Mosquito Pass

Well today I went for a 400 mile drive, I drove across Mosquito Pass in Colorado. This is the highest pass in Colorado that you can traverse both way (from Leadville to Alma), at the peak of the Pass it's 13,185 but you can go higher if the head up some of the other trails.



This was a blast! If the getting to use the Jeep as it was meant to be used was not enough the scenery was just breath taking, ok what little breath there is up above 13,000' :)




I saw mines (and not the kind I am used to in Afghanistan) lakes, old mining equipment and even some snow on top. Oh and the Aspen trees, WOW did I pick the right time to do this. I will have to upload the Aspen trees from my phone as the cameras battery died.

Any how just wanted to let you all know what I was up to this weekend.
Aloha!

My Saturday

OK so I started the day off with some breakfast (duh) and then hit the gym, it’s amazing how empty that place is on a Sat morning. After that I headed to the Jeep dealer to see if I could get the switch for my headlights that I broke last night, well they are closed on Saturdays here in the capital city, so I called Autozone and they said that the one in Greeley had the part I needed.
So after a nice lunch at the house I got in the Jeep and headed south. An hour later I had the part in hand and well it kinda worked. I had all the lights working except the headlights. So I thought that the headlights may have blown when I saw big sparks last night. After a LONG and PAINFUL process I determent that the headlights were good, so it must be a bad switch. Oh and yes I checked all the fuses that I could find.

So back in the Jeep and headed another 45 minutes in the wrong direction to try another switch. The dude was nice and just swapped them out and I tried it in the parking lot and it was the same, no headlights. Now I was way tired of messing with this and I was pretty sure that the switch must be working and there is something wrong with the Jeep so I headed home before it got too dark.

I did have to use my Off Road lights on the way home but at least this time I had my running lights on so everyone could see me. I had a wonderful leftover dinner and now planning on crashing early as I am pooped from all the driving and working on the Jeep.

My Leftovers

I hope to post some better news about the lights tomorrow, wish me luck.

Fixin the Jeep

So I did it, I have always wanted an ARB bull bar for the Jeep and now I have it. After the crash of 2008 I needed a new bumper and was running out of excuses so I spent the money on a bull bar and a Warn winch to put in it.

My sister Amy was in town looking for a place to live when she was volunteered to help me pick the bumper up from Denver. It fit in the back of the Jeep, barley… thanks Amy!

Then once the Jeep was in the shop getting the other minor body work done I put the winch into the bumper. This sure sounds easy but moving an 80lb bumper and an 80lb winch by yourself without scratching the paint is not easy. But after a few hours of expanding my vocabulary I got the winch in the bumper and then had to wait to get the Jeep back from the body shop.








When I got the Jeep back I was anything by impressed, let’s just say that I will never ever go back to Spradley Motors for anything. I am sure they will make it right but that’s another story.

So I enlisted the help of Rob a buddy from work to help me move the now ~160lb bumper onto the Jeep. Well it always looks easier then it is. This process evolved drilling, pounding, painting, drinking, wiring, bleeding, and even a little burning but we got it on and it looks great!!!

Now I have a very heavy front end but I can now go off-roading with confidence that I can pull myself out of almost anything.

Vail, or so we though...

So it’s the day before the big 30 and I thought a trip to Vail for some fun in the snow would be a good idea. So as I head to the snow Mecca of Vail with my friend Marci I am amazed at how blue the sky is and how perfect the weather is. This is going to be a wonderful day.

Oh wait what is that in front of us about ¼ of a mile, a flipped SUV and cars going everywhere, I think I should slow down. Oh what is this… I am on ice going down hill, humm no ideal. Break…slide…break…slide… maybe I could go left, nope cars there… Maybe right? Yea I’ll put the Jeep into the snow on the right and hope it stops before I hit the flipped pathfinder, ok hold on… humm still on ice and Jeep wont turn (yea I was in 2 wheel drive as the roads prior to this were fine) Guess it looks like we are going to hit the Acura in front of us… So after slowing to 10-15mph we slid into the Acura and pushed him to the side. We were slow enough that the airbags did not deploy and no one was hurt. I pulled the Jeep in front of the rolled Pathfinder and checked to see if everyone was OK. Everyone was OK but we helped to pull out a girl out of the Pathfinder. As we were getting everything straightened up cars continued to pill up behind us, not fun.

The fliped Xtera that may have started it all

So the damage; I guess there is something said for bigger vehicles, the Acura did not fair well. I guess the Acura did what it was supposed to, it crumpled to protect the occupants. I smashed up the trunk pretty good and it looks like I broke 2 snowboards inside =( But everyone was fine.

I guess it was designed to crumple?

Very drivable just a bent bumper =(

As for the Jeep, it bent my front bumper back a little and broke the plastic grill in front of the radiator. Also a little radiator fluid was leaking as I had a piece of plastic brake light in my radiator. My Jeep was drivable and the Acura was towed. After Marci helped me put some stop leak in the radiator we were good to go. Unfortunately due to the cars pilling up behind us it took over 2 hours before we could leave the accident scene.

Marci and I decided that the day was shoot for the snow so we headed to Denver and enjoyed a nice lunch at the Cheesecake Factory. So all in all I guess you could say that I left my 20s with a Bang, but at least everyone was OK.

I will have to try out Vail another time.