Poteau, Oct 11 2003

(Click on image to enlarge)

Best wheelin' weather of the year.  Gotta love early fall.
Leaves were not all turned yet, but there is some great color starting to come out.

Here's the first challenge of the day, the start of transfer case hill.  This spots get worst every time we see it....

Steve took first crack at it.  Some of the off camber ledges can be quite an issue.

Ken took pics as me and Larry took our shot.  Steve and Henry tried a tug to get the rear tire to climb the ledge but was not successful.  Faced with the good chance for a barrel roll down the hill, I opted to hook up the winch.

Ken worked his way to the spot then gave one of the best wheel stands of the day.  His assault on the wall ended when the left rear started gushing out air.  They hooked up the winch and pulled him up to Steve's before the tire was totally dismounted.

Norm also put on a great show at the wall!  He also took a cable tug to avoid the impending flop and roll...

Hamid had problems early on.   As he was getting in position on the hill his front lock-right gave and he lost all pull on the front end.  He was put on Steve's cable for the drag up the hill.

We were joined by a small group from Missouri.  These guys did an awesome job assaulting and beating this spot.   Excellent driving!

On up the trail, you actually come to the spot that gave the hill it's name sake.  There are a couple nice ledges, but dry they did not prove too much concern.

It's also an awesome view from up here.  This hill has some terrific scenic spots.

After a lunch break, the rest of the group moves on up. 
Here comes Ken.

And Norm passed over driving duties to Jackie. 
She makes short work of this spot!

And here comes Steve, ripping and roaring up the loose rocks.

Why ripping and roaring, because he's got some extra weight attached. 
With Hamid's dead front, these loose rocks and ledges require an endless tug.

It's slow going with the injured truck, so sorry to the Missouri group.  No real way to get by, so they are stuck behind us.  But, they are making the best of it.

Well, we made it back to the top.  It's about 3pm, to late to start one of the big trails, but too early to call it stops.  So, we went over to check out cable hill.  This is a real bear on bad days, but with dry rocks it did not prove too much of a problem for anyone.  It's still an awesome sight!

After this, it was time to load up and get some dinner.  We made our way back into Poteau and tried out Warehouse Willies steak joint down town.  Umm, that hit the spot!