coops2k

Well last week, I drove out to SFO to pick up some photography equipment for my wife. To make this happen and carry the equipment back, I took my 87 Toyota Pickup, with some mods to carry the stuff back. Curt, a good friend, was going to fly out to SFO and drive back with me, so we had a route planned to take in some of this great country, but do to his father-in-law passing away, I had to do the whole trip myself.

The first day, I left around 11pm and my first night stop was Grand Junction, CO about 21 hours and 1200 mile later. Had a hard time making in up Monarch Pass, 25mph at the top, guess I need to add a cam or turbo to the 22re (already have a header & exhaust)
Day 2, was a stop at Salt Lake City to get rid of my trailer and then on to SFO and I would of made in that night, except for everyone else trying to get to Reno on a Friday night, with 1 lane closed. Just outside of Reno, I was doing 6 miles per hour, yes 6 miles per hour and then 10 miles per hour about 30 miles from Reno.
Day 3, I was in SFO around 9:30am, for 4 days.

Thursday, I left for home and the route took me through Yosemite, and then across NV to Cedar City, UT. The route from Tonopah, NV to Cedar City, UT is the "Extraterrestrial Highway", which shows no gas for 111 miles, I counted 255 miles between gas stations I saw open.

Friday i went across UT on highway 12 and 95, which has to be one of the best routes for scenery and would be a nice driving route, except you keep looking around and not down the road (get ready for Enchantment Drive 2012) and then stopped Friday night at a friend's place outside of Durango.

Saturday, I was on my way to visit a friend in El Paso and pick up some Pistachios nuts from Alamogordo, until I got an exhaust leak, the 02 sensor bolts where backing out and I could not tighten them, they where frozen. I stopped at my wife's aunt & uncle's to do some repairs. Using some fence wire to hold the 02 sensor in place, which held all the way home. Night stop in Amarillo.

Sunday, I wanted to just get home and just outside of Dallas and the radio quit working, luckily I had "pandora" and head phones.

Here are some pics
Old Station in Texas

Top of Monarch pass

Great Salt Lake & Salt Flats



Truck getting loaded, back was packed



Cutting across Yosemite






went 54 miles before seeing this sign and then about another 90 before seeing a open gas station

For Tim



Part of the 2012 drive










And more across HWY & 95 to the north side of Lake Powell

olharleyman

nice ride that lil aleinn is a trip huh? did you go to the black mailbox? 395 is such a fun road to drive

Teuf

Wow thats amazing. Great adventure. Tell us how the truck held up. How many miles are on it? Did you have any mechanicals? In 97 I drove to central Fla. from NH. Then back to do some photography. In my 85 yota 2wd. No radio. It was a blast.

coops2k

the truck now has a little over 140k. other than the CB antenna, the radio stopped working, and my 02 sensor trying to come out, everything went fine and the truck avg 19 mpg overall. Really thinking I need to turbo the engine or something.

Teuf

140 Thats all, Wow again. That a 4 banger?

BajaRunner

Really cool pictures, thanks for sharing

shore.runner

loved the pics, in may i went on a 6500 KM trip from vancouver bc to saskatchewan in my 88 4runner with two buddies for 15 days. truck struggled through the rockies and the high mountain passes but other than that it ran fine. best part of the trip was driving for 45 miles with the fuel light on praying that we would get to the gas station before it ran out.

93yotaSR5

very nice man. love the pics. looks like it was a blast

akaphilly

sweet pics. sounds like a fun trip.. i kinda know how you feel about driving all alone. went from phoenix to boston all alone in my lifted yota, broke down twice. what a trip. im willing to bet every first second and third gen pickup struggles up thoes big mountians.

SoCal4Running

Sweet adventure and great pics.

michael1963

Excellent looking pics, thanks for sharing these. It's only because of people like yourself that people like me get to see the different parts of your country that we would not normal get that chance too.

nlinn

that does look like it was a pretty awesome trip.
I liked the sign for the extraterrestrial highway.
You've got a very clean yota for the age

RMA

cool pics man . thanks ..

stevenazevedo00

my truck would of spontaniously combusted into flames if i tried that trip my truck is loose with 250k miles

HighLux

Makes me wanna take a road trip somewhere.....awesome pics.
Very inspiring. Love it.

SKT

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Just stumbled upon this old thread.

Great pics and always awesome to read about road trips in older vehicles!

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