at the Pinehurst Resort Spa
)4. I made it to 44 in a realtively healthy manner.
Background: I have been a Jeep guy my whole life, since my older brother brought home his 19something or other Jeep Commando, lifted, half cab.... since then I have been the wagoneer, scrambler, cherokee, TJ Rubicon and TJ sport route. I did all the modification work on those projects myself, and while no mechanic, if I can find a decent write up I can learn and do myself for most things anyway. Got the most out of the Rubicon as my 16 year old and I traveled up and down the east coast, adopting the adventure based lifetsyle, working our way through the best trails we could find. Our favorite was Tellico (RIP)
Now with a new, unexpected, almost 2 year old in the house, we picked up a used pop up camper, which the Jeep pulled ok, but made mee feel a bit uneasy, not too bad, but at this point in time we have a differnt kind of adventure in mind. So we began looking, considered trading my TJ to my older son for his cherokee and eventually found my way to the Land Rover Discovery 1. A family oriented vehicle (room, comfort, but still a truck...) Then, as if it was supposed to be, I spotted Andy's For Sale thread, with him just about 1 hour from home, seemed like we had to look. Truck turned out to be great, well taken care of and Andy turned out to be a guy of similar interests, solid character and remarkably open and honest about the vehicle's history and condition.
SO - here we go. I am feeling as though I have betrayed some of my Jeep heritage
but cannot get over the desire to at least give the Rover a shot. Our plan is to finalize some of the basic modifications I deem needed as I begin to understand the vehicle, and then use the truck for our family adventures, camping, trail riding in the LR, Mountain biking, canoeing, trail runs and hiking. I will be looking hard at skid plating and functional mechanical improvements as needed. Not building a rock crawler, but a solid dependable, off the road capable vehicle.I will also be driving the LR on a regular basis and using it around our 45 acres for general duty such as dragging logs, winching timber as I cut and toting my utility trailer.
We pick it up tomorrow. I am really excited about learning a new (to me) vehicle and planning our own version of adventure.
Thanks Andy and thanks EX. Portal for help in finding it.
John
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