Epic adventures here in BC Canada

Hottest I’ve experienced here was hiking in a rocky box canyon in LYTTON. The rock faces has baked in the sun all day , in 39 deg C heat . No wind. In the little canyon it was dead still oven air, I recorded 45 deg C in the shade of a tree, 49 Deg C in the open.

 

I was doing reclamation work on my homestead place in 109F the other day. Consumed in the neighborhood of 2 1/2 gallons of water and electrolytes in 6 hours time.

 

800 km drive to have coffee in the woods.

left late Sunday afternoon, ripped down the freeway to RamboTown (Hope BC) and then did a blistering hard pull in the diesel Jeep up the Coquilhalla Hwy. Hot ambient temps out (35 deg C plus) . Did a solid hard pull up the steep hwy at 140 KM’s / hour for a solid 120 KM’s . I was getting passed even at those speeds (120 km/h is the speed limit) .

Jeep was building power bigtime going up .

Lots of burnt up vehicles littering the sides of the Hwy, their auto transmissions can’t handle the heat / steady steep altitude gains due to cheap ATF, poor maintenance .

Stopped to help a fellow 4x4 - saw his old Jeep Cherokee squarebody with the hood up. His engine overheated . That was a nonissue , his electric fan had a bad connection. The big issue was he accidentally locked his only key inside the Jeep. He had to wait for his folks to drive out from Merrit with a spare key. I gave him 2 liters of water , as it was about 38 Deg C near the summit of the Hwy, with no shade .

The great Bear Snowshed. Entire hwy is a major major avalanche zone , snow can get upwards of 16 metres . The snow shed is an absolute engineering marvel. Built of millions of tons of reinforced concrete, it allows massive avalanches (literally billions of tonnes of snow / ice) to pass overhead and into the deep valley below.
The CDN FORCES has something like 30 concrete bases for huge howitzers along the hwy, they used to roll up every year in winter, with military trucks , trailers, crane truck and mount their massive howitzers on the concrete pads. Then barrage the hell out of the mountains above the highway , causing avalanches . This reduces the danger, somewhat . Nowadays the avalanche reduction is done with explosives dropped by helicopters.

https://infotel.ca/inwheels/ever-wo...e-side-of-the-coquihalla-highway-are/it100773



ripping up the Hwy.


Great Bear Snowshed. Pics don’t it Justice . Roof is 60’ thick solid rebar / steel beams, metal mesh and millions of tonnes of concrete. It extends INTO the mountain on the upper side of the Hwy. The roof top has 3” thick steel plates bolted deep into the concrete , and had a yearly replaceable “sacrificial” layer of shot Crete over 3’ deep in it, to act as a wear barrier.


Ice/snow polished mountain peaks.
Stopped at Juliet, to scout out camping spots.


lots of dead zones from the pine beetle tree kill. (Dead, bone dry forests . You sneeze it go up in flames )

 

Went off highway onto a FSR, drove about 50 KM’s up. Dropped off a jerry can of gas for a buddy who was camping up there for the long weekend. Chatted and headed back down .
Stopped to let the Jeep have a cool down - ambient temps were pushing 38 deg C and I’d been running the Jeep HARD. I was hungry anyways. Homemade cornbread , 10 year aged sharp cheddar. Mmmmmm

played with Jenny Wren a bit. .
Drove back out to the highway, and headed further into Merritt BC. Rolling open hills, ranches , grasslands

 

Time to explore the rolling foothills above Merritt. Everything smells like pine, honey and pine sap. It’s heaven

SERIOUSLY impressed with the jeeps torque and traction. Went up a very steep gravelly grade. The rear LSD only kicked in once.

Explored further , went back down the steep grade, 4Lo , in lo lo crawler. Then back up another section of the foothills. Stopped to let the Jeep have a cool down, played with Jenny some more.


listen to that diesel engine purr. Over 275,000 KM’s plus on it. Serious maintenance done. High end full synthetic fluids, diesel fuel additives, and no short trips under 100 KM’s .

M

 

Anytime is time for a brew up!!!



After coffee, I broke out the recovery gear and rigged up a mechanical advantage system for practice. I try to do this every outing , it’s good to train .

