RIP Little Red Jeep

After the Christmas in Oregon was over it was time for Team 3Up to lead a caravan of fun back to Idaho. Unfortunately, loaded down with a regular refigerator, an RV refrigerator and freezer (for the cabin), a freezer, and a trailer axle the little red Jeep just wasn’t up for it. Right in Portland (THANK GOD) the clacking started and steam started coming out the exhaust. We got off at the next exit and had to declare my car dead. On our way to Idaho. With a ton of shit. And six friends expecting to stay at our house that night and go to the cabin tomorrow.

So. We started shopping. But that’s a story for tomorrow. For now a requiem for the little red Cherokee that could:

I found a 5 speed Cherokee about four hours away (fortunately where my parents live). We promptly load up six-week old Sprocket and head north.

Forrest gets a big idea: a ’round the country tour in our 24MPG “motorhome.”

And then the Jeep spent a summer exploring the Montana Rockies before I used it to move all of our stuff to Idaho (regretfully there is not a picture of it loaded down with the little red Harbor Freight trailer also very full behind it).

And then, it went wheeling in Moab:

For Memorial Day weekend we joined our friends on a drive over to their cabin in the Clearwater. We were the odd ones in the bunch but did okay; especially when you consider there was still 10′ of snow at the top. 🙂

An awesome weekend roadtrip through Eastern Oregon:

The Jeep even took us to Yellowstone this fall for what turned out to be our last nights of stealth camping.

Two years and about 45,600 miles later it’s time to say goodbye.