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The search for my Trail Teams Edition is finally coming to an end. I’m hoping on a plane tomorrow and thought some of you would enjoy some pics and a story of the journey to pass the time.

As a satisfied owner of 2 other FJ Cruisers I still caught myself lusting over Trail Teams online. The occasional sighting of one in the wild nearly caused several distracted wrecks on my part.

I’ve looked at a handful of local ones for sale over the past year, but could never find quite what I was looking for and some (possibly rightfully so) proud owners had “bring a trailer” price goals. Which would probably make for an interesting thread in itself.

I’ve driven and off-roaded Toyotas my entire life and honestly when the FJ Cruiser first came out I was pretty skeptical. Growing up our family had an FJ40 and the FJ just looked like a city slicker phony.

 

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My first vehicle was an old red Jeep CJ7 I bought for $3500 in high-school. I bagged a lot of groceries for Dan’s grocery store on 7200 South in Salt Lake City to pay for her. Later in life my dad and I rebuilt a CJ5 together. Let me tell you that little 225 fireball engine was a lot of fun to drive in the mountains east of Heber City.

After a pile of 4Runners (some old some new) a handful of Tundras and Tacomas-that I typically put 200k on before moving on down the road, the FJ finally really started to capture my attention.

A good time for some kudos-
My hats off to FJX2000 and the amount of time and work he puts into his YouTube videos. There’s obviously a ton of FJ videos on YouTube but hands down his stuff is the best and most comprehensive.

 

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Time to get packed and ready to hit the friendly skies in the am. Unfortunately that involves Salt Lake cities new and improved airport….. it’s great if you’re training for an Ironman event…

 

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Out of the single digits this am at 10 Fahrenheit. Skiff of snow. It just never ends this winter. Alta ski resort has received over 35 FEET. A quick shovel, let the Tacoma wake up and it’s off to drop my son off at school.

 

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As every Utahn knows this is adventures first stop!

There’s an LDS Chapel and a Maverick gas station on every other block.

Looking forward to getting out of the deep winter for a day-headed to warmer country for the FJ.

 

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Enjoy the drive home!

 

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Enjoy the drive home!

Thanks

 

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The dreaded road salt that drives us to looking for FJs from southern states. It’s inevitable to get some rust on older vehicles if they’ve spent any time in the salt country.

Fortunately Utah has an ABUNDANCE of salt from the ancient Lake Bonneville
-salt flats and salt mines, but it sure wrecks havoc on under carriages.

 

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Luckily the Sundance Film Festival crowds have mostly left and SLC International is pretty smooth today. Now we’ll just see if Southwest Airlines can keep it together… First stop is Southern California, but not my final destination.

 

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Ok, Maverick gas station has taken its brand to whole new levels with shops in the airport. Sadly no bahama mamas available.

 

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As much as I love the FJ I wouldn’t want one as a daily driver if my commute was over over 20 miles or so. The blind spots are real, but not nearly as bad as some would leave you to believe. I could see how maybe some younger drivers that have grown use to blind spot monitoring and other tech could find it bad. But all in all visibility is actually pretty decent and definitely a one of a kind experience.
I imagine most fjs are second and third cars for most owners, toys and hobbies-kind of like a Tesla’s-which I’d also never want as my only vehicle.
There are better off-road, rock-crawling, overlanding, mudders, etc. for sure. The FJ just seems to hit a sweet spot for a lot of us.

Living in Utah there is no shortage of 4x4s of all shapes and sizes, not even a shortage of FJs. It’s not rare to see a half dozen or so heavily moded cruisers braving I15 every weekend to rough it at the Airbnb and some glamping around Zions-Moab area is similar.

True backcountry rigged outfits that you rarely if ever see out on the far reaches of the Arizona strip or the vast wasteland back country of the western desert or Nevada. Rotopax, traction boards, winches, jacks, bumpers, you name it. All to be seen stuffed into nightly rental parking stalls and and posing for IG pics at Sand Hollow and Snow Canyon.

 

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Sand Hollow from the air as we journey to California. Hopefully Matt and his off-road crew are staying safe and busy.

 

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On the wrong side of the plane to catch what was once known as Lake Mead, but the Colorado looks pretty full from up here. Glad I didn’t have to look at Las Vegas. That place could definitely dry up and blow away.

 

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Southwest Airlines reputation didn’t disappoint and I missed my connecting flight. So now instead of arriving at my final destination at 4pm I’ll be arriving after 10pm and get a flight to Phoenix. That’s the last time I fly Southwest with any kind of tight connection.

Time to grab a cold drink and do some airport time…

 

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😂🤦‍♂️ so the captain of the next Southwest flight just got on and said they have a hydraulic leak and they were getting maintenance to check it out. So here I sit in Burbank on the Trail Teams journey.

 

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First world problems. Bird grounded, but never again. Southwest Airlines.

 

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Having fished and hunted a bit in Alaska you expect to have flight issues and welcome them when the salmon are running and you get to fish a bit longer or just BE in Alaska, but when what should have been a few hours in the air turns into a day of lines and airports. Well…

It’s all an adventure and there’s an FJ waiting…

Stay tuned. Going to try getting one of these flying thingys off the ground again.

 

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Later California.

 

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Wasn’t planning on going to Phoenix today, but here we are. That traffic looks insane.