Expedition Off-Road Trips in the Lower 48

I keep telling people that I am building my FJ up as an expedition vehicle. Earlier this week I started asking my self what this really means. In places like Africa and Australia there are many WIDE OPEN spaces where one can leave the highway for days on end. For trips in those regions of the world expedition vehicle really fill a need. In the lower 48 can we really experience Expedition type travel.

The first question I asked myself was “What is the definition of an off-road expedition in the lower 48?”.

I am defining my expedition criteria to be:

 – Off highway for extended miles (50+) that will require more than one day to traverse at a sightseeing pace with late starts and early stops.
– Require self support for both camping and vehicle repairs
– Preferably in isolated areas where few other people are available to assist.
– Require specific preparation
– Can include situations that my be life threatening
– Vehicle breakdown can require a full day or multi day hike to reach help.

With the above criteria I do find it hard to find actual expedition type trips in our part of the country.  The first consideration is are there places where I can go and be off highway for extended periods of time and miles. We have found a few already in the southwest in both Colorado and Utah. In Utah we visited Canyonlands Maze District where we were off highway for 4 days and over 150 miles. I Colorado we traversed the Flattops from Rifle to Glenwood Springs which took 3 shorter days and about 70 miles.

I do fudge the criteria I have defined a little by connecting shorted off road segments with short on highway travel. An example of this is connecting Tincup, Tailor,  Pearl Schofield Passes. I call this my 4 pass tour which I extend to a four day trip by doing one pass a day. To connect the passes there are a few on highway miles and small towns.

We will never be able to as remote and isolated as expedition in Africa, Australia and some other countries but we can simulate the same experiences by finding small segments of land that allow off road travel.

Through investigation and actual experiences I plan on starting to catalogue areas in the US where one can actually experience expedition type off-road travel.