October 5, 2003
Hummer Happening: Fall Foliage
We got this invitation in the mail a few weeks ago for a Hummer Happening sponsored by our dealership. Seemed like a good opportunity to get out, meet some people, and take the family for a ride. I figured a few people might show. When we arrived this morning at the starting point, Hummers were descending from everywhere! When it was time to mount up and ride out, we counted a total of 30 Hummers lined up from start to tail! That is over 1.5 million in trucks — but who is counting. As we proceeded up I-70 to Idaho Springs, the line of Hummers dominated the highway. It was pretty funny to see people notice the first few. You could just hear them say “Hey, there is one of those Hummers…and another one…and another one….holy crap!”.
We left the highway at Idaho Springs and headed up “Oh My God” road. The road isn’t so worthy of the name anymore with the Hummer but its still a good uphill climb. It passes by a dozen old mining areas that were neat to see. The road ends up going over the mountain and then descends down into the town of Central City, home to Colorado’s casinos. I guess its an old mining back route from one valley to another over the mountain.
From there we headed out of town and up through the ghost town of Nevadaville. Outside of town, we played around in a large area that had some nice hills to practice climbing with the truck. This is one of the few pictures I got with my actual truck. Kim got tired of me asking her to get out and take a picture of me driving the truck up some other hill. Women do not understand. The other thing that struck Kim as funny was the fact that everytime the line of trucks came to some sort of dirt pile on the side of the road, we immediately drove over to it and over the top of it instead of just staying on the road.
After traversing over a few more ridges, we ended up at the trailhead for the Moffat Road. I rode this place yesterday on my ATV. Small world. Here we all are along the lake near the top.
There were lots of cool hills to climb on the way up. The H2 is impressive once you lock in. The tires never slip. Going down some of the hills was more fun because you feel your seat belt tighten and hold you in as gravity pulls you forward out of your seat. You would swear the back of the truck is going to come right over the top. When we reached Jenny Lake at the top, they had arranged for a fly fishing lesson for all 100 of us. Kim gave it a shot. Not pro material I must say. I still hate fishing.
After coming back down from the summit, we all went into Nederland to a dinner at the Black Forest. I need to give credit to MedVed, our Hummer dealer, and the Hummer folks. These guys weren’t satisfied to just take a page out of the playbook of other luxury cars dealers — they rewrote the book. As background, I remember when Kim got her Lexus, they sent us some fresh baked cookies days later as a thank you. Now the Humer folks, well they organized and paid for every aspect of this trip from the bagels for breakfast, to the boxed lunches with logoed carrying cases, to the fly fishing demonstration, to the route planning, to the cool keychains, to the nice dinner afterwards, and to the many prizes they gave out along the way. These folks really go out of their way to make a community of happy owners even after they have gotten your money. My hats off to them. Job well done! Except, they didn’t wash my truck when the day was over.
Oh and by the way, the next big event is in February and you guess what — its ice driving! They take the Hummers out on a frozen lake near Georgetown and do winter driving training. That is going to be a fun ride! Kim said her baby Sydney is not going to die falling in some lake so I need a co-pilot!
