"MM54" (mm54mk2)
05/21/2018 at 21:15 • Filed to: CALIFORNICAR
16
19|
"MM54" (mm54mk2)
05/21/2018 at 21:15 • Filed to: CALIFORNICAR | 16
| 19 |
Last Saturday morning, myself and 6 friends flew one-way into LA. The plan? Try and buy some cars and drive back. After two days of shopping, only one of the three of us car-searching had found anything, so we decided to enjoy the rest of the trip instead of burning more time on Craigslist.
Day 1
With a flight departing Cleveland at 8am, a short layover in St Louis, and arriving at LAX at 11:30 local time, we were already tired. We also had already arranged to look at a few cars from Craigslist, so we picked up a couple rentals, a Fusion and Challenger (National ‘Executive’ has its perks). As was alluded earlier, there was no luck on day 1 of car hunting, so we headed down to the Santa Monica Pier to be tourists for a bit.
Day 2
By the time we finished breakfast, more arrangements had been made for craigslist shopping, so we again headed separate ways. I tried to buy a Lexus LS400 but it had major title issues and loved a completely stock base model 1.6 NA Miata but it hadn’t been maintained much, if at all. The others checked out a Jeep Comanche that would end up coming home with us, and an e46 which was in much-worse-than-advertised condition.
After dinner, we decided to have some fun and took the rental cars up Glendora Ridge Road, which was awesome. I was pleasantly surprised by how well the rental Challenger handled it, all things considered. The Fusion was lighter (probably), AWD, and turbocharged, but I kept up. The passengers’ stomachs in both cars didn’t fare as well.
That night at the hotel we decided to call off the car search - in the morning a couple of us would go pick up the Comanche and the rest of us a rental and head out of town to enjoy the road trip.
Day 3
The chosen Comanche had a non-op registration because it wouldn’t pass smog (non-issue where the new owner lives) so while half the group spent a few hours in line at the DMV, the rest of us went up to the Griffith Observatory to look around.
After plenty of Observing, we returned the rental Challenger and met up with the others to return the rental Fusion. Again leveraging my ‘Executive’ rewards status, we got a one-way rental of a 2018 GMC Yukon XL to haul all 7 people’s luggage and 5 of the people (the other two would be in the Jeep).
We then grabbed a late lunch and headed to the Petersen Museum.
It was good.
At the end of the day, we got on the road out of town, and headed for Barstow for the night.
Day 4
Day 4 began the road trip in earnest, as we hit the highway targeting the Grand Canyon Skywalk thing. More on that later.
Along the way, we saw something just off the highway called the Pisgah Lava Tubes. Sounds like an interesting stop.
Turns out this is a long-extinct volcano just out in the desert. We clearly weren’t the first ones there, but being a Tuesday morning we certainly were the only ones there at the time.
With the rental car safely stopped just past the end of the pavement, we explored for a while. Old lava turned out to be very cool (well, hot - it is the desert after all).
After getting back on the road, we headed towards the Grand Canyon Skywalk. After a long trip to get there, it turned out to be just about the definition of a tourist trap, at over $70 a person to even be able to get near it. Most of us had seen the Grand Canyon before, so we opted to head towards Flagstaff for the evening instead.
I like the desert.
We made it into Flagstaff around midnight, but ahead of where we expected to be at this point.
Day 5
The next morning we set off to drive through the desert again, this time to Monument Valley in SE Utah. It was well worth the drive, and much more reasonable cost of admission.
The pictures do the scale no justice. We drove down the “scenic path” pictured above to get a better view.
Greatly satisfied, we headed for Four Corners on the way into Colorado. We arrived at 6:57PM.
We headed to Durango, Colorado for the night.
Day 6
We drove north through the mountains, passed through Colorado Springs (where I met up with a friend I’ve not seen in 7 years), and went to Limon for the night. I’ll let the pictures explain what I can’t.
We went down near the water to eat lunch
Day 7
We drove out of Limon, CO across Kansas to Columbia, MO. It was flat, but not as flat as I expected.
We noticed mid-Kansas when we stopped for lunch that the Comanche had taken to puking oil into the airbox. A replacement PCV and new air filter was sourced from the local auto parts store, and we were back on the road. This would be the only issue encountered on the entire trip.
Day 8
By this point in the trip, we were getting back into familiar territory, and most importantly scenery that we all see every day. We did stop just east of Indianapolis for some high-speed karting, which was awesome. Since we all were driving karts, there are no pictures. Sorry. We spent the night in Dayton, OH.
Day 9
Being several hours from home on a Sunday morning (and we all had to go to work on Monday), we decided to not get right back on the road and instead spend a few hours at the National Museum of the United States Air Force (Dayton Aerospace Museum). It was worth it.
From here, we made it back to the Cleveland airport, returned the rental, and went our separate ways.
Remarkably, we had driven 3000 miles across the country and never hit so much as a light rain. The dust from the desert was still all over the rental (as well as thousands of bugs on the front) when returned. It could not have gone better.
