Member III
Well my first real trip is under my belt and I'm pretty happy with the Xterra!
I started out Friday around 11:30 am, leaving the house headed on a mostly unknown route headed north from my house toward Harrisonburg, Va. Now this normally would be about an hour and a half drive, and it wound up taking me almost 10 hours of driving. The terrain ranged from nice paved roads all the way to some mild crawling in low range and straddling places. As usual, my picture taking in the rough stuff just flat didn't happen. When presented with a challenge I get very focused and things like picture taking or dropping pins on my GPS just go out the window.
This was a solo trip, just me and the dog. It was one nights camping in a nice little campground near West Augusta, Va. I also met up with another member from Overland Bound in Afton, Va yesterday for supper at Blue Mountain Brewery before riding the Blue Ridge Parkway from there to Buena Vista, Va and hopping on RTE 60 to get home from there. All told, I covered about 350 miles and the Xterra performed amazingly. I really want to get the lift done now and re-gear to 3.54, but those will have to wait a while. I'm going to be looking more seriously at sliders now, as I tagged both step rails pretty good (hush Jim @JOSX2 ) and also got some good contact with the radiator and oil pan skid. New shocks are pretty high on the list as well, I'm kinda sore from the constant wallowing back and forth on the trail that a good set of shocks could have controlled better.
I did the post trip checkout this morning and everything seems to be in great shape, just a little dirty. I'm really looking forward to going on another run soon though!
Starting out:
Lunch Day one. This is a little roadside site I had scoped out a few months ago and decided that it would be a good place to stop and eat my $3 Wal-Mart salad.
The dog doing the only things she's really good at...
This is a good idea of my view for most of the day. I had been looking on Google Maps for months figuring out this route. Most of it worked out, there was a large section of it that has been closed to vehicles for some time and designated as horse trails. However, I really enjoyed the parts that were open on day one. I had ZERO cell service for the majority of it, but managed to have intermittent contact on my home repeater and carried on a few QSOs with some of my buddies around here.
After being blocked on those horse trails, I did find Fort Edward Johnson on Rte 250 between Head Waters, Va and West Augusta, Va. This was a Confederate fort during the Civil War and there are still trenches dug at the top of the mountain where both the Confederate and Union held the fort during the war. There is a little 0.5mi walking trail around the top of the mountain and the dog thought it would be good for us to stretch our legs, so begrudgingly I agreed and we were off.
The trail leading up to the summit:
From there, with my track for the day exhausted, I headed for the campground I had picked out for our nights stay. I pulled in and paid my $5 for the night and picked a spot near the exit of the loop, right next to the creek (river?) that encircled the campground. I got right to stringing up my hammock and tarp and once that was done, supper was in order. I had picked up a ribeye to cook on my Coleman Peak1 and chopped some of it up for the dog's supper as well.
While I was working on my supper, the folks in the camp beside me came back from fishing. They were a really nice fella named Rickey and his 4 y/o son (who's name I should have written down) from Richmond who'd left momma, who's a school teacher, at home to finish up her school year to do some father/son stuff. We chatted a bit and I gave his son a couple Kit-Kats I had picked up for snacks. After that, I took the dog for a walk and then settled down in my chair to read till dark. It was a great evening and as much as I like my kids, it was so nice just sitting and reading without a constant noise trying to get my attention.
I started out Friday around 11:30 am, leaving the house headed on a mostly unknown route headed north from my house toward Harrisonburg, Va. Now this normally would be about an hour and a half drive, and it wound up taking me almost 10 hours of driving. The terrain ranged from nice paved roads all the way to some mild crawling in low range and straddling places. As usual, my picture taking in the rough stuff just flat didn't happen. When presented with a challenge I get very focused and things like picture taking or dropping pins on my GPS just go out the window.
This was a solo trip, just me and the dog. It was one nights camping in a nice little campground near West Augusta, Va. I also met up with another member from Overland Bound in Afton, Va yesterday for supper at Blue Mountain Brewery before riding the Blue Ridge Parkway from there to Buena Vista, Va and hopping on RTE 60 to get home from there. All told, I covered about 350 miles and the Xterra performed amazingly. I really want to get the lift done now and re-gear to 3.54, but those will have to wait a while. I'm going to be looking more seriously at sliders now, as I tagged both step rails pretty good (hush Jim @JOSX2 ) and also got some good contact with the radiator and oil pan skid. New shocks are pretty high on the list as well, I'm kinda sore from the constant wallowing back and forth on the trail that a good set of shocks could have controlled better.
I did the post trip checkout this morning and everything seems to be in great shape, just a little dirty. I'm really looking forward to going on another run soon though!
Starting out:
Lunch Day one. This is a little roadside site I had scoped out a few months ago and decided that it would be a good place to stop and eat my $3 Wal-Mart salad.
The dog doing the only things she's really good at...
This is a good idea of my view for most of the day. I had been looking on Google Maps for months figuring out this route. Most of it worked out, there was a large section of it that has been closed to vehicles for some time and designated as horse trails. However, I really enjoyed the parts that were open on day one. I had ZERO cell service for the majority of it, but managed to have intermittent contact on my home repeater and carried on a few QSOs with some of my buddies around here.
After being blocked on those horse trails, I did find Fort Edward Johnson on Rte 250 between Head Waters, Va and West Augusta, Va. This was a Confederate fort during the Civil War and there are still trenches dug at the top of the mountain where both the Confederate and Union held the fort during the war. There is a little 0.5mi walking trail around the top of the mountain and the dog thought it would be good for us to stretch our legs, so begrudgingly I agreed and we were off.
The trail leading up to the summit:
From there, with my track for the day exhausted, I headed for the campground I had picked out for our nights stay. I pulled in and paid my $5 for the night and picked a spot near the exit of the loop, right next to the creek (river?) that encircled the campground. I got right to stringing up my hammock and tarp and once that was done, supper was in order. I had picked up a ribeye to cook on my Coleman Peak1 and chopped some of it up for the dog's supper as well.
While I was working on my supper, the folks in the camp beside me came back from fishing. They were a really nice fella named Rickey and his 4 y/o son (who's name I should have written down) from Richmond who'd left momma, who's a school teacher, at home to finish up her school year to do some father/son stuff. We chatted a bit and I gave his son a couple Kit-Kats I had picked up for snacks. After that, I took the dog for a walk and then settled down in my chair to read till dark. It was a great evening and as much as I like my kids, it was so nice just sitting and reading without a constant noise trying to get my attention.
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