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A K5 Blazer and a farm pasture

Iwas fumbling around my office the other day and found an old photo of my K5 Blazer taken in one of the pastures near our family farm in northern Illinois. The date stamp on the back says it was taken in April 1986. To a photo critic it’s an unremarkable image. The subject is too far away and the light wasn’t very good. But when I found the photo after more than three decades, it flipped a switch in my old 58-year-old brain and I couldn’t help but smile when I thought of all the hours I spent wheeling in those rolling pastures. Typically, I can’t remember where I leave a wrench, but after all the years I could recall the small-block sounds coming from the tips of the Blazer’s dual exhaust and I could almost feel the crisp temperatures on that spring day.

As wheelers, I think we all have that Great Memory of off-roading. For me, wheeling the pastures around the farm is my Great Memory. The K5 and I spent a lot of time in those pastures, often within sight of at least the tip of the farm’s silo, sometimes sharing space with cattle. Some folks would look at the pastures and say there’s no good wheeling there. As a matter of fact, I had friends say that, so I invited them out to wheel. They soon found that the pastures may have looked docile from a distance, but actually held some challenging obstacles. Some of the obstacles grabbed 4x4s so well they had to be rescued with the International 706 tractor.

I learned a lot about wheeling in those pastures, like how to finesse the big Blazer up ledges and the correct speed needed to ascend various heights of hillclimb. One of the pastures held two very old quarries that in the mid- to late-1800s provided stone for a variety of things, including local farmhouse foundations, a farmhouse, a large barn, and a one-room schoolhouse (all of which are still standing). The walls of these quarries were steep and littered with loose and fixed rocks and I learned much from ascending and descending them in the Blazer. In the pastures I learned about how soil consistency and moisture content affect traction. I wheeled those pastures in all four seasons, so I learned that snow could fill small ravines and stop a 4x4 cold. I learned to “read” snowdrifts on uneven ground to gauge depth. I learned to really “see” the various angles of the terrain, pair that info with the conditions, and adjust my K5’s route accordingly. I learned that the greasy mud that forms on top of frozen ground as spring day temperatures warm can leave a 4x4 spinning its wheels, helpless to move. I learned about off-camber pucker factor when the Blazer tipped precariously close to its roll point when I took the wrong line.

As mentioned, I also got stuck from time to time. I didn’t mind because I then got to learn about vehicle recovery. I learned that the momentum of blasting into an enormous snow drift could sometimes get the K5 to the other side (and it was fun), but often it just got the machine stuck. Once I learned that trying to wildly throttle out of a deep drift can cost a front driveshaft U-joint and contribute to transmission failure. Several times I found that if I shoveled snow long enough a big Blazer will drive out of a snowdrift under its own power. And several times I found that the walk from the pasture to the farm to get a tractor took much longer than it took to drive to the pasture.

My brain is a bit foggy after all these years, but I do remember a bit about the day this photo was taken. It was one of the first days of spring when the snow was completely gone, and warmer daytime temperatures were gaining a foothold even though the wind was still cold.

The ground was no longer frozen, nor was it a sloppy mess. It was one of those days when you realized winter was over and warm days were around the corner. This is a big deal for many folks in the snowbelt.

I’ve aged quite a bit since that photo was taken and the K5 is long gone, but I still have a house on that farm. The pasture where this photo was taken isn’t used for grazing cattle anymore, but it’s virtually unchanged. It’s been a while since I’ve been in that pasture, but the old photo of the K5 has me thinking it’s about time to point a 4x4 in that direction and explore.

QThe date stamp on this photo of my K5 Blazer says it was taken in April 1986. It was snapped during one of my many wheeling forays into the pasture where I honed off-road skills.

–KEN BRUBAKER

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