Sunday, February 21, 2016

IX Shaver Lake Snow Run, the return of the Spaniards...

After doing the first 2 editions of the snow run organized by NCLR, this year, we finally joined the fun, see previous editions here:

http://dcprovenlandrover.blogspot.com/2008/02/shaver-lake-snow-run-nclr.html

http://dcprovenlandrover.blogspot.com/2009/03/ii-shaver-lake-snow-run.html

We arrived late Friday, tired and ready to eat something and sleep.

But next day, oh boy!

The white stuff and the black dog:



We had a decent group, good thing RedRover waited for us, before leaving...


We made it quickly to the trailhead, but this "trap" was waiting for us:


Same place, just before me:


Of course, when I tried it, well, let's say this should be straight not bent:


It was such a gorgeous day out there in the Sierra Nevada:

















The snow started easy but turned out at the end very loose like sand, I started without airing down but I had to go to 15 psi to get enough traction.

Plenty of people on the trail and very good camaraderie all around, from Jeeps, Toyotas or Land Rovers. Specially this nice Toyota guy that helped me out of the big hole. Thanks to everyone involved in my rescue from the frozen water... hear your exhaust making bubbles on knee deep ice cold water, is not very reassuring.... imaging when the engine died (the inertia switch, good catch Lutzi).

Lots of fun out there... and the pizza was amazing.

Carnage:

- ARB front bumper, is not as strong as you may think... what was amazing is that the shackle that broke it is fabric (nylon, I assume), very impressed 35000 pounds max pull!!
- The tie rod bent and a trail fix was in order. Thanks must go to Colin for helping with this, I owe you one!... and we made it back home without issues.


- Steering box is tired of living, so I will replace soon:
- Who needs plastic moldings on the bottom of the car anyway.... or panels for that matter.



And of course, the LR came back with the right color:

And a little video from our phones, with some music tracks I had created a while back.