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2 Years on the Road in the Wee Rover

We spent 2 years traveling in the Wee Rover from Vermont to Florida to the Arctic Ocean (twice) to Baja and the Yucatán Peninsula. It was a trip filled with adventure, fun, frustration, and many many many firsts (but not the lasts). Unfortunately, in the end were chased home by Covid which added a bizzare end to our trip. Overall, it was a life changing experience in more ways than I can write.

This blog was a fantastic way to stay in touch with family and friends and document the trip, but the time has come to close it down. Fear not, this is not the end of our travels. Our adventures are just beginning and while the Wee Rover has moved into retirement our new rig Huddy McBruce is just getting started. To follow our future adventures, please visit our Instagram account under….you got it MacKenzies on the Road.

For now it is farewell, or see you down the road, or tata for now.

The Wee Rover back where she started with a map of her Adventures. Not bad for a vehicle built in 1962.
The Adventures of the Wee Rover.

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Hovenweep

Another beautiful day in southern Utah and another National Monument preserving the Ancestral Puebloan ruins. The structures here date about the same as the Navajo Monument we visited earlier in the week, but are different in that they were built into canyon-heads instead of under a pre-existing cliff in a canyon.

Time and erosion have taken most of the buildings that were constructed on the sandstone leaving only those built on the more solid rock. When viewing the ruins, you need to use your imagination to fill in the lost buildings that would have connected these remaining structures, creating a small city network of rooftop paths and ladders from the canyon bottom up to the mesa rim.

The buildings that connected this building to the canyon floor are long gone. A house is only as good as its foundation, sand isn’t a great foundation.
Mi casa, su casa.
We felt like we were walking in their footsteps as we traversed the canyon.
These ruins reminded us of castle ruins we had seen in Scotland.
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Valley of the Gods

We found a great dispersed camping spot on BLM land right below Mexican Hat. While there, we chatted with our friend Dan from Arizona (we met Dan remote camping in the Badlands last summer) about places we should visit. He mentioned Valley of the Gods. We looked at the map and it was right across the road…why not?

The 17 mile drive, and another night dispersed camping in the valley, was spectacular. It is called a mini Monument Valley, and to be honest, we liked it a lot better. It was a quiet dirt road with minimal traffic (probably busier during the summer), lots of those red rocks we love, lots of stars and a Sentinel watching over us as we slept.

Thanks Dan for the tip!

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A day of up, down, and around!

The Muley Point road should have intersected the dirt road we took along the Goosenecks, but we never found it. Well, we soon discover why! Muley Point is on the top of the butte, and we were hugging the bottom edge of the butte.

A quick look at the map and we found a 3 mile, 5 mile per hour, dirt, steep, really steep, set of switchbacks up the cliff face of the butte called Mokie Dugway that connected the bottom to the top. We dropped the Wee Rover into second gear and headed up!

Steep, twisting, no guardrail, dirt, drop offs, brings us to Muley Point and one of our best coffee break spots of the trip, and on the way back down we made a friend!

The Wee Rover was very proud of herself for climbing up the switchbacks, she doesn’t know yet that she has to go back down.
Lunch at Muley’ Point.
The dirt road we drove earlier…no wonder they didn’t intersect.
Our new friend, Charlie ( and his parent’s Dave and Shandi).
Ok, everyone be serious.
Charlie wanted to go with us, but his parent’s said No Way!
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Road Less Traversed

Most people who visit the Goosenecks area of southern Utah stay at the state park, look over the edge to the San Juan River and then move on. Us? We skipped the State Park (no surprise there), found the small red dirt road that ran parallel to the goosenecks and San Juan River, and headed out.

Oh my, what a beautiful drive. We encountered our first tumbleweeds, saw pictographs from the Archaic Period (that’s really, really, really old) up close, and saw more beautiful red rocks. We just can’t get enough of the gorgeous red cliffs and spires.

The Wee Rover decided to investigate the tumbleweeds up close. She is a bit of a ham…wonder where she gets it from?
More dust…
Darrin climbed up to get a better look. How many hours do you think it took to chip the rock with a rock?
A perfect likeness, don’t you think?
Not to be outdone,
The wee Rover had to pose a few more times.
Gorgeous
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Utah Sprint

Our first night in Utah at Crystal Hot Springs, it snowed in the mountains…that should have been our first clue. Since then, we have been chased through Utah by the snow, the cold and the wind. Yesterday, we made a run for southern Utah to get ahead of the predicted snow. We avoided the snow, but the cold arctic blast brought cold wind with night time temperatures down into the teens and day time temps only in the 40’s.

Our Gatorade froze solid!
When you need to run both heaters to stay warm it is time to head south.
Knitting needle casualty of the cold.
Luckily, I had another…why, I don’t know.
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The lesson of the Grub Screw!

I have to admit that I hadn’t heard of a set screw called a Grub Screw before. In 24 hours we had 2 lessons on grub screws.

  1. We took this rough, sandy, 4WD track up a canyon outside Kanab heading to Montezuma’s Cave. Local lore states that Montezuma hid his gold there. We didn’t find the gold and when we got back to the pavement our transmission was stuck in first gear! Bummer! A couple of calls and we learned that we needed to check the grub screw that links the shifter to the transmission. 20 miles later at 10 miles per hour we were back at camp! The next morning and 45 minutes later the grub screw was snug and we were back in business.
  2. The next morning while taking down the tent a couple of poles had loosened up from the relentless pounding of the wind over the past few weeks. Guess what! The grub screw was missing from one of the tees! A quick trip to the hardware store and the tent was all snug again!
These are Grub Screws.
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Little Hollywood!

Kanab, Utah, aka Little Hollywood!, who new? Josey Wales, Stagecoach, Gunsmoke, and the Lone Ranger were all filmed here. Those and over 300+ other films and TV series. There is a small inn, the Parry Lodge, where all of the stars stayed during production. The lobby walls of the lodge are filled with pictures and memorabilia from all of the western stars. While we were looking at the pics, the gentleman working the desk told us a couple stories. It seems that when The Rat Pack, of Sinatra, Martin, etc…were filming Sergeants 3, they wanted to cool off after a day of filming so Frank Sinatra paid to have a pool put in at the inn. Crazy!

Set for Josey Wales, one of our favorite movies.
Parry Lodge where they all stayed and partied.
A few of the 300+.
One of the fampus ones.
Another old set. Not sure what show or movie.
Signs all over town talk about the different actors, movies, and shows, this one happens to be one of our favorites.
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A Bit of a Glow

While camping below the The Hondoo Arch we hiked around a bit exploring and came across old uranium mines dotting the cliffs. In the 40’s, miners flocked here to strike it rich mining uranium, unfortunately many died. We didn’t drink the water, but we did seem to glow a bit for a few days!

The mines are all along this edge.
The shoot down at the bottom.
Old ammunitions storage.
All of the mines have been concreted in.