Westward Ho! Finale

With a successful day of Jeeping under our belt, David was completely hooked. And then for some reason decided he wanted to try and break the Jeep. As you might remember, his Wrangler had originally been rated a 3, much to our humiliation. David wasn't content with that and was determined to get moved up a rank. Partway through the first trail of the morning we came across an optional, more challenging section. We watched a few of the the more heavily-upgraded Jeeps, with bigger lifts and locking diff, work they way through this particularly tough section of trail. After those few went through, David decided he wanted to give it a shot. I grabbed the GoPro and hopped in, crossing my fingers nothing would break.

A much larger Jeep taking on the trail.

Right about this time is when we learned the Jeep's secret weapon, Because we were running narrower tires without spacers, we were able to navigate between the rocks, instead of over them! The Jeep also had a full set of MetalCloak body armor, so sliding over any rocks we couldn't go around was a viable option. David's Jeep dominated the section of trail. As he re-entered the main path, David asked the leader what that particular section was rated. "Four or four plus" was his reply. David decided right then and there he needed a new sticker.

After that it became a game of how far would the Jeep go? Everything we threw at it, the Jeep would do. Vertical climbs? Bring it on. Vertical drops? Easy. Fitting between two narrow trees? Ok fine, we didn't actually make that one and had to go around. But in reality the Jeep did it all. In fact, the only trail we turned around on was one where the (much larger) Jeep in front of us got very stuck. David is adamant he could have made it through, but I'm not quite as confident. It was on the last day that we had my favorite moment of the trip. I was taking a turn a driving, and there was a wide section of trail with several options available to take. I had been planning on taking the easiest one to the right, but the spotter (person on the trail who guides you, if you didn't know what that was) was insistent that I take the middle path: a large, boob-shaped rock. And  you know what? I dominated it. It was a section of the trail I didn't think I could do, but the spotter pushed me to push myself. Totally worth it.

Mounting the... you know what, maybe I'll just stop the caption there.

 As we headed back to the cabin after the Saturday night cookout, we were very happy with what we had achieved. An intact Jeep. No new squeaks or rattles. A shiny new "4" sticker on the windshield, displaying our new rank. It had been a very good trip. David and I had both developed a severe case of Jeep fever. I was determined to buy my own Jeep (maybe Cherokee or Grand Cherokee... heat stroke on the last day wasn't fun) and David had developed the urge to drive the Jeep over everything everywhere. In fact, when it came time to load the Jeep on the trailer, he had me drive it on there without ramps! On the drive home on Sunday, we all agreed that this needed to be an annual tradition. So see you next year Jeep Camp!