OK Getting My photos downloaded and sorted out. Report Shortly.....

With the end of summer approaching I decided to put this Dusy trip together on short notice. John (Dirtdriver) confirmed so that was good, since this is a trail that you cant do alone.

I had my 89 SWB with 33's, Crawler Gears, Gen 2 SR rear end and Trailing Arms, Air Lockers front and rear, armor and winch.

John had his 90 LWB with 33's, Crawler Gears, 5.29's and ARB airlockers in both diffs Gen 2 Trailing arms, RB sliders and tube bumper.

Day 1

I got off to a late start on Wednesday, and John even later, but we met up at camp on Thursday Morning. Stories of bears rummaging through peoples campsites were being told by the other campers at Voyager Rock. I was glad I locked all my food up in the Montero that night.

First Campsite:



Courtright Resevoir:



The trail started off at Chicken rock, which is a steep climb up a granite dome, easy enough with low speed crawling but nothing too crazy. A couple hours ahead we met one of the Fresno 4Wheelers who maintain the trail as he was hiking the trail and he said the Toughest part was up a ways ahead.

Top of Chicken Rock:













After about 5 hours of slow speed crawling, we stopped as Johns truck started to heat up, when we lifted the hood we saw that the radiator had sprung a leak at the top front tank seal <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/scared.gif" alt="" /> Luckily I had packed a propane torch some solder and flux in my tool bag right before I left. We let it cool for an hour or so, drained some coolant, soldered up the tank, refilled and we were back on the trail.

Getting ready to solder radiator:


The repair put us behind and it was getting dark by the time we got to Thompson Hill which is the toughest part of the trail. Thompson Hill is long and steep with with powdery dirt with granite boulders strewn about. Both I and John were high centered at one point so it was time to break out the winch. I plug in the controller and hit the power out button. Nothing! Winch not working...WTF?? A couple jeepers lent us a hand here since they were already winching each other at this point they hooked us up and pulled us out. After a couple hours of super slow progress and stacking rocks, we made it to camp at about 9:30PM. Sorry No photos of this part of the trail as we were just trying to survive and make it through before dark so we could get to the campsite up at the top.

Day 2

Campsite near Thompson Lake:





Day 2 is probably where you make up the most of the 30 mile distance, but its not fast by any means I think this is the day my roof rack took the most hits on trees which was a constant battle. Mounting the Hi-Lift jack on the outside was not a good Idea <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/lol.gif" alt="" />











Campsite at Ershim Lake:


We were glad to get to the campsite at about 530 PM this day and set up and cook dinner while it was still light out. We had a nice fire that night and met some cool wheelers who were in a Samurai and a FJ40? They were quite interested in the Montero's and were happy to see something different out on the trail.

Day 3:

Day 3 started easy but got harder towards the second half of the day. Most of the obstacles were down hill which made traction easy, but also made for the possibility of damage more likely. Tight S turns down ledges were the order of the day. I wish I had more photos of these spots, but we were just concentrating on getting through.

















Once we got to this scenic viewpoint which is over 10,000 feet some clouds rolled in and eventually we got about a half hour of hail/rain right when we were negotiating a downhill boulder field towards the end of the trail. This was where I did the majority of my damage on the trail.





The last campsite near the North trail head:

[img]http://gallery.me.com/zone1wst/100449/100_3193/web.jpg[/img]

I wish I had more pictures of the hard stuff, but we were just concentrating on getting through. I was glad for every piece of armor I had and that I had re-enfoced my Tcase skid plate. All the skids took a beating.

The photos don't do this trail justice and took a lot of effort and concentration to get through. We were too exhausted each day to fish, after setting up camp and eating dinner it was sleep time.

The last campsite was about 1/4 mile from the trail head and we left early Sunday morning at the Pavement we aired up and I found one of my Upper A-arm bolts was loose so I tightened that up and we were off. I got seperated from John after he stopped due to his rear locker not disengaging. Hopefully he'll chime in with some more pics.

Great Pics Thanks for the write-up
Russ <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cheers.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/patriot.gif" alt="" />

Good pics, thanks.

Hmmm, maybe I ought to reinforce all skids before attempting the Dusy. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/zombie.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/shiner.gif" alt="" />

Thanks for the trip report Justice. Gives me a renewed focus of things to accomplish before I attempt it in September. Now just got to find a fabricator with time to do the mods (winch & skid plates). <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" />

Justice nice trip report, i know a JY that has the parts you need send me a pm. Did John loose is mirrors in the trail?

Nick, PM sent. TIA. Ray, one thing you want to make sure you've done if not taken care of already, is to make sure your radiator is lowered 2" to match the 2" body lift and that you are running the full shroud. Also dont forget to run the bypass switch for the condenser fan if you havent already done so.

I was really pleased with the cooling of my 89 running a stock recently rodded radiator with 2 condenser fans blowing in the front. No movement of the temp guage the entire time.

Nice, Justice. You guys look like you had fun! Looks like someone's little girl is out growing her big sister... <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Thanks for the pics!

Ray, let me know if you want info on the guy I now trust with all things fabrication related. He's in Gilroy...