Went to explore some Forest Service Roads in the Olympic National Forest. Definitely should not have gone out there solo and should have thought to read road conditions as it became apparent after a while that the roads I was driving on were not traversed by anyone else in a good while. There were multiple rock slides but they looked like they had been taken care of and were passable (weren't covering the road, just a few large rocks that you had to go around) but holy shit the overgrowth and brush absolutely murdered my paint job. Hopefully I'll be able to get out the majority of them with cutting and buffing, but there may be some that are permanent.
I will say this, the 4Runner is definitely capable in stock form. I know most hardcore enthusiasts would scoff at Forest Service Roads but some of the sharp rocks and debris fields reeeeally made me paranoid driving over with the stock dunlops - but they made it through!
I definitely had my ass puckered for a good hour or so driving across previous rockslides (again, they seemed to have been maintained, just a few large rocks I had to drive around) next to 3200 feet elevation mountain sides. I was really worried about puncturing a tire and getting stuck out there without any roaming cell coverage or anything. Definitely feel like a dumbass.
I eventually got to the main gravel road and headed the direction I planned to go only to turn a corner and see a rockslide that literally covered the road and would be hard to traverse even by foot. So I turned around and went the opposite direction on the road and luckily it was passable. I was panicking for a while.
This was my first real "off road" trip and I definitely should not have been doing it alone. Spent about three hours on-trail. In the grand scheme, unless I got killed by a rockslide, it probably wouldn't have been a big deal. My biggest concern was puncturing a tire and having to swap it out with an unstable cliff face up and to my right and a 1000+ foot drop off to my left.
Lesson learned: if the brush is blatantly overgrown, turn the **** around (well, maybe some of y'all could deal with it, but I need to turn around lol). Too bad I don't have any friends up in this part of the country to go with me, otherwise it would have been a little less stressful.
So yeah, I'm an idiot. But I'm alive so, yay?
On the bright side, there was a gravel pit at the beginning that allowed me to test all the off-road features of the 4Runner. This thing really is pretty capable in stock form. A little extra height on the front end, some rock sliders and underbody protection and some better tires and I can't imagine people really need much more except for extreme situations. I also got to test the crawl control on a beach where the truck seemed to be having some trouble and it took pretty good care of it. Really impressed!
And got some decent photos! (none of the really sketchy parts that I drove on since I was too panicky to even consider stepping out of the truck to take pictures)
Posing like a total bro!
Fire smoke from Canada made visibility pretty short
Conquering the beach
I will say this, the 4Runner is definitely capable in stock form. I know most hardcore enthusiasts would scoff at Forest Service Roads but some of the sharp rocks and debris fields reeeeally made me paranoid driving over with the stock dunlops - but they made it through!
I definitely had my ass puckered for a good hour or so driving across previous rockslides (again, they seemed to have been maintained, just a few large rocks I had to drive around) next to 3200 feet elevation mountain sides. I was really worried about puncturing a tire and getting stuck out there without any roaming cell coverage or anything. Definitely feel like a dumbass.
I eventually got to the main gravel road and headed the direction I planned to go only to turn a corner and see a rockslide that literally covered the road and would be hard to traverse even by foot. So I turned around and went the opposite direction on the road and luckily it was passable. I was panicking for a while.
This was my first real "off road" trip and I definitely should not have been doing it alone. Spent about three hours on-trail. In the grand scheme, unless I got killed by a rockslide, it probably wouldn't have been a big deal. My biggest concern was puncturing a tire and having to swap it out with an unstable cliff face up and to my right and a 1000+ foot drop off to my left.
Lesson learned: if the brush is blatantly overgrown, turn the **** around (well, maybe some of y'all could deal with it, but I need to turn around lol). Too bad I don't have any friends up in this part of the country to go with me, otherwise it would have been a little less stressful.
So yeah, I'm an idiot. But I'm alive so, yay?
On the bright side, there was a gravel pit at the beginning that allowed me to test all the off-road features of the 4Runner. This thing really is pretty capable in stock form. A little extra height on the front end, some rock sliders and underbody protection and some better tires and I can't imagine people really need much more except for extreme situations. I also got to test the crawl control on a beach where the truck seemed to be having some trouble and it took pretty good care of it. Really impressed!
And got some decent photos! (none of the really sketchy parts that I drove on since I was too panicky to even consider stepping out of the truck to take pictures)
Posing like a total bro!
Fire smoke from Canada made visibility pretty short
Conquering the beach
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imp: 
: thanks [MENTION=122818]michalik.piotr6837[/MENTION]