While a slight bummer to have not bought a car while in CA, the trip was still incredible - it’s been nearly 15 years since I’ve been on a real vacation. I look forward to returning to some of these areas to spend more time there, especially Colorado (so pretty) and the LA area (so much to do).
Matt Nichelson
> MM54
05/21/2018 at 21:21 |
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Aweseom story from what sounds like and even more awesome trip. You may not have found a vehicle, but you will always have the memories.
AestheticsInMotion
> MM54
05/21/2018 at 21:22 |
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All that work and no car! Sounds like an awesome trip though, I’d love to do the same, but in the opposite direction. 3000 miles without rain is something my PNW head cannot wrap itself around
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MM54
> AestheticsInMotion
05/21/2018 at 21:42 |
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The lack of rain amazed me, too. Early forecasts had us in severe storms all through the midwest, but it never materialized. I definitely would like to continue doing such trips, it was great. I may consider something next year driving out to Colorado for a few days; we also briefly discussed a short-form where we go south instead of west for a future possibility.
I had been avoiding test driving Miatas because I suspected that once I did, I would need one in my life. I did, and I do.
sony1492
> MM54
05/21/2018 at 21:54 |
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That’s excellent, might not have gotten a car but still got to see some amazing stuff. Colorado looks especially beautiful, I’d like to do a trip like that at some point.
Decay buys too many beaters
> MM54
05/21/2018 at 21:59 |
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Sweet! Sounds like a blast!
I’ve been trying to get a group together to do similar for years, but it always ends up being hard to get firm commitments.
Boxer_4
> MM54
05/21/2018 at 22:02 |
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That’s too bad that the car buying didn’t work out like you had hoped. Looks like a fun trip regardless!
jminer
> MM54
05/21/2018 at 22:07 |
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Nicely done an beautiful pictures. I love Colorado too, I went there late last year and fell in love with it again after not having been in about a decade.
I’ve been contemplating a fly and drive on an upcoming work trip. Any tips on targeting CL a bit better that random searches? I’m going to be in town a week but busy during each day.
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MM54
> jminer
05/21/2018 at 22:36 |
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I don’t have much advice on it other than put in a max price and start looking through the whole of it and search for anything you have in mind. The hardest part for me was not knowing where locations were to see if they were realistic to make it there - for example the BMW my friends went to look out was almost 2 hours out of town, but the Miata I looked at was basically around the corner from the previous car I’d looked at. Knowing the area would help make it a bit more efficient.
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MM54
> Boxer_4
05/21/2018 at 22:37 |
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I was a bit bummed to not buy something, but in the end the goal was to have a good vacation/road trip, and it exceeded all expectations there, even in a rental.
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MM54
> Decay buys too many beaters
05/21/2018 at 22:38 |
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We started planning this around Christmas time, becoming firm plans mid-January. It wasn’t easy to get everyone together, but very much worth it.
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MM54
> sony1492
05/21/2018 at 22:38 |
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It was unbelievable; I’ve never been anywhere like it. Definitely tops the list of places-to-go-back-to.
CompactLuxuryFan
> MM54
05/22/2018 at 03:53 |
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Nice trip! I wanna go to Monument Valley so bad! The thing with road trips is I find I’m never committed enough to spend the time coming back. One way like this would be ideal. I am thinking of selling my A4 Avant... maybe I should make a road trip out of it.
Comanche looks like a great find, too!
BobintheMtns
> MM54
05/22/2018 at 18:40 |
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So, of your Colorado mountain pics.. You were on HWY 550 along the western edge of the Weminuche Wilderness, between Silverton and Durango.
1st Pic:
Twilight Peak (13,200 ft) There’s a classic backcountry ski couloir on the North Face- and just a dope mtn overall.....
2nd Pic:
Same... Twilight from Coal Bank Pass (10,400 ft) And of note- your truck is in the exact parking spot for one of the best backcountry ski runs in Southern Colorado....
3rd Pic: Looking at the northern reaches of the Grenadier Range of the Weminuche from Molas Pass above Silverton, Co.
4th Pic: The Sultan (13,400 ft) all sorts of great skiing on it.. Towers over Molas Pass and Silverton, Colorado.
Cool pics.......!
And that Air force museum looks super cool btw!
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MM54
> BobintheMtns
05/22/2018 at 18:53 |
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I’m impressed! That is the route we took. There were occasional signs with the names of peaks on them but I was too in awe to remember any of it. A very beautiful place for sure.
Elumerere
> MM54
05/22/2018 at 19:39 |
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Check out Utah next time as well, more in-depth. Most beautiful state nature-wise in my opinion.
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MM54
> Elumerere
05/22/2018 at 20:54 |
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There was a lot of stuff on the “possible stops” list in Utah, but time-wise we only had time to swing by Monument Valley. Some day I’ll go back!
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Elumerere
> MM54
05/22/2018 at 21:09 |
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Worth it.
bltoe
> MM54
05/22/2018 at 21:35 |
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Looks like a fun trip, thanks for sharing! Sweet Comanche also. Just picked one up myself..
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BobintheMtns
> MM54
05/23/2018 at 14:05 |
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Yeah- the San Juans is the best mountain range in colorado... so much goodness there......