Thanks, AutoAnything.com!

Check out the top post link to the page I created describing my experiences with this great retailer. AutoAnything also holds the distinction of being our first contributing sponsor to RoadTrek#2: GONE Moab. They have graciously donated a Yellow Top Optima battery to replace the lead acid battery in my dual battery system. The upgrade greatly enhances the safety of the setup, as the AGM technology of the Optima battery is virtually spill-proof and very resilient to vibrations. (Nonetheless, they should be installed with a mounting tray/battery hold down strap etc. I'll have this bad boy mounted in my side rail toolbox and will have great peace of mind knowing that as I go over sandy dunes or slick rock elevations, I'm not spilling acid in the back and having it eat its way through my toolbox and damaging the expensive wiring and relay. Click on the link to the AutoAnything.com tab I created near the top of the blog to learn more about how this company has really helped me to take this truck from stock to ROCK!

-will

Adding some pictures...

This was what my truck looked like in January...

Taken in New Hampshire in the White Mountains

Since then, I've completed a dual battery system installation and axle vent modification that I got hipped to while crawling around on ClubFrontier.org. I'll post photos and descriptions of things that I observed in doing both in a later post.

I'm currently working on a cargo basket for the roof and have a new suspension on order.

Teaser of the raw basket fitted for locating and tack welding of attachment points.

I'll post full writeups for the two completed projects and continue to document the cargo basket construction. Ultimately, it'll be a place for me to relocate the spare tire from beneath the undercarriage for safer transport on rough terrain. I'll probably leave the spare down below for highway driving to help at least somewhat with minimizing drag.

Backdated Entry#1 (April 1, 2012)

So I wanted to create this blog for some time. I made my first entry and posted to a Facebook event page. For the next month, all that I'm focusing on and talking about is GONE Moab. Don't know what it is?
It's this:

gonemoab.com

 

I'll try to class it up some here now. Please see below for my first backdated entry:

Entry #1                                                           4/1/2012

I was maybe a little more than 4 years old that crisp morning when my family and I drove to meet the charter bus at a mall parking lot. We were going to Disney World. I don’t recall there being any pent up anticipation. I suppose the destination was a surprise for me. Maybe I was too young to appreciate the treat of the Magic Kingdom, but what I remember most about that vacation was the journey there, a long one by bus. It was actually the rest stops, as strange as that might seem, that held the most excitement for me. I couldn’t see very well from the windows due to my small stature; so each time we emerged from the bus at a scheduled stop, it was like stepping out of a space ship after having been transported to some far away land. (Otherwise known as “North Carolina”). South of the Border might as well had been Disney World as far as I was concerned. As it turns out for me, it is the novelty of a locale, the unique sites (and sights), the eclectic roadside venues, and the possibility of discovering more that lie just beyond the crest of the rolling highway expanses that dare me to travel just a bit further down the road. And so, from an early age, it was an oft-repeated ambition of mine to one day visit all 50 states. 

Fast forward 26 years, and life and happenstance had brought me to and through a good many. However, the balance remaining to be seen outweighs those already crossed off of my bucket list. I relished the opportunity to drive somewhere for work, or be invited to a conference or collegiate athletic event whilst I was still a student. Road trips were the best, but where logistics warranted such, I was nearly just as happy to get a plane ticket and set course for somewhere I’d never been. The delta in attitude wasn’t owing to a lack of gratitude but could more so be attributed to my recognition of the discontinuity inherent in air travel. So although I once spent a week in and around Norman, Oklahoma for the women’s NCAA basketball tournament in 2003, having flown there and bypassed all of the intervening cities and counties, I have experienced virtually nothing of the heartland of this great country. I have wanted to change that for some time.

I found in my wife, a kindred spirit for exploration. This is a shared ambition. As we are both busy professionals, we kind of resigned ourselves initially to maybe having to pool our collective prior experiences to cover states that one partner had visited and the other was unlikely to have an opportunity to travel through. We set off this past winter and covered the northeastern seaboard states on a whim, taking advantage of a timeshare presentation invitation as the impetus for this trip. Maryland to Maine effectively became our itinerary although our invitation was to the White Mountains of New Hampshire. My wife was a bit weary from the road ; the diversion would take us about 2hours out of the way, but I nevertheless successfully tempted her to accompany me to Portland, Maine by offering to treat us to a lobster dinner. She acquiesced. And we both could check off Maine. It was my first time having lobster…@ 29 years old.

This promises to be a year of “firsts”. First things first, the preparations must begin in earnest. Forty-nine days; nay 46 ½ before I pack up and head to Utah. The road that lies ahead (and then leads to a desert landscape) presents some unique challenges for which I’ll be soliciting assistance. I hope that you derive some entertainment from the fun and the follies that will undoubtedly ensue.