To be brief, this is what we encountered less than a mile into the loop:
3 rigs: Ford PU, Jeep Gr Cherokee, Jeep Cherokee. They were in the process of getting the Gr Cherokee and it's 6" lift and 20" bling mudders back on the trail by driving the other two rigs all over off the trail. Once they did, they let us by.
After we drove up another 200yds and hit deep, wet snow, got stuck and unstuck, and turned around 11 rigs; we came back down (about an hour later) to find the Cherokee stuck off the trail.
During the next 1+ hours we watched as they attempted to get the Jeep out. NONE of them had a single recovery point and they had a single tow strap between them (Harbor Freight vintage by the looks of it...) that they wrapped around bumpers, axles and spring shackles. At the end of the 2+ hour ridiculousness, the PU had a broken windshield and bent passenger A-pillar, and the Jeep Cherokee had both the front and rear passenger doors bashed in, the roof rack ripped off by trees (yes, more than one tree) and the grill smashed in by his buddy in the PU backing into him with his steel bumper.
The truly remarkable signature of these wonderful wheelers, however, was the emphasis on drinking beer. The PU had really cool in-door custom-made beer bottle holders where you might normally find silly things like windows. I wish I'd had my camera, and it's a shame we didn't get the entire saga on video; in particular the driver of the pickup with his beer readily at hand while he totally ****ed up his buddies Cherokee dragging him into trees and refusing help from 14 well-equipped rigs and 20+ people. My favorite quote of the entire event was, "D'oh, gotta put put my beer in the cooler" before sticking it in the snow at my feet in time to help push the Cherokee.... with his hands... uphill... along a tree... as they ripped the roof rack off... Beer was still cold!
Several of us offered to help and they said things like, "F***-off" and "Naw, we're good" until it was clear they could not get their buddy out. When they finally had the courtesy to let us by, I stopped and asked the guy with the Cherokee what we could do to help him get out and he asked me to winch him, so I agreed to come back after the rest of our crew was out of the way. Apparently they got impatient and blocked the last rig leaving and demanded they help them out. Luckily, another group of folks coming down behind us took 10 minutes to winch the guy out and we all went on our merry way.
I felt really bad for the Cherokee driver. I don't think he was drinking, but all of his "buddies" were, and he had little or no experience and trashed his otherwise nice rig.
T O T A L L Y F * * * E D U P...
Other than that it was fun! Sorry I can't post pics, but the camera is at the shop...
Really, that's the short version, I could go on and on and on and on and on...
Regardless, nice to meet some new folks, say hello to old and got to use the winch and hi-lift, so it's all good!
'07 FJ - Voodoo Blue
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