I had the same car god karma with a buddy of mine.
Myself and about 13 other friends grabed our gear on a hot friday afternoon and took out, 8 off-road worth trucks, about 2 hours away from home to Hungry Valley OHV for a camping trip. We had the following on board: Explorer, Cherokee, F-150, Blazer, 2 Sierras, and 2 Rangers.
We got there and of course all the big camp sites were taking by the smallest groups, while we had 13 people.
So we unpack our stuff. Got the fire going and relaxed after the long haul through LA's finest friday afternoon traffic. Talked about plans for the morning. We decided we would head over to the 4x4 off-road practice area in the morning to mess around.
Later that night my buddy decided he wanted to find the mud pit in the 4x4 area. So him and another friend set off into the night in search of the pit. About a half an hour later i get a call. Hes stuck. So i grabbed my tow straps and off into the night me and another friend went. Luckly i had 2 ProComp 130 Watt driving lights to light up the scence when we got there.
My friend had tryed to drive in the jeep entrance, we called it because it was steep and deep. Lucky he was stuck on his running boards with just the bumper of the blazer in the water. His rear end was about 3 feet in the air. So we hooked him up and pulled him out and had a good laugh while other splashed in the mud with there trucks.
We went back to camp and laughed about it some more then went to sleep. We woke up the next morning a good breakfast in the dryest weather ever. Then we all decided to go to the spot where our friend with the blazer got stuck. My buddy and i leave early. He was in his ranger i was in my X.
We get there before everyone else and he takes his ranger straight into the pit. As i watched, he was doing fine in 4H and then all i see in the front end of the ranger take a dive for the worst. The front end of the ranger went completly under water. Then the worst part came. I watch him panic and throw it into reverse and listen to the engine suck in a mouth full of muddy water into her heart. That was the end for the 2001 4.0L V6. He had hydro-locked the right 3 cylinders.
We pulled the spark plugs and drained the oil. The oil didn't even look like oil, it looked like the stuff he had just driven through. We turned it over without the plugs and fresh oil. Then we drained the oil and replaced it with more fresh oil(trying to clean it out). Then got new plugs in her. No go. So we go to plan B. Keep in mind this is a 4 day old USED truck that he had just got and the fact that we are 2 hours away from home.
So plan B was to rent a trailer and tow it home. Non of us were 25 so that idea was dropped. So we called AAA and they sent us a tow truck, but they wouldnt drive into the park. So we had to tow it with tow straps to the front (About 5 miles). We put it on the back of the truck and I followed the truck to the nearest ford dealer where the new engine was put in for a nice small $6000!!! AHHH!!!
After all that we packed up and cut our loss' and journeyed home. 4 of the 8 cars that went needed new transmissions after that trip.
Hungry Valley is the right name for it, cause it was so hungry it ATE all our cars!
But this event was a learning expierence and hasn't stopped me from playing in the dirt!
