2017 Colorado/Moab trip report

GONOVRIT · Sep 26, 2017

At 4pm on August 31st Austin Claytor(@SPOA87YJ , my wife Melissa and I left our house for Rangely,CO....over 1500 miles away. We started out with my buggy loaded in front of Austins jeep on our new 28' Kauffman trailer. I was driving the first leg and noticed the trailer wagging. We made it to Knoxville before I couldn't take it anymore and we stopped and rearranged the rigs on the trailer. Much to my relief this fixed that issue.

Austin had the wheel next and had the pleasure of driving through the remnants of hurricane Harvey all the way from the east side of Nashville into Illinois. That was a lot of rain for hrs on end.

Melissa got the late shift and had some clear weather and good roads.

All was good until we hit bumper to bumper Friday traffic @2:30pm on the east side of Denver. This along with pulling over to let the trans cool in the truck delayed us well over 3hrs, Much to my dismay. We stopped in Rifle, CO for a quick sit down dinner around 8pm. We finally got to the Blue Mountain inn in Rangely@10:45pm. I was happy and exhausted. I managed to get less than an hr of sleep since 5:30am the previous day.

Tom@Hilltop_Machine · Sep 26, 2017

^^^^^^^^^
Looks like going to Murphy to wheel Tellico back in the day.

kaiser715 · Sep 26, 2017

More! More! Type faster!

GONOVRIT · Sep 26, 2017

Sept. 2cnd

We caught up with our friends Matt and Ashely from the Denver area. Matt had wheeled Rangely before and was looking forward to showing us the place. We drove maybe a half mile from the hotel before we hit some winding dirt roads and found a place to park. No gate here, no fees or posted rules, just pull off and start wheeling! Matt had picked up a map of the place at a store to show us our options. It seamed nearly useless to me as the trails had signs at the beginning but no specific line to follow for the most part, pick your poison. We got to the first obstacle on the first trail. With Matts experience and water in his tires he made it fairly clean. Next up Austin, he flopped, welcome to Colorado! I gave it a good effort but rolled over. Finally doing significant damage to the custom hood that @MarsFab built, sad moment! The rest of the day went well as we got used to the traction. There are lots of big climbs with huge amounts of pucker factor here as well as trails that will twist you up and have you carrying a tire trough the air. We wheeled until dinner time even though the temp was over 100 degrees.

I
Got super lucky and found reverse here.

Notice the road behind/below Austin here?!?!

Paul · Sep 26, 2017

@GONOVRIT
I hate you as a person.
More pics please!

GONOVRIT · Sep 26, 2017

More Rangely pics.

After walking to a Mexican restaraunt for dinner and cervezas we walked over to the Main st. Pub. Rangely is a tiny town and this was the only bar. With the rodeo in town EVERYONE was there. We were waiting to be served at the bar when I noticed a cowboy standing beside a sign that said "spit cups". I wanted a picture and thought I could sneak one, but forgot to turn my flash off! Oops! Hey everybody!!! We had a fun night :lol:

Pappy · Sep 28, 2017

I have family in rangley. I have been there a few times. The wheeling is awesome there. Awesome to see you having a good time.

GONOVRIT · Sep 28, 2017

Another note I need to add about the Pub. They were serving raw steaks on a plate across the bar, you took it outside and grilled it yourself. I wish I'd known that before we had Mexican

orange150 · Sep 28, 2017

I've been to a place like that right outside of Yellowstone.
You walk up to the counter, order your cut of meat and sides. They give you your raw meat and you walk back to a big grill where everyone is standing around cooking. Once you're seated they brought you your sides.

Very cool. We got there via snowmobile.

StretchASU · Sep 28, 2017

orange150 said:
I've been to a place like that right outside of Yellowstone.
You walk up to the counter, order your cut of meat and sides. They give you your raw meat and you walk back to a big grill where everyone is standing around cooking. Once you're seated they brought you your sides.

Very cool. We got there via snowmobile.

Same kind of place in San Diego as well in the Gaslamp District. I thoroughly enjoy turning in expense reports with "The Strip Club" on it to our accountant.

GONOVRIT · Sep 29, 2017

Sept. 3rd

We got up early and started our drive straight to Area BFE just outside Moab. Headed south on hwy 139 @65mph we hit a large dip in the road in a right hand curve, being as tongue heavy as we were this sent at least the right front of the truck airborne, we heard the tire chirp when it landed! I almost needed to change my shorts! Then a large flock of turkeys crosses the road in front of Matt who had to hit the brakes hard to avoid them. I'm glad we had some good distance between us there.

Now we had to climb Douglas Pass at 8,240ft. No biggy right? Well this was a 2 lane rd with switch backs and big brown obstacles....free range cattle. We had to let out of the gas for them a few times, too close for comfort. We stopped at the top of the pass at a lookout to let the trucks cool and take some pics.

