This is the story of Roo, my 1999 3rd Gen Toyota 4Runner SR5.
I affectionately named her Roo because, as I was searching for T4R build ideas in 2012 and 2013, I stumbled upon an ARB product video on YouTube in which an Aussie described “when you’re driving through the bush at a high rate of speed, it’s inevitable that a roo (kangaroo) will jump in front of you and ruin your day. But, you’ve got an ARB bull guard bumper, so you can plow right through and not be stranded in the Outback, mate!”
I purchased Roo for about $5,000 cash in Oct 2013. After nursing my 2004 Honda Civic for several months, it blew a head gasket on Floyd Hill on I-70. On the way home (limping the Civic), I stopped at Stevenson Toyota and found Roo on the used car lot. They played a bit of hardball and claimed another guy had just put down a deposit, so I decided to head home and find another truck another day. Roo had 184,000 miles on her, and I knew Meg would be concerned about buying such an old truck. While having dinner with Meg that evening, the dealership called back and said the other guy’s financing fell through, and it was mine if I wanted. I topped off the coolant in the Civic, stopped at the car wash to clean off the coolant, and headed back to Golden.
I parked the Civic in the darkest spot on the lot that evening and hoped to get at least $500 for it as a trade-in. Ironically, they gave me $2,500 and said they couldn’t do more because it had dirty seats covered in dog hair (thanks, Zena - lol). I think the sales manager might have gotten fired the next day. That Civic had a visibly leaking sunroof, a blown head gasket, a primer’d and Bondo’d front quarter panel, and was well pin-striped underneath. Let’s just say that the Civic had passed Jeep’s on trails before.
Within the first few weeks of owning Roo, I replaced her rusting rear bumper and painted the new (cheap) aftermarket one flat black. I removed all of the chrome ascents, removed the running boards, and scheduled an appointment at Slee Offroad in Golden for a lift and front bumper install. Christo installed an ARB Old Man Emu 2.5” suspension lift and an ARB bull guard bumper. The lift immediately corrected the saggy rear end. My buddy, Mike, hooked me up with a deal on some new 31.5” Hancook Dynapro all-terrain tires, and I was off to the races. Roo started to look like a proper off-road vehicle.
About a year later, in 2014, a miracle brought my son, Bennett, into this world. After a very emotionally draining (and expensive) month at the Rocky Mountain Hospital for Children in Denver, I drove him and Meg home in Roo. Roo took Bennett to daycare and school for several years, along with his first camping trip, first backpacking trip, and first proper off-roading adventure.
One time, on the way to school, Bennett asked me why we didn’t have a fancy car like the Audi A8 in front of us. I joked that Roo was 1000x better, and so were my retirement accounts. I'm unsure he understood what I meant, but I hoped I could pass Roo on to him someday.
Roo took me on more adventures than I can recall and never left me stranded. She was my adventure buddy as we explored the state of Colorado together. We traversed the San Juans, including Cinnamon, Engineer, California, Hurricane, and Cork Screw passes several times together. We drove 3/4 of the way up Mt. Antero with Zena. We went winter backpacking several times, and she always started back up upon returning to those remote and desolate trailheads.
Although Roo never failed me on the road or in the backcountry, she wasn’t flawless—no truck is. Roo taught me how to replace a CV axle and lower ball joints. No, they didn’t fail, but the CV boot did, and I figured it was worth the effort to knock that out while I had the front end apart.
In the roughly ten years of ownership, I also had to replace the steering rack, master brake cylinder, and at least one injector. A professional shop did all of that, but I regularly changed the oil and transmission fluid and bled the brakes once a year.
Around 2020, I decided to sand down the alloy OE wheels and paint them black. I should have done that years ago, as it was well worth the effort.
In 2021, I started to get serious about overlanding and wanted to take it to the next level. This was probably due to watching too much YouTube during the pandemic, but I wanted Roo to look good. I ordered 17” Toyota FJ steelies and put 33” tires on them. I also installed an RCI steel skid plate and had RSG Offroad in Golden weld on a pair of rock sliders.
