The Hummer H1 makes the ultimate offroad vehicle. It will go anywhere most any other vehicle will go without question. Have you ever driven by a mountain and seen a road driving right up the side and wondered what kind of vehicle can do that? Well, a Hummer can. If there is a road the Hummer will take it.
I've done quite a bit of work to improve its offroad capabilities and particularly its safety. In the entire history of the Hummer, there has only been between 12-14 fatalties. Of those all but between 2-4 involved drinking or falling asleep on the part of the driver. How much is your family's safety worth -- I value mine quite a bit. Without going into details, safety is a big selling point with me since my family and I were caught in a flash flood in Moab UT in my earlier H1 and washed 3 miles down the canyon. We all (4) lived but had we been in anything else, odds are we wouldn't have made it....
Here is a picture of me going up Hell's Gate in Moab. This picture was taken just after having pulled 7 Jeeps that were part of a tour group up this using my MileMarker 12,000lb winch. It wasn't the Jeeps fault so much as it was the driver's since they were not listening to their spotter. I can't figure out why they hired a guide when they don't listen to him. Anyway, I got a free spot for my efforts and some cool pics to boot. Hell's Revenge is a 4+ trail (out of 5) and the Hummer really makes it look easy even dangerous obsticals such as "Tip Over Challenge."
One of the more interesting trails in Moab is called Steel Bender. You end up driving down a number of canyons and up on to different plateaus each of which is unique and very beautiful. This was taken from one of them. Steel Bender is a 4+ trail (out of 5).
Anybody take their truck off a 7 foot embankment? Lots of fun and there is definitely some pucker factor to it. This was taken in June 2004 on the Behind the Rocks trail in Moab Utah. This is considered by some to be in the top 4-5 hardest trails in Moab. It all ends up after some extreme obsticles such as "High Dive" at "White Knuckle Hill" which gets steeper every year due to erosion caused by people driving over it. Now, White Knuckle Hill is almost vertical and most have to strap themselves down tied to another vehicle on top. If you do it wrong, you crash at the bottom landing like a brick and break your front end and will require a tow back home.There is no way around White Knuckle Hill you do it or go back the way you came and go home. The Hummer takes it all in stride and comes through it ok as long as you remembered to tie down your cooler.
As you can see, after easing down Really slowly, you can simply drive out of it. I think I scraped my trailer hitch at the very end as I pulled out. Not bad and a little spray paint made the trailer hitch look good again. This trail is not recommended for the faint at heart and a good spotter is required.
Of course, the Hummer gets you where you need to go in style. Just imagine being able to drive the hardest trails in the hottest country with your air conditioner blazing and when you are done, you can drive home in style in the same vehicle.
How does the Hummer do over boulders? Just fine. Here is a picture of what it looks like driving a Hummer. As you can see, the truck ahead is climbing over a boulder that is probably a good foot and a half in size without problem. This is actually the easier part of the trail the really big boulders were behind us at this point. This was the Camp-5 trail just outside Deadwood South Dakota in the Black Hills (August 2004). The hard stuff was lots big boulders without much space between them to catch a break.
In case anybody is interested, here is a picture of what is left of my earlier truck. A few things about the flood.
* Once in a 50-100 year flood by volume.
* 10MPH flow speed.
* 15% sediment
* Floated 3 miles (with us inside) down the canyon WITHOUT overturning and suffering severe abuse the whole time with ease. (It sounded like a thunderclap every time we bounced off a big boulder.)
* Passengers: Myself, my wife, my two sons (3yrs and 5mo).
* Injuries: 1 bruise on my back from forcing the door open against the water pressure.
* Would we all still be alive had we been driving a Ford hybrid SUV? No way.