It was fast approaching 100 degrees when we got to BFE. Our truck trans was getting warm on the pull in(rough, uphill dirt rd) so we unloaded the trailer and drove everything in. We waited to load the trailer at the pavement on our way out. We hit Helldorado first. All of us got up the trail cleanly and made the waterfall on our first attempt. Once Austin cleared the top we realized his PSC reservoir had exploded. While we were fixing that the guys from Moab 4x4 came up behind us. Rory Irish put on a show in his home built buggy when he took the left line of the waterfall and made it with no winching or rear steer. It was awesome to see. The hole below has gotten really deep and if he would have fell completely in it would have been REALLY bad. Only other issue we had was our fuel cell vents puking. Austins gas was getting hot enough his jeep wouldn't run. We gave his cell some shade with Melissa's umbrella for the rest of the day. In all we ran Helldorado, Green Day, Britney Spears, suicide hill and various ledges.

That night we hit the pizza buffet at Zax and then to the Moab Brewery. There we saw Rory and sent a beer over to him for the line of the day!

GONOVRIT · Sep 29, 2017

More BFE pics

XJfreakHO · Sep 29, 2017

Sounds like an awesome trip. Wanting to plan a similar trip in the next year or two once my rig is better dialed in lol

lockedup5 · Oct 1, 2017

Area BFE is bad ass!! I was there back the end of May. The two of us that rode that day rode every thing but helldorado. It was actually blocked by some idiots running it backwards and he had his hood stuck up under the hanging rock. Although I did the Gate Keeper. Brittany Spears was pretty good but short.
Green Day had some wicked little crevices.
My favorite part of the day was Pucker Pass. I think it was on Suicide Hill. It definitely stood up to it's name. Did you run Pucker Pass?

GONOVRIT · Oct 1, 2017

I don't think we did, I've never even heard of it. We got some information about a new trail there that should be opening up this winter that sounds pretty intense. Enough to make me want to go back next year For the sole purpose of running it.

lockedup5 · Oct 1, 2017

GONOVRIT said:
I don't think we did, I've never even heard of it. We got some information about a new trail there that should be opening up this winter that sounds pretty intense. Enough to make me want to go back next year For the sole purpose of running it.

Pretty sure it was at the top of suicide hill. Suicide Hill was just down below Brittany Spears to the right correct?
Just an obstacle in the trail but there was a bypass down below

braxton357 · Oct 1, 2017

lockedup5 said:
Pretty sure it was at the top of suicide hill. Suicide Hill was just down below Brittany Spears to the right correct?
Just an obstacle in the trail but there was a bypass down below

You just making up trail names right now ain't u big dog.

GONOVRIT · Oct 1, 2017

I see it now. We did that years ago but not this trip.

I'm hoping to finish posting this trip by the end of the year :rolleyes:

lockedup5 · Oct 1, 2017

braxton357 said:
You just making up trail names right now ain't u big dog.

Uh nope. All trail names at BFE

lockedup5 · Oct 1, 2017

Yeah pucker pass is on Dropkick.
Look forward to reading more.
Did you happen to do the Devils hot tub?

GONOVRIT · Oct 2, 2017

lockedup5 said:
Yeah pucker pass is on Dropkick.
Look forward to reading more.
Did you happen to do the Devils hot tub?

Not this time. We've ran hells revenge on a previous trip though.

GONOVRIT · Oct 29, 2017

September 4th.

We decided to run something we hadn’t in a while and set out for rusty nail(think that’s what it was). Never found it after driving around for a couple hrs and decided to head back and run Pritchett Canyon before it got too late. Just before the very last climb Austin and I both ran out of gas! It was over 100 degrees and our fuel was puking and evaporating out of our vents quicker than we realized. Thank goodness Matt topped off his tank at lunch. We took my vent line off my cell and ran it into Matt’s tank. Hooked jumper cables to a spare e2000 and we were crawling again in no time. Our friend Jeremy Dickenson of Johnson City stopped in to hangout with us that night after working an Ultra 4 event in Reno, NV. We closed down the Blu Pig that night.

GONOVRIT · Dec 18, 2017

Sept 5th

We rolled out of Moab after an early breakfast headed for Montrose, CO. Chris Halvorson got up practically in the middle of the night and drove in from Colorado Springs to wheel with us. After 2 straight yrs of wheeling Montrose the only trail I hadn’t done was Boulder Canyon. This trail is on an opposite side of the BLM land so we all towed over to a parking area near the trail head.

We drove down into a Canyon, Rounded a few trees looked up and BAM! It was obvious why they named this trail Boulder Canyon and it looked like we were in for some fun! I got out and walked about a 100 yds in to get an idea of the lines with Matt then we got started with him leading the way.

Matt flopped into a nasty pinch point that took some time and 2 winches to get him back on all 4. Chris was the only one to make the first sketchy climb. I had to replace a power steering pump halfway through the trail(glad I had that and the necessary tools to change it with us). None of us made the exit without winching. Chris was probably the closest to making it before he flopped. In all it was an awesome day. It took 4 well built rigs 6-7hrs to complete this trail that is around 3/4 of a mile long.

GONOVRIT · Dec 18, 2017

More Bolulder pics.

While we were on the trail one of our crew was texting Melissa to see how the trip was going. He was supposed to be with us but had to go to another continent on a mission for Uncle Sam on short notice. The girls decided to send him a scenic pic along with the wheeling ones :smokin: