The Story Of A Cummins Suburban (Lots Of Pics)

[Average Joe]

Once again thank you for sharing your journey with us. It brought back lots of good memories of a similar trip I did in '93. After visiting my brother in SoCal, we headed across the Mojave desert and camped in the Hualapai? mountains before heading into the Grand Canyon via the south rim. From there we went on to Zion and Bryce Canyon before breaking a ball joint in Capitol Reef NP.

Fortunatly for us, me and a couple buddies from high school, we got a tow into the mighty town of Loa, Utah. Parts were three days out so the shop owner, who was also the tow truck driver as well as the local deacon, put us up on his backyard trampoline. Three days later our ball joint came in and the shop owner was kind enough to press it in the control arm of my VW bug for us. We assembled the car, eyeballing the alighnment, and got the heck outta Utah. Long haired fellers with Grateful Dead stickers on a beat up VW kinda put the locals on edge I think. Lol.

We ended up going through CO, WY, MT, and ID before making it home on three cylinders. Shot a cross threaded plug out 150 miles from home and limped on into town, Klamath Falls at the time. Good stuff!

These days I take maintenance issues much more seriously. I also got a haircut and parted ways with the VW. I always do a walk around before leaving each morning as well as an under hood check. I also drive much more cautiously knowing what can happen. Your picture and words about the wreck and some others driving habits were spot on. Well said sir!

[mosesburb]

Originally Posted by lower50's

I'm loving your adventure with no agenda, That's the way we love traveling as well. The scenery is just amazing you don't need to blaa blaa the pics I enjoy looking at new places. 13 years ago I drove through Ceder city on my way home from Santa Monica driving a 1986 Nissan pre runner I bought. 2500mi trip.

Any time someone, during conversation, mentions that they have to schedule things out in order to travel, I ask them how long the schedule works before adjustments have to be made?? The answer is almost always two days or less. So with that, I say why bother and just shoot from the hip and see what happens. I/we often have a general idea of things we want to do/see, but once the truck is in motion adjustments are made almost constantly.

Originally Posted by hgs_notes

I like the rear A/C label. Is that OEM? I've seen a few burbs with the rear air in junkyards but never looked at the dash to find that.

It is a plastic tab that fits behind the chrome nut like the factory in-dash throttle tabs. It is indeed factory and if you ever see one in a wrecking yard, grab it AND the switch and knob. None of it is reproduced and is never available when you need it.

Originally Posted by hgs_notes

I could see the climber, which helps give perspective to how high that was. Incredible.

It was crazy looking up and just barely being able to see the guy. That pic is zoomed in with the camera.

Originally Posted by Dieselwrencher

That tunnel is so cool. That climber is out of his mind.

I agree--on both counts.

Originally Posted by Dieselwrencher

Thanks for posting these pics. Those are some amazing views. I bet the ol burb was singing right along at 80.

Thanks. Yeah, this was before I put the new GSK in it, so there wasn't much left at this point. Plenty to keep it there, but engine speed beyond was not so available.

Originally Posted by Average Joe

Once again thank you for sharing your journey with us. It brought back lots of good memories of a similar trip I did in '93. After visiting my brother in SoCal, we headed across the Mojave desert and camped in the Hualapai? mountains before heading into the Grand Canyon via the south rim. From there we went on to Zion and Bryce Canyon before breaking a ball joint in Capitol Reef NP.

Fortunatly for us, me and a couple buddies from high school, we got a tow into the mighty town of Loa, Utah. Parts were three days out so the shop owner, who was also the tow truck driver as well as the local deacon, put us up on his backyard trampoline. Three days later our ball joint came in and the shop owner was kind enough to press it in the control arm of my VW bug for us. We assembled the car, eyeballing the alighnment, and got the heck outta Utah. Long haired fellers with Grateful Dead stickers on a beat up VW kinda put the locals on edge I think. Lol.

We ended up going through CO, WY, MT, and ID before making it home on three cylinders. Shot a cross threaded plug out 150 miles from home and limped on into town, Klamath Falls at the time. Good stuff!

These days I take maintenance issues much more seriously. I also got a haircut and parted ways with the VW.

Sounds like a great time!! Has some eerie similarities to Charlie Daniels Uneasy Rider LOL.

Originally Posted by Average Joe

I always do a walk around before leaving each morning as well as an under hood check. I also drive much more cautiously knowing what can happen. Your picture and words about the wreck and some others driving habits were spot on. Well said sir!

Thank you. It's not something that is always top of mind when hitting the road and sometimes a reality refresher can help prevent problems and/or catastrophes. A familiar vehicle that is driven daily reacts totally different when loaded and/or towing. We run some desolate roads, and even with SPOT tracking, a seemingly small problem can turn into a huge problem very quickly. Complacency breeds catastrophes.

[MaxPF]

I'm guessing this little spot is the climber?

[mosesburb]

Originally Posted by MaxPF

I'm guessing this little spot is the climber?

Yeah, that's it. The one thing that is missing from the pic is a ground reference. The bottom of the pic is well above the bottom of the canyon.

[mosesburb]

Ok, so the next day we got up and headed to a store in Cedar City to buy a jacket for me. We quickly found out that it is no easy task in summer to buy a jacket. Most normal stores do not stock jackets in summer for some reason. After finally locating one we headed back down the road to Kolob Canyons of Zion National Park. This is a neat area that if time permits, I highly recommend checking out.



We were quickly greeted with great views and the familiar red asphalt:



Gratuitous truck pic:



It's not a long drive into the park before you get to the end of the road and beginning of the trails:



We weren't set up for hiking this day, so we decided to mark it for next time and continue on. We headed back up the road and headed up into Dixie Mountain. Toward the top of the 13% grade we came upon Brian Head. I'm guessing it is a ski resort judging by all of the hotels and ski lifts..



After passing through Brian Head, i found a trail leading off the road to what would be the top of a mountain. It looked like there should be some great views, so off we went. Unfortunately, we were there too early in the summer and got thwarted by snow:



11,019' in June



Shortly after getting back on the road we came upon Cedar Breaks National Monument. There were some great views to be had:



Another area:



Very neat stuff.

Yet another gratuitous truck pic:



Heading down the east side of Dixie Mountain, while looking for an area to camp, we came across a gigantic pile of volcanic lava flow. The pic does no justice to how much volume of this stuff is here:



We didn't find anywhere to camp that we liked. Mostly because it was too early in the day to be stopping to set up camp, so we kept heading down the road. We went through Panguitch on 89 and got onto 12 heading toward Bryce Canyon National Park. We were actively seeking a camp location along the way. We had to stop and look at the scenery along the way though:



With a truck that kind of matches the color of the scenery:



Another arch/tunnel:



We passed a really neat campground that had some nice bike trails in it. While we don't normally stay in campgrounds, we did scoop the loop looking for any open spots. We didn't find any and continued down the road. I noticed that the area north of the road was labeled as BLM land on the map so if we could find a trail, we should be able to find somewhere to set up camp. Before long we did and after heading back into the hills for a couple/few miles we found our address for the night. It was a nice secluded spot. We got set up and I got my boy's bike down so he could burn off some energy before we had dinner. While getting everything in order it started raining a bit. Now comes a quick non-complete explanation of the roof rack and its purpose. An awning!! A self supporting, no poles needed, no strings necessary awning. Well, in this case an awning structure with a tarp covering. The awning material was supposed to be finished before our trip, but didn't actually get done. I had grabbed a HF tarp and some cheap paracord and by combining the structure I made and the HF components, we had a nice dry area to eat our dinner:



The real awning is yet to come, so much like me, you will have to wait to see just how awesome it turned out!!