Day 46: Truck Bonding on the 4 Peaks Trail

I wake up and spend some time online looking at truck stuff. I think. I am not really sure what I am doing on my computer actually. At about noon, the door opens and Hanna shows up. "What are you doing here?" I ask. Haha, well, she lives here obviously. School sent them home early apparently. "Wanna ride down a dirt road with me in my truck?" No? You have school stuff to do. :(  A little later, I decide to finally leave for my adventure.

About 1, I head out the door. I immediately come back in to fill up my water bottles. I don't know if I am just driving or if I am going to hike as well. I spill water all over the place. Awesome. I take my water and get in the truck. I start my 25 mile on-road drive to the off-road trail. I drive through a neighborhood area. Some lady is jogging. She waves at me. Interesting, I don't think I have ever had a jogger wave at me before. My truck must just be that awesome! I continue down the road. There is some shoulder work going on. I check out the rollers compacting some dirt. Looks fun! 

As I get further from town, the road gets a little scary. There are small hills that I go over and can see nothing as I approach the crest. This is definitely not safe. Someone did not check for stopping sight distance when these hills were made in this road. Some engineer missed something... Oh well. Before I know it, I have reached the trail.

Near the trail head before the truck got covered in dust

It is an easy trail. I want to properly "break in" the new truck but have no desire to push it. It is so easy that I end up getting passed by some guy driving a mini van. Embarrassing. I am really taking it easy though. I don't want to break the truck and I am stopping to take pictures quite frequently. It is a 20 some odd mile trail. It wraps around a mountain (or group of mountains?) called 4 Peaks. It is pretty easy to identify which mountain the name refers to.

No name truck framing the 4 Peaks Mountain

 The first part of the trail is at a pretty low elevation. I see some cacti and drive through deserty stuff. I take a picture of my new truck with some cacti. Since I like cacti so much, I feel that this is necessary. I then start to climb. Most of the trip is spent winding around the side of mountains and driving atop ridges. The trail is pretty well maintained. A few rocky spots but nothing big or anything that is likely to cause damage. As I climb, the cacti disappear and trees appear. There is even some snow in a few places. Places of the trail wind around pin tight blind corners. These make me nervous as the trail is only about a truck and a half wide in most of these areas and people are going both directions.

Nice 'n desert-y

Starting to ascend the mountainsides

I slowly approach these blind corners. At one point, I do encounter someone coming the other direction. I slam on the brakes. OMG what was that noise?!?! Oh, anti-lock breaks. She is on the outside and there is a significant drop off. She waits for me to go. I don't blame her. I wouldn't want to risk falling over that. I let the clutch up and jam down the accelerator. (I am going uphill and one of my wheels is in a bit of a rut....) VROOM! At least I have stock exhaust so it is not that loud. I make it out just fine and continue on my way. I pass many people on the trail. Most of them are friendly and wave. I only see one other Tacoma. I am slightly disappointed that he doesn't even knowledge me or our Toyota connection. Oh well.

That's the trail wayyy off in the distance

 I eventually reach a marked trail head amongst some trees. "4 Peaks Trail." Ok, that sounds fun. I get out. As I start walking toward the trail, I inhale and get a bug up my nose. Grosss. I try to snort it out. I am still not sure if I got it out. I walk a little further. There is no one else here. Ok, probably not a good idea to hike this. As I head back, I inhale a bug through my mouth. I try to cough it up. I am pretty sure it didn't work. Ok, even if there were people here, I am so over this place. These bugs are ridiculous. I am happy to be back in my truck and out of reach of these obnoxious bugs.

Snow on the back side of the 4 Peaks

I continue on my way. I eventually reach a branch in the trail. Both options look pretty well traveled. My trail guide I used to find this place didn't say anything about this. At least not that I remember. I pick the way that my GPS shows as the more predominate road. At least it knows where I am for once. Usually when I am in places like this it is clueless. I drive for a while and conclude that I might have picked the wrong way. I decide to try actually using my GPS. I put Hanna's house address in and tell it to take me there. Yup, going the wrong way.

Descending (on the correct trail)

I turn around surprisingly easily on the narrow trail. I only have to do a 1 point turn! Good truck! I get back to the branch and take the other option. I begin descending out of the mountains. 30 minutes later, I am at the highway. My GPS tells me to turn left. I am 100% sure the most direct way to town is to go right. I stop before turning on the highway and consult Google Maps. Well, I am correct. However, going right will lead me along the Apache trail, which is also dirt and bumpy. It will be faster to just go to the left and go 50 miles out of my way. I am done with dirt road driving for the day so I go left.

Good truck! I think we just might be friends...

It is 75 miles back to town. I have to go all the way around the recreation area that I just drove through. Oh well. The new truck (that still needs a name... I haven't found the perfect one yet :( ) does just fine on the highway. Well, aside from the rocks that it flings out of the tire treads as soon as I start moving faster than 15 mph.

As I drive, I conclude that I am hungry. Hmmm... chicken sounds good. And pineapple! And cashews. Hanna even has some pineapple laying around that is about to go bad and needs to be eaten.... I have no recipie and decide to concoct one of my own. Using my (lack of) vast knowledge about cooking, I think up a sauce that contains soy sauce, ginger, cinnamon, salsa, brown sugar, and baking powder that I could cook all of these in. I text Hanna to verify that the pineapple is still there. It is. I tell her I am making something for dinner.

I get back and immediately start cooking. She asks what I am making. Uhhh, I don't know. It has all this stuff in it though. She concludes that it doesn't sound terrible and goes back to studying. I throw stuff in the pan. Half an hour later, I conclude that it is probably done. Well, the rice is done and usually when I make stuff to go with rice, whatever I am cooking is done before the rice is. Therefore, since the rice is done, I conclude everything else must be done too. Surprisingly, it tastes pretty darned good. However, it can't decide if it is sweet, salty, or spicy. Maybe next time more spicy stuff and no cinnamon.....

I am now sitting at my computer, still trying to dislodge the bugs from my airway, and thinking of a way to make a sweet skid plate for my truck... I have a cool idea but am just trying to make it feasible. I have plenty of time to think about details though since I won't be doing any fabrication until I get back...