Cole claimed he wasn't interested in doing it, but after a little prodding from John he was in the driver seat hitting the first cliff. The suspension on Tom's Bronco stretched to mind-boggling limits, and he went all the way through the 100-yard trail. Sam showed us why he built his CJ-7 the way he did and made quick work of both obstacles. Sam also let Cole drive a short section of the trail in his Jeep, causing the tires on Cole's imaginary flatfender to grow. Dan made it to the top of the waterfall only to spit out a rear driveshaft. For some reason we couldn't get Dan's winch to work (we later found out that a three-prong remote doesn't work with Warn's new five-prong plug) so local Phil Collard winched him up. John and Dan repaired the driveshaft while the others traversed the falls and helped an unprepared Toyota (not with our group) out of trouble. Tom had tried to make a second pass on the waterfall only to break an axle U-joint on the first section. He turned around and we all headed back to town.
Day SevenDan and Tom woke early so they could replace Tom's broken axle from the day before. Harold was kind enough to let them use his shop, Off Again Off-Road. John and Tom later helped Dan weld a cracked and sagging spare-tire rack in the hotel parking lot, while everyone else choked down breakfast.
By now most of us had noticed a trend of increasingly more difficult trails on this wondrous adventure. We could only speculate as to what was in store for us at the last trail we'd traverse on this trip: Die Trying.
The drive between Farmington and Montrose was perhaps the most scenic and relaxing of the whole trip. We did, however, run into two separate road crews working on the two-lane mountain road, which held-up traffic for about 45 minutes apiece. The drive was short compared to the previous on-road day, and the scenery made it much more endurable.
We made it to the hotel before nightfall and geared up for Die Trying. The locals told us a little about the trail and how a short wheelbase would benefit on the tight corners (finally, a trail for flatfenders). We also found out that this was the longest trail of the adventure (in time, not distance).
Day EightWe were now pros at the routine. Breakfast was something you ate while greasing U-joints or packing the truck for the day. Gas station food became the staple, and McDonald's was health food. We all met in front of the hotel with trail leader Sherman Mathieu after completing our daily morning rituals. The skies were for the most part clear, but dark clouds lingered in the direction of the trail.
The trail began with a smattering of large rocks that required slow, low-geared crawling. This is the kind of wheeling we were accustomed to, and most of us entertained the thought that this wouldn't be too bad. However, several tight sections made fullsize truck navigation almost impossible, and climbing the 5-foot-tall boulders that the Jeeps were able to steer around was the only option. Even with six spotters yelling at Cole, he couldn't avoid major body damage. The first 100 yards of the trail took several hours. It was enough time for some at the back of the lineup to rethink if they really wanted to do this trail badly enough to ugly their vehicles. Trenton, Brian, Drew, and Steve wisely turned tail and came around to the top of the trail. They walked down to where we were only to confirm that we had completed about one sixteenth of the trail. By this time Greg had broken a front axle U-joint without a spare and was headed out the way he came in. The trail leader had broken some steering components and had to catch a ride back into town for spares. We continued on as rain clouds approached.