I can already hear the howls and protests of the 4x4 crowd and the rescue crowd - about me using double braided 3/4” bull rope for recovery . Yes I’m aware of the compound effect on the rope, yes I’m aware of the risks. Relax - I’ve done this setup for years. It’s simple, fast to deploy , and works excellent to pull a 4x4 out of a rut or a mud hole etc. And it can be pulled out with less than 50lbs exertion by one person. I went easy on this setup , normally I build it with upward of 16:1 MA, and I’ve built one with over 22:1 MA that I could pull a Jeep on level ground with 1 finger.

think outside the box folks. The Kliemheist Hitch or Prussiks I use slip long before the ropes MBS (18,500 lbs) is ever reached. I sent off a section of the bull rope to have it professionally broken and it snapped at 24,210 lbs load. I’m really not worried about it breaking with my MA system. If the Prussia cords (rated for 5000 lb MBS) don’t snap under the MA loads I put them under , I’m really not concerned about the bull rope . Esp since it’s a smooth steady pull, unlike the severe shock loads these bull ropes see when dropping down log rounds from 100’ up in a tree….

I do have a Lewis Chainsaw winch with synthetic winch line coming at the end of the year- that’s gonna a very nice bit of kit , esp with some MA pulleys thrown in.


Time to head out, it was getting late in the day and I was thirsty for REEBS!!

headed down the Lower Nicola canyon to Spence’s Bridge / Fraser Canyon area





Long drive home, got in about 0045 hours and cracked open a few icy REEBS.

800 KM’s round trip , including off highway. Did it on 3/4 tank of diesel . Fricking awesome milage , considering it uses loads of fuel in 4HI/4LO off highway. Seriously impressed with the synthetic fluids I’m running, and the performance of the engine , and 4x4 system today.

 

@Twoody88 would like to have a word with you

 

Sundays Church Of The Woods -big cat in the woods, coffee, MPRE testing, more coffee


Big cat in the woods meow



walked up the hydro FSR, stopped to make coffee.

The Carcajou Tactical webbing rig. Overloaded as usual


todays toys , including my sweetheart Jenny


campfire/burn ban finally over - brought the SAS MKettle out today. Could wait to fire up some fat wood splints

But first I wanted to test it with the BCB INTERNATIONAL FIREDRAGON solid fuel - I can store 4 blocks in the burner base during transport- gotta take advantage of every nook and cranny of storage space in the webbing rig


burns well in the MKettle . Hot boiling water in no time


with no visible flame / smoke, and just a slight alcohol odour



Had a brew up , then another brew up using fine splints of fatwood.


Jenny splitting fat wood


burn baby burn!


Fatwood creosote - look at all that flammable goodness


literally the only chimney you ever want creosote build up in.


after two brew ups of coffee, I made a bullroarer.


it was way too light though and didn’t make any sound when spun fast overhead. Need denser/heavier wood


nice view .


more

 

Wandered back down the FSR, took a trail down into the old quarry. Wandered around for a bit.

time for some MPRE (Meal Partially Ready to Eat) - some cooking required. Wanted to see how many BCB fuel blocks it would take to prep. For research purposes.

MPRE - diced bacon, smokies, onion, garlic, peas, carrots, glob of butter, herbs / spices . Prepped / vac bagged just before I left the apt


lid of the titanium mess tin makes a nice stable base for the MKettle burner cup


pan frying the ingredients . Took three blocks of the BCB FIRE-DRAGON solid fuel to cook completely. Hmmm…. Too much fuel needed. Next time I’ll pre cook at home instead , and just sous-vide it in the vac bag with boiling water (1 BCB FIRE-DRAGON block required)


Adding water and scraping off all the delicious FOND off the bottom of the mess tin. Made sorta a gravy


mixing in IDAHOAN instant mashed potatoes


shredded Parmesan


mmmm yummy goodness. Almost 2.5 lbs serving I almost burst open


More spice mix


and green jalapeño hot sauce


Any MPRE packaging waste goes into the empty mess tin for sealed leak free / odour free transport back home. (Lid has silicone O ring seal , mess tin has twin clips to secure the lid on)


Time for a brew up before heading out


going


going



……..and GONE! Out come the skeeters!

Nice day. Gotta tweak the contents of the webbing, change the MRE’s to boil and soak only to save fuel and WEIGHT. But that’s why we continually go out for hikes with our gear - testing ,evaluating , taking notes, making changes . Polishing the gear and loadouts to our needs.

 

Been fun….

 

Any updates??

 

really cool, i would love to join you for an adventure in my jeep, I am down here in Vancouver, rigging my jeep to be a nice little over lander one step at a time.

 

It's probably about a 2.5 hr drive for me to get up to Merritt, it would be nice to join you for an adventure in my jeep.

 

I still talk to bushy on the regular. Shoot me a PM he's still out there weekly. I haven't been out for way too long. He's active over on Instagram I belive too

 

Glad to hear he is ok. You just never know when someone disappears online.

 

Merritt BC

 

Very nice camp!

 

That's badass enough.