I had to hike three 4500ft up these trails, set the cameras up, all the while making sure I didn’t break an ankle, twisted knee, or trash anything else. These trails are black diamond. These trails are made for lightweight off road vehicles. So why wouldn’t I bring a fully loaded overland 7000 pound land cruiser up them? What could possibly go wrong? So there I am on this enormous off road park.

Nobody’s around, nobody knows I’m here, and I have absolutely no cell phone service. So what do I do? I go look for the toughest track I could possibly find. And I found it. I don’t recommend that anybody goes off roading alone, but I’ve been doing it for a decade. It’s just what I do. The trails in the ozarks are intense. Huge rocks, trees everywhere, and running water. It’s an off roader’s dream come true.

The trails you’re looking at right now are simply the side roads to get to the extreme trails. Trees everywhere, enormous boulders absolutely everywhere. And it had poured rain the entire time except for a couple of breaks. This trail right here would be considered extreme by any stretch of the imagination. But it turns out this was just a warm up trail in the scheme of things. The trail that I found made this look like absolutely nothing.

So after a couple of hours of warm up trails, setting up cameras and dodging bigfoot, I found it. Trail number 19 450ft straight up. And it really looked like a trail I should not be on. So I did it. It’s almost impossible to catch the perspective or the angle, but these are extraordinarily large rocks. I mean, I can’t move either one of those with no cell phone service.

Nobody else knows I’m out here. Nobody else in the entire park. A trail labeled as a black diamond for buggies and truggies only. Why wouldn’t I take a 7000 pound land cruiser up it? I set up all my cameras, I took a couple of hits of my vape and I headed in. There was no turning back now. Literally, it was either go all the way up or call a helicopter to extract me.

There was nowhere to turn around. The only option would be to back down. This. These boulders are larger than my 36 inch tires. Keep that in mind. Even if you wanted to turn around, you couldn’t. You’d have to back down. So there was no place to go. But I was really regretting that there was nobody else to consult with, because left to my own devices, this is what I do.

Not only are you going straight up, climbing over three foot boulders on really loose gravel, but you have to thread the needle through the trees. The Ozarks was no joke. I’d never seen terrain like this, and I’ve been all over the United States now. This is where it got hectic. It was tight, incredibly steep, and super muddy. I’m totally committed right now. The truck is hugging the mud bank on the side.

The tires are filling with plague, and it’s just getting steeper and steeper. And just when I think I’m in the clear, she stumbles, lose forward momentum, and get stuck on some huge rocks, slamming me into a tree. Here’s where things got hectic. My forward momentum stopped. She started to go sideways, and I was pinned against the tree. I engaged the front and rear lockers, gave it some gas, and the marlin crawler did the rest.

This red clay is no joke with the mud grapplers. Pretty much throw it left a little there a little bit. As you can see, I was down in the valley, and now I’m up in the tree line. And make no mistake, Bigfoot is watching. Welcome back to another episode of Jailbreak overlander. I’m Richie, and this is jailbreak. And once again, I found myself in southern Missouri, pushing my truck through the tangled, overgrown trails of the Ozarks.

I was looking for a camping site that I had found once before. It was incredibly desolate and hard to find, but I made my way there. I was on a mission. Not only was I looking for the campground, I was also bound and determined to find and videotape poisonous snakes, water moccasins, cotton mouths, or copperheads. And that led me to the river. And you’re gonna want to see this, so sit here.

I was once again in the Ozarks, driving down a trail that looked like no one had been here in ten to 15 years. Pushing my truck through overgrown tangles of branches, vines, and steep, muddy inclines, only to be met by stream and river crossing after river crossing. Fortunately, it was summertime, and the water was fairly low. I pushed my truck through the woods like a seamstress pushes a needle through fabric.

It was no joke whatsoever. But I had to find this camping spot because I was bound and determined to get video of poisonous snakes. This was no easy task, believe me. I finally made my way to the campsite I was looking for. Skirted on one side by sheer cliffs and on the other by a trout filled river. If you were fast enough, you could literally pull a twelve inch trout out of that river with your bare hands.

It’s amazing. The water is a golden brown, clear as can be. And when the water’s high enough, it makes for a phenomenal swimming hole. Sadly, the water was fairly low right now, but still crystal clear. Before I started cutting campfire wood for the night, I decided to take a walk around. The sun was setting, and copperheads are notorious for warming themselves on rocks at night. And I wanted to see if I could locate one again.

