By Craig Dumas
Editor’s note: Craig submitted a truly stunning article with all sorts of pictures of the trucks he’s describing. Unfortunately, you need a computer engineering degree to navigate the complex publishing program used on this website. And I’m anything but a computer engineer. So, enjoy the verbiage sans pics.
Much like my Tonka-loving son, I just can’t give up trucks.
If you know anything about deer hunting you know it basically requires three things: a rifle, a truck and a trailer. Everything else is secondary and menial at that. It pretty much goes without saying that the essentials listed are for their necessity, dependability and comfort.
In my years of growing older – but never growing up, mind you – I’ve learned that you need the proper truck for the job. Whether it be moving a friend or relative (anyone with a truck knows that they can and will be called upon for work by all their non-truck owning friends and family), getting firewood for the home stove, or even towing your oversized trailer out to the woods, a too-big truck is logical and essential for getting it done right. I’m in truck number six over a 16-year span counting a Suburban, which qualified as a modified station wagon to the state, but a truck to any real man. Sadly, I’ve had to learn the hard way over the years about what size truck would accommodate my needs. I started with the Suburban, a two wheel drive, half-ton which was beefed up to a three-quarter-ton for ease of loads, but after nearly losing a small trailer to a ditch in about 8 inches of rising snow, I realized the need for four-wheel drive.
Next it was a half-ton Chevy Blazer 4×4. What a great toy.
Then it was another Chevy half-ton 4×4, but this one was an extended cab pickup. The bed was too short and it wasn’t so good for hauling the big trailer that I acquired in the meantime. A trip to the Upper Peninsula nearly wrecked the engine as it was literally burning up all the oil in the motor due to the lack of an adequate towing package. The lesson of that trip wasn’t soon forgotten. I have to admit, that poor truck was probably the most beaten on of all my victims. The first time was coming home late from a ball game and a tree decided to cross the road at the last minute causing me some minor damage. Then there was the time I was in the backwoods joyriding with a friend (and a barley soda or two too many) and ended up ditching into 3 feet of water. A farmer on a tractor had to pull me out. I was rewarded for my stupidity with a terrible ride home because the alignment was out due to a bent tie rod. My last act of brilliance was the time when some yahoo got the forklift stuck in the mud at work and being macho, I thought, hey, my truck can pull it out. After taking the time to properly hook it up and make sure we were safe, the towing commenced. When the metal handlebars ripped, a jagged metal projectile was sent careening at my windshield. All I could do is lean over flat on the bench seat wait for the crashing of glass. The windshield was spared but the hood of the truck was scratched and dented. And that’s how I turned it in when the lease expired.
Editor’s note: I witnessed this firsthand. Craig’s big ol’ truck with a mangled mass of steel embedded on the hood. Stunned coworkers all around in stunned silence. The big vein in Craig’s reddening neck beating like a drum. He was biting his lip so hard, I was just waiting for a trickle of blood. I’m betting my cackling laughter didn’t help the situation very much. What an awesome sight to see.
Next was a trade-in purchase from my uncle Denny that worked out fairly well. (Here it must be said that I’ve learned to purchase vehicles from him when possible considering he doesn’t drive anywhere, and at the time he was working, the drive was a mere 6 miles roundtrip. Even with the occasional ventures up north, he turns his leases in with 20,000 miles or less on them. He was more a babysitter for it than anything so it was like buying a new truck. The smell of old man barely dented the new car smell.) It was a Chevy three-quarter-ton 4×4, extended cab, full bed and this one included the towing kit, so no more problems there.
But it was determined that when we moved out to Podunk and with a baby on the way, something bigger was needed to not only meet the needs of my growing family, but accommodate the loads I was moving and handle the larger trailer we had recently purchased. (Incidentally, this trailer was a 31-foot Terry nicknamed ‘The Hilton’ by Jeffrey – more on that in Part II next week.) Let it be said that I had been a Chevy man all my life and grew up in a Chevy family. My Dad put in 37 years for “The General†or “Generous Motors†as loyalists have come to know GM.
Then I made the jump to Ford. (I still get flack for it to this day, but they gave me good trade value and the price was right where we wanted to be.) The truck was an F-250, 4×4 (of course), three-quarter-ton with the big crew cab. Good size, ample room for family and towing was a breeze. Needless to say, during hunting, I was the one that drove to the bar on our deer camp fieldtrips. It’s also ideal for post-bar joyriding on the way back.
Unlike Denny’s situation and the resulting low mileage, living on the edge of humanity comes at the cost of miles quickly adding up (100,000 and counting). I was born with an irrational fear (which I always have with high mileage vehicles – I don’t know if it’s old school, superstitious, experience, logic, or common sense that makes me think this way, maybe a little of all – that problems are inevitably on the way and I’m living on borrowed time. So it was determined by my wife and me that a new truck was needed. Now, there were some things that I had to agree on like “This is the last one for quite a while,†since I am notorious for wanting the newest and the best and my wife “was the next in line for something newâ€. I had built this one online and ordered it new from the factory. The last and current truck to date is, what I like to call ‘Road Hog’, or ‘ Road King’, an F-350 4×4, crew cab, one-ton, full bed. Dennis likes to say I drive it like a big rig, wide turns and all. Uncle Dave likes to say it’s just a truck on steroids. All that said, it does what I need it to do and tows what I need it to tow.
Editor’s note: “Truck on steroids,†is fitting because I regularly insist Craig is compensating for something when he buys these oversized testosterone machines. Maybe it’s a chicken-or-the-egg discussion when comparing little men to their big trucks.
Check back in next week for Part II of the Grizzly Woodsman and his man-crush on trucks and trailers.
If you enjoy The Grizzly Woodsman, please check in regularly with Canon Fodder and sample some of our other writers. And remember to pass CF on to friends, family and coworkers.