Unfortunately, I ripped the stock roof rack off after accidentally backing into my garage with the Thule box still on top. The good news is that I had a Pinsu full roof rack two weeks later. I loved the look of that rack so much that I eventually put another one on the ‘21 5th-gen.
Roo started to see more frequent offroad trips now that I had more armor and clearance with the taller tires. We did Weston, Webster (easy Red Cone), Hancock, and Tin Cup Passes in 2021 and 2022. I hit 250,000 miles at some point in 2022 and took Bennett, my father-in-law, Jim, and my nephew, Nick, on the full Alpine Loop from Silverton that summer. I acquired an ARB air compressor and regularly aired down the 33’s.
I dinged up the rear bumper on Hancock Pass in early 2022, and later that summer, I was pulling into the local Home Depot. A random guy approaches me and asks me where I got that cool custom rear bumper. I looked at him, told him aisle 8 (the spray paint section), and laughed. He couldn’t believe it was an OE bumper that had been painted and banged up by the trail.
On December 29th, 2022, I planned on heading up to A-Basin to meet my buddy, Jed, for a powder day. We had received a few inches of snow in Denver, and the mountains had received at least a foot. Being a weekday, I didn’t expect many problems, but boy, was I wrong.
Around 7a, I was on I-70 westbound in Golden when a Dodge Ram 3500 swerved on the icy highway and hit the rear bumper of a UPS trailer parked on the shoulder. The Dodge spun sideways, and I impacted it at a high rate of speed. I honestly thought I wasn’t going to make it out alive. I recall thinking, “Well, it’s been a good 46 years…”. I thought I was going to flip, and God knows what else.
Luckily, Roo didn’t flip, and nobody hit me from behind. Still in shock, I slid into the shoulder in front of the UPS truck. The airbags hadn’t deployed, and I was sitting there in shock. One of the UPS drivers ran up and knocked on my window to see if I was okay. I realized I was indeed okay and checked if Roo was leaking fuel. The ARB bull guard bumper took most of the impact, and the truck was still somewhat drivable.
Oddly enough, the Dodge drove off. Roo must have left my license plate numbers imprinted in the Dodge’s driver-side door, but whatever. The driver probably didn’t have insurance or was under the influence of something. I limped Roo home and started the arduous process of filing an accident report and insurance claim.
It wasn’t until later that day that I fully realized what had happened. A flood of emotion overcame me when I realized Roo had saved my life. I tried finding that ARB YouTube video from back in 2013 but couldn’t find it anywhere. ARB changed its marketing approach and removed all of its older YouTube content. It wasn’t a kangaroo that I hit, but something much worse, and Roo and the ARB bull guard bumper saved me. I was eternally grateful.
Roo had 254,000 miles on her when she was totaled. We shared 70,000 miles over those ten years. The ARB bumper took most of the impact and bent the front frame rails. I probably could have fixed her, but she would have had a branded salvage title and I didn’t want to bother with that.
After a month of fighting with insurance, I agreed to a settlement and repurchased the vehicle for its salvage value. Luckily, 3rd Gen 4Runners had appreciated significantly over the last ten years, and I felt fairly compensated from the insurance settlement. My buddy, Lee, bought it from me for the salvage value to harvest the engine and transmission for his 2nd Gen T4R. It felt like the right thing to do for Roo and a friend vs. sending it to a parts yard for somebody else’s profit.
Later that spring I had the opportunity to see Roo for the last time as Lee and his brother, John, pulled the engine and transmission out of her. It was great to see her one last time. Lee sold most of the salvageable parts and recouped the cost of buying it from me.
As I write this, in April 2024, I believe Lee is still preparing Roo’s engine to slide into his 2nd Gen.
Thank you, Roo, for the adventures we shared. I am eternally grateful that I’m still here today with Meg and Bennett after that fateful day in late Dec 2022.
You will be forever missed. Enjoy your 2nd life in Lee’s 2nd Gen…