My 18-month old son’s favorite toy is a yellow plastic Hummer H2. He pushes it all around the house loudly proclaiming “big truck!” to anyone that will listen. I figured it was about time he saw what it was like to go out and see the real trucks in action.

“A tame Vermont trail ride with NEHOG is the perfect way to introduce Griffin to his first wheeling adventure,” I explained to my wife. “We can bring his toy Hummer and he can play with it outside and enjoy the summer weather. It will be great!” She bought it. I cleaned up the interior of my truck and installed the car seat where the munchkin could sit and safely see everything. As we prepared to trek four hours to the border of Vermont and New York, I made a last minute weather check. The forecast called for heavy rain. All weekend. Optimistically hoping the forecast would prove wrong, we headed out.

Halfway through our drive the rolling green hills slid in behind the low clouds and the rain started to spatter onto the windshield. As the rain got heavier and heavier, I navigated the remainder of the ride by watching snapshot-like flashes of the road as the clunky windshield wipers on my H1 tried to keep up. My son kicked his legs around in excitement and reminded me several hundred times, “It’s raaaaining.” Thanks, kid.

Kevin Leonard of Leonard Motorsports (2) did much of the planning for this event, and he was there to greet us when we arrived at the small country inn that would serve as our home base for the weekend. Over the course of the night, truck after truck rolled in, and I met the other drivers as they stepped in the door. Griffin wasn’t the only one who was attending his first New England Hummer Owners event. In fact, of all the trucks, only two had ever been to a NEHOG event in the past.

In the morning we assembled for breakfast and a drivers meeting. Kevin gave us an overview of the trails we would be running on, and went over some safety points before we braved the rain to line up in our trucks and hit the woods. Despite the pouring rain, everyone had a great time and none of the rigs got seriously hung up or stuck. In fact we made such good time driving through the trails that we ended up re-running some of them in the opposite direction before lunchtime. For lunch the group got sandwiches at a local country store, and then we ran some additional trails in the afternoon.

The rain pounded relentlessly throughout the day, so many of the trails had rivers running down them as we continued on the trails. Despite the foul weather, Kevin and his staff diligently directed drivers through obstacles, getting thoroughly soaked along the way. A large culvert pipe presented some minor delays and allowed them to coach some of the less experienced drivers to through some log crossing driving techniques, including diagonal approaches and using left-foot braking to perform a “torque bump” when necessary.

In the late afternoon we returned to the inn. The rain stopped long enough for the Kevin to put on a winch class and demonstration. I’m not sure Griffin paid attention through this part, however, because throughout the demonstration he pushed his toy H2 all over the parking lot. The damp weather forced the planned cookout to be adapted to a cook-in, but the whole thing went off very smoothly. Everyone stayed up late that night sharing stories from their past wheeling adventures, and getting to know one another.

The trails were far from extreme, and the weather did everything it could to ruin our event – but it didn’t. Griffin grinned from ear to ear through every trail, and he marveled and smiled at all the “big trucks” in the parking lot throughout the weekend. Despite the rain, we got to drive under covered bridges, catch fleeting glimpses of the mountains through the fog, and most importantly we got go out on the trails with some great people. Everyone was all smiles when we parted ways on Sunday, and every new member of NEHOG asked anxiously about when the next event was going to take place. We all made some new friends, and I expect many of us will see each other at another event in the near future.

For good measure, on Sunday the clouds parted and the sun came out in the afternoon – so we did get to see those rolling green hills during the ride home. Oddly enough, despite the fact that none of the trucks got stuck on our trip, Griffin’s latest obsession is to repeatedly pretend his toy trucks are hung up, proclaiming, “Big truck stuck in the mud.” We’ll have to do that on the next trip!

Links:

(1) New England Hummer Owners Group (http://www.nehog.org)

(2) Leonard Motorsports (http://www.leonardmotorsports.net)