Meet Sable

I bought an off-road truck before I’d ever driven anything off-road. This is it: Sable, a black 2015 Toyota 4Runner Trail Premium. The blog is about turning it into a proper overland rig, and turning me into someone who knows what to do with one.

Sable above treeline, parked next to the “Tundra Closed” sign.

Where this started

Not on a Colorado trail. It started in Kruger National Park in South Africa, where I stayed at Jock Safari Lodge and spent two days in the back of a modified Toyota Land Cruiser.

I was having a blast within a few minutes. There’s nothing like riding a dirt trail with nothing between you and the bush, eyes darting around for anything that moves.

About thirty minutes in, the ranger, a haggered guy named Thabo born and raised within a couple dozen miles of where we were, spotted a leopard and went after it. He left the road and drove over brush, rocks, tree roots and through streams, wherever the hell he wanted, as long as the leopard was there.

That leopard, on the first evening drive.

The next morning we heard lions being territorial, and he did it again. He followed the sound until we had a view I still can’t quite believe.

It didn’t click for years. Then I was planning a hike and realized my car couldn’t get to the trailhead, at least not safely or easily. I thought about that Land Cruiser.

Colorado has fewer lions. It does have thousands of miles of dirt roads to places a regular car can’t reach, and I wanted a truck that could get me there.

Why a ten-year-old truck

I wanted something capable that would last a long time, but not something new. A new truck is a truck you baby. I want to scrape this one on rocks and pack it full of muddy gear without wincing every time a branch drags down the side. A 2015 already got its first scratches from someone else.

The rest are on me.

The 5th gen made the choice easy. Toyota built it for fifteen model years, 2010 to 2024, without changing much, so there’s a deep pool of parts, forums, and people who’ve already solved whatever problem I’m about to have. It’s body-on-frame, with a 4.0L V6 (the 1GR-FE) and a 5-speed automatic. Neither is exciting. Both have a reputation for running a very long time.

Trail is the off-road trim for 2015, and its hardware is the reason to buy one used: a locking rear diff, KDSS, A-TRAC, CRAWL Control and Multi-Terrain Select. KDSS is a big part of why the same truck can daily drive and crawl. It also complicates any future lift, which is a problem for later me and a post for later.

Mine came with about 140,800 miles, all-terrain tires in good shape, and a black SofTex interior.

I’d been browsing trucks for a few months, never seriously. My one hard requirement was a locking rear diff, and I didn’t need a TRD Pro to get one, or the markup that comes with it. Then a few things converged. I got a job, I was offered more than I expected for my Mazda, and this truck popped up meeting every requirement. Trucks like it go quickly in Colorado.

I didn’t wait.

One truck, every job

This is my only vehicle. It handles daily driving around Denver, trailhead runs, dispersed camping, overlanding trips, and the occasional technical trail. That’s the filter for everything on this blog. A mod that makes it a better rock crawler and a worse daily driver isn’t an upgrade. It’s a trade.

Why “Sable”

I wanted a name that suited a black truck without turning the truck into a theme. Sable does two jobs.

In heraldry, sable is the word for black. A black shield is “a field sable.”

It’s also an antelope. Male sable antelope are black, with long curved horns, and that half of the name is a quiet nod back to Kruger. I didn’t want an Africa theme on the truck itself (no safari names, nothing on the plate), but I did want the connection, ideally one nobody needed explained.

The badge puts both halves together: a shield, a sable antelope, and a ridge of Colorado peaks.

The blog is SableRunner: the truck’s name plus the “Runner” from 4Runner.

What happens here

Part build log, part record of how I make decisions. Some posts will be what I did this weekend. Others will be how I chose between three options and what I got wrong. The build runs in phases, from making sure a 140,000-mile truck has no hidden problems through trail readiness, armor, camping, power, and eventually self-recovery.

Next up is the plan, in seven phases. For a guy who bought an off-road truck without ever going off-road, it starts in the right place.

Phase one involves no dirt.