Nobody comes to this area. It’s very, very desolate and a perfect place to find wildlife. And that’s exactly what I was hoping to find. I searched high and I searched low. I set up my bone valley saw and started banging out some firewood for the night. It was already incredibly hot, but I just feel a little more secure with a campfire going when you’re all alone in the middle of nowhere.

Like I was. The bosaw from Bone Valley just blows right through wood, no matter what size it is. And I cut up a lot of firewood. Now, for kindling, I use birch bark that I bring from the northeast and carry in a bag. Whether it’s freezing, raining, snowing, it doesn’t matter. Simply hit it with a lighter or a ferroceum rod. And this stuff goes right up like that, no problem.

Birch bark is fairly common. You can actually see it on a tree behind me. After searching for snakes, getting the camp ready, I set the fire and settled in for the night. This was my view. Waking up in my alucab rooftop tent first thing in the morning. It’s pretty amazing. But it was time to head back out and head for a stream. I had found out that there was a stream close by that I could go down in a kayak and would have a good chance of spotting wildlife.

So I was all about it. Now, I’ve used a kayak on the Atlantic Ocean, on many rivers and streams, and I didn’t think this was going to be a problem whatsoever at all. The water was very low. What could possibly go wrong? Nice and calm, nice and flat. And it’s only about seven inches deep right here. All is well, correct. Well, that’s going to change in a second and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

Fortunately, I have a gopro on my forehead, so you get to see it firsthand, just like I did. Here we go. I managed to get myself wedged under a tree limb and the kayak was filling with water rapidly again. I’m only in twelve inches of water, but I’m jammed sideways under a tree with the current trying to jam me. Even worse, I did everything I possibly could to get myself out of this log jam and finally just stood up and tipped the kayak back over and carried it over to the shore.

It was quite the godsmack, we’ll call it. After calming my nerves, I jumped back in the kayak and headed downstream. I only had it about another hour and a half of sunlight as sun was setting rapidly. The scenery was amazing. Tons of incredibly large soft shell turtles scurried along the bottom of the water. The cliff faces were beautiful. The birds, the insects. Everything was just amazing. I found numerous six to ten foot deep pools of water just like this.

Crystal clear, bright blue water, almost tropical. Just utterly amazing. And most people will never see this in their lifetimes. As it started getting closer to nightfall, I started noticing things in the water. You’ll see right here. I finally located a copperhead. This is about a three foot long snake with more than enough venom to put you in the hospital all day. It’s kind of crazy thinking that people swim in this stream and there’s poisonous snakes everywhere, but normally, if you don’t bother them, they won’t bother you.

There were caves speckled all over the cliff faces and beaches everywhere as the water was incredibly low. Seeing two foot, three foot alligator, gar pike was incredibly common, as were the softshell turtles, not to mention the beaver that would pop up here and there. It was awesome. It was just phenomenal. Everything I could possibly ask for. As I continued paddling downstream with one hand while using a camera to check underwater, more and more rocks began presenting themselves in the stream or the river.

And that’s when I started noticing them. About a half an hour till nightfall, I noticed a large water moccasin coiled up on top of a rock. And then on the next rock, I noticed a large copperhead. And then I began to notice that on top of all the rocks all around me were incredibly poisonous snakes. I had found them like this copperhead right here, just sitting there. I’m within a foot of these guys because I am that dumb.

I’ve loved wildlife since I was a child. And I have absolutely no fear of them. This is a four foot water moccasin that I paddled right up to. He was a big boy. And on this rock right here, there’s a copperhead sliding into the water. As you can see. Can see at the end of the day, they warm themselves on hot rocks. I am literally two foot away from this water moccasin.

I had wondered how it would be I’d be able to videotape these guys because they’re always moving so quickly. Well, this was the perfect way. This copperhead was just kind of hanging off the side of this rock. And remember, I’m at water level. Another copperhead. They were literally all around me. It was amazing. Utterly amazing. I had finally found the snakes I was looking for, and not one or two, but a good half dozen.

The sun finally went down and I realized I was surrounded by rocks with poisonous snakes in the dark. And it was time to find my way out of there, which I did. I love this stuff and I hope you enjoyed it as well. If you’d enjoyed this video as much as I enjoyed making it, make sure you subscribe. Hit that thumbs up and leave a comment below. I am out.

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