Big Blue's Ouachita National Forest Trip

[Gary Lewis]

Janey and I just got back from a 720 mile trip into Arkansas to drive around in the Ouachita National Forest.  Of that we were off the highway right at 150 miles, with 40 miles the first afternoon and 110 the next day.

The routes are shown below, but I can give gpx files if someone is interested.  Of the route I'd say that 140 of the 150 miles were on fairly easy gravel roads, but those other 10 miles were on some extremely narrow forest service roads with brush hanging in from both sides that had to be cleared.  Even then Big Blue has new pin striping.  Plus there were many, many mud puddles that were completely frozen over as it was down to 15F overnight.  But the puddles were not frozen solid so we broke the ice - not knowing how deep the puddles were.  So we were in 4Lo with the front diff locked in on several of those.  In addition there was one section that required 4Lo just to go slowly enough to handle the rocks and bumps.  And another section that was on the planned route was just too tight and too rough so after walking it a ways we found another route.

We had a wonderful time, and the fact that there were sections that challenging means that my son and I may decide to go back.  But that will require some route clearing, and we'll have to make sure that doing so is ok with the Forest Service.

Anyway, here are some pics from our trip as well as the routes.

Here's a shot from the first day showing Janey with the wonderful view of the Ouachita mountains in the background:



And here is a shot showing a typical view of the trail ahead.  We had many small concrete water crossings like the one you can see in this shot.  But, there were also lots of larger bridges to cross as the area has beautiful streams everywhere.




But, there were those 10 miles.  Here's a shot of a section where I had to clear out limbs above and pull brush from both sides just to get by, and even then the driver's mirror got bumped pretty hard.




Last, here are the routes:

[Nothing Special]

Sounds like fun!

[Gary Lewis]

It was fun, Bob.  And it may have been a scouting trip for the trip with our son.  Just checked and the whole of the Ouachita national forest is available for dispersed camping.  So, having found some difficult trails...

[grumpin]

That is cool! Nice pictures! Does look like fun.

[Gary Lewis]

Thanks, Dane.  We certainly did have fun.

Here are some more pics.  First, here's what Big Blue looked like when we got home.  Mud caked everywhere, although it is hard to see due to the sun going down.  I got him out and hosed him off yesterday, but he's still not clean.



And here he is on a tight trail, but not the tightest spot 'cause I couldn't get out to take a pic on the tightest spots!



Here's an example of limbs we had to deal with - this one is ready to hit the truck on the passenger's side:




And here I am out clearing limbs away so we can go on.  This was typical of this section of the trail.

[Machspeed]

Looks like fun, Gary! A couple those pics look like ATV trails. No way I'd take my truck through those....LOL! I'm thinking Big Blue is not likely to ever see nice shiny paint.

[taskswap]

What a fun trip! Should we start a section on adventures/trips? It would be fun to showcase how capable these old trucks still are.

[Gary Lewis]

Good idea!  Done.  

John - Now you see why I told my son "NO!" when he asked if I'd had Big Blue painted.  

[BigBrother-84]

Gary Lewis wrote

'cause I couldn't get out to take a pic on the tightest spots!

[Gary Lewis]

And from what I hear/read it is even tighter on the Ozark Overland Adventure Trail.  But, we shall see - Thursday.

[Rembrant]

Great pics Gary, looks like fun!

[BigBrother-84]

Gary Lewis wrote

Thursday.

So exiting!