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A friend of ours from Houston drove up to my house a couple weeks ago and we headed up to the UP. Once we got there we stopped for pasties and ate them at a park along Lake Michigan on the edge of town. A younger guy stopped on his motorcycle and asked about the Impreza, we talked Subarus for a bit. He had just imported a 99 STI from Japan. It's funny to me, ever since I got this Impreza I've gotten a lot more questions and had a lot more people taking pictures of the car than with the other Subarus. Not sure how much of that is people's love of first gen Imprezas and how much is the fact that you don't see many turn of the century Subarus driving around anymore. We drove up to the campground along the reservoir in the southern UP. M and B showed up later. Friday we went to the rapids and then hit the mini banked oval. There was a snapping turtle at the edge of the oval. Then we wandered up to the Baraga pipeline grade. We were all entertained as usual. Hit some of the sandy stunt areas nearby and a few of the side trails. Before we got to Houghton we were on a trail in the woods where we decided to turn around. I could not get the Forester out of the ruts so we eventually put a bunch of branches and sticks in the ruts and I was eventually able to get out. Then going back down the trail I was crabbing the Forester sideways for hundreds of feet before I finally got straightened out. Headed north to Houghton and then to Gay beach. M declared it the mother of all stunt areas. Drove much farther south than we had before after crossing a narrow spit of tailings along the lake. Did some side by side uphill jumps and then decided maybe we should leave while we still could. Checked out the mine building ruins, some good post apocalyptic flavor there. Temps were solid while driving on Gay beach which is a good test of high duty cycle and low speeds. Then they crept up in the woods and we discovered one of the fan fuses was blown. The passenger side fan would turn most of the way pretty easily but there was one spot in the rotation it would get stuck. We eventually figured out there was a tiny pebble(?) stuck to the outer ring of the fan blades. We were eventually able to get it off and replaced the fuse. Later we noticed it had a slight coolant leak. We tracked this down to the small welds on the underhood heater core that attach the mounting flange to the end tanks. Rerouted the heater hoses to the stock configuration. Got up to the top of the cliff along Cliff drive. I had parked a few hundred feet back from the first overlook and when I was walking back to my car a UTV was coming up. I heard the driver blurt out “what the f--k?” when he saw the Impreza. He told me he knows people who won't take their Jeeps up the rocky climb we took to get to the top. I then walked back to the overlook and he said the same thing to the other guys. We drove to the next overlook and hard parked on the edge for some pictures. The yoopers showed up again and we talked to them for a while. “This isn't what most people from Illinois do when they come up here” one of them says while holding out his pinky finger. They had both seen different UFOs and had some story about a cave nearby that no one could find with a wall of silver and a bag of gold coins. I believed the UFO stories more. We camped at the overlook. Saturday morning we headed up to Brockway Mountain. As we pulled on to the long road going there we were proceeded by three extremely slow drivers. We pulled off on a side trail rather than test our patience following them the whole way there. This trail eventually led to a very sketchy bridge but we managed to cross it. I think it was in this area I checked one muddy stretch on foot and it didn't seem too bad so I drove through it, but I was barely able to do so and then the ruts were deeper and softer. So I told B he shouldn't come through and I didn't want to go back through so worst case we come back to that spot in a half hour. Fortunately we were able to maintain radio contact and I was able to drive around the block so to speak and meet back up with them. We eventually found a different way out of the area. At one point the temps had started to creep up in the Impreza again and a fan fuse was blown. This one was probably from the fans running while driving in deep water, we replaced it and never had the problem again. We eventually got up to Brockway Mountain from the other side. After we'd been on trails for quite a while and got back to pavement B said the Forester was shaking quite a bit. Turned out all the LR lugnuts on his Forester were loose and one was missing. We tightened down the ones we could and continued. From there we did a little more trail riding and buzzed up to the beach to camp for the night. At camp B swapped out his wheel studs on the LR hub as most of them were somewhat damaged or packed full of aluminum. Sunday we started heading back on various trails. One of them eventually became deeply rutted and I didn't think I could get through without taking off a mirror so we turned around. We came to a fairly long and deep water crossing where beavers had flooded a road. There was a muskrat swimming in it when we pulled up. I walked it and it was just below knee deep for a couple hundred feet. I drove through it in the Impreza after we removed the fan fuses. There was water over the front of the hood for a good portion of the crossing and we realized we should have stuck the gopro on. B crossed it in the Forester and then we put the gopro on the Impreza and I crossed it back the way we came and then back again to proceed. At the top of the hill right next to the stream was a cool old furnace of some kind. Later we found the beaver dam that was flooding that road. The highlight of the day was probably discovering and climbing Mt Houghton. Probably the most intimidating rocky climb we accomplished that weekend (ever in the UP?) and one of the best views in the UP once we made it to the top. Got gas and water at the Lac La Belle resort. Cashier was using binoculars to read the mechanical gas pumps. Found a silly hillclimb along the border of a wildlife sanctuary that M almost convinced me to try but ultimately we decided it should wait for a different weekend. Buzzed down to Lake Linden to camp that night so J could take a shower and we'd be closer to the portage. Monday morning we took the Bill Nichols trail basically all the way from South Range to Adventure Mountain with a few detours and stops for some stunt areas and mines along the way. M and J enjoyed the Firesteel trestles and the lookout near the top of Adventure mountain and we headed back from there. The trail west out from the Adventure mountain climb was rough and narrow but we made it through with some extra dents in the rockers and floorboards. Stopped near the end of that trail to air up and eat PB&Js. We drove down to Watersmeet together and the Impreza seemed to have some high frequency vibration that didn't go away when I put the clutch in. Cleaned some dirt out of the wheels when we stopped for gas but that didn't help. Stopped again and discovered two of the driveshaft bolts were missing from the pinion flange. I had looked before but those two must have been up. Installed some bolts and tightened them all down and had a smooth ride home. Could only run the AC intermittently on the way home or the coolant temp would creep up. Overall a good weekend, cooling issues with the Impreza are still frustrating but we all had a good time. J and M were impressed with the Impreza, especially the EZ36. J definitely enjoyed the UP and quickly got in the groove of following overgrown trails (with a surprisingly high success rate of connecting to other trails this weekend). M said it was probably his favorite off road trip we've taken, no major malfunctions, lots of stunt areas, lots of overgrown trails (which he likes). Removed the radiator after we got home and it seemed clean. I had sprayed it off at the car wash but that's usually not too effective. So I'm still a bit surprised the car was running hot on the highway. We did check the overflow at least once when it was hot and still have never seen air bubbles. After spraying the condenser out from the back with a hose wand it did become clear that a lot of the fins on it are bent over. We did go through a lot of brush so it's probably from the fan blades spinning leaves and twigs against the condenser. Should be getting a replacement today, hopefully that brings the temps back under control. Also got a pair of 80s Ford Econoline heater cores I plan on putting where the extra heater core is now for more cooling capacity.

oil pressure sending unit