Well, another great Wudi trip in the books. Wudi X in
was better than the ice storm at Wudi 8! The bad part about
the weather on this one was that there was a big ice storm
to our north in
weather get in the way of a long planned ride like this, and
we sure missed not having everyone.
I got to
they were helped folks find their way in. Terry and Rick
from the USFS showed up about 3:PM as they promised and we
cut down a few trees to aid parking and driving around in the
camp area. And that really helped traffic flow, IMO.
Most or all of that green lumber was piled on the fires the
next few nights. Burns well on a good fire, much to my
surprise.
No one else showed up Wednesday. I wasn't really expecting
anyone so no big surprise there. I burned a Ribeye, settled
in with some Leiny's Creamy Dark ale and plugged Vin
Diesel's "Pitch Black" Riddick flick into the laptop's DVD
player. Maybe not a good choice when alone in a dark forest,
but I survived it.
I was still the only one in camp at sunrise so I cooked up
the normal bacon, eggs and coffee thing and went to work on
the road into camp. I knew some of the folks were talking
about bringing Class C's and the road is kind of sketchy.
It's really an old forest road that winds back 1/3 of a mile
or so from the trail head to camp. It has water bars and
lots of face slappers. With all the rain, it had a bunch of
deep looking puddles. So I took a shovel and drained all
the puddles as best I could and cut back the sides with a
machete. Worked up a sweat, but it was much better when I
got done.
I did a bunch of jetting runs on that road with my 08 KTM
250XC-We. Gotta' love that happy button on a 2 stroke!
Anyway, I had 4 needles I wanted to try and finally settled
on one for the weekend, which worked great for me.
Outhouse's were delivered shortly after that, with the first
MN group closely following them in. Coincidence? I think
not! :-) Those guys camped out near the trail head, though.
So we agreed to a ride after lunch.
I took them on some relatively easy trails to start, but it
got progressively harder. Overall the trails were pretty
easy, but some of the uphills in the wet conditions were
kind of hard for them dern flatlanders. Sorry about that
guys! At the end, Tim and I were the only ones that wanted
to go through the Schoolhouse Hollow back to camp. It's a
pretty technical hill climb to get out of there. So I sent
the rest of the group around on the road while we did a
little hill climbing. Tim's a very good rider. I told him
I'd say that if he didn't tell anyone about seeing me wash
the frontend in the mud and taking out my headlight shroud.
;-)
Jim and Deb Cook had arrived by the time I got back, as well
as Phil (MXPlipper) and one other group from MN, Steve,
Greg and Ray. It was beer and steak time again while those
guys setup. Chris (Wudscrasher) from Colorado came sliding
to a stop in his rental car shortly after that. He was too
smart to show us rednecks where the keys were, though. ;-)
We started a fire but then it started raining. Kind of let
off and then it rained pretty good for a while. Deb had
bought some zipup sidewall deal for their easy up at Wally
World and Jim, her, Phil, Chris and I holed up in there.
Worked awesome at keeping the heat in and the rain out. The
easy up canopy leaked a bit, though. So they were playing
poker with wet cards. Kind of fun to watch. I'm not a card
player at all so I just drank beer and lied about anything
I could think of.
Friday we finally started seeing more folks arrive over the
course of the day. Tal Isbell and his buddy Mike from
Atalanta; the Texas crew of Ev, Kieth and Cameron (3 of the
nicest guys you'll ever meet in your life) with Kieth's
new pop up camper; Jeff Nethry from KC with Mark and Ryon;
Dave Schriner, Paul Schromer and crew; Max; Jack Bondus;
Jim and his crew from MN; Josh Cook; Jeff Gaston; Jon R, on
crutches. I might have some of that wrong, but close
enough!
I took Tal and Mike out and we rode pretty much all the
trails there before and after lunch. They were riding really
well so we covered ground pretty well. Some of the rocks and
wet hills slowed them down a bit but that's okay, gave me
a chance to catch my breath. We picked up some more guys in
the group after lunch. I'm pretty sure it was Jeff, Steve,
Greg and Ryon came along and we did the trials trail. That
always happens to me on these rides, BTW. All the rides
tend to blend together and I forget who was in which groups.
So I apologize if I don't mention someone. Weather was
pretty good Friday, at least no rain to speak of.
After a goodly amount of miles for a BC day, it was, you
guessed it, steak and beer time again! Along with going
around and saying howdy to everyone. Tal and Mike were
staying in Russelville, so grocery poor. I threw some brats on
for them and gave them some of my desert bars. They said
"Jeb, you guided us around all day, showed us the good lines
on the hills, always waited when we had trouble and feed us
at the end of the day. If you were gay, you'd be getting
lucky tonight!". I thought the Vin Diesel movie was
scary! Made sure the trailer door was firmly locked when I went to
bed, I'll tell you that! :-)
The Bullet Proof Designs rig had pulled in late so it was
good to see those guys on Saturday morning. They make the
best radiator guards on the planet for a dirt bike, bar
none. http://www.bulletproofdesigns.com Jeff Gaston and I know
the trails around there pretty well so I took one group of
10 guys and he took another. We kind of wound all over the
place and put on a pretty good loop of the typical BC rocky
and hilly single track. Daniel Boone to Mt Man to the
Bottoms trail and them back to camp for lunch. Group kept up
pretty darn well for a group that size. And no major
issues with man or machine. Just had to let a little air out
of Kieth's new trials tire.
After lunch, we did a big loop starting at the Colorado
trail, through the Horseshoe trail area and ending up at the
backside of Schoolhouse Hollow/Copperhead. Some of the guys
decided to take the road around to camp and Mark, Jeff N,
Ryon and I went through Copperhead. That's a 1.6 mile, very
technical, almost all 1st gear trail that Gaston put in
last year. It's a very beautiful trail, but it's getting
kind of torn up right now. Still a lot of fun to do.
We picked up the rest of the group again at camp and headed
off for a brand new trail on John Mt. It was basically
just ribboned by Jim D. and not really ridden in yet. It's
7+ miles of single track winding up and down the mountain
side. Very cool trail, but a little slow going always
looking for that next marker. It'll be a blast once established.
Thanks for your hard work on that, Jim!
It was easy to get turned around in there and most of the
two groups that were in there, 22 riders, accidentally found
the shortcut out. I never even saw it. So they beat us back
to camp, which was a lot better than having them lost in
the woods at dark! Especially the way some of them Yankees
bend over out in the woods. I kept telling them to be
careful, this is banjo country, Arkansas, after all.
Deliverance ring a bell? Helloooo! ;-)
Lots of great folks in camp by now and the fire was going
good. Felt great, too. Miss Debbie announced that the Gumbo
feed was ready in the gambling tent. I almost spilled my Fat
Tire leaping out of my chair. And I have to apologize to
the guys I knocked down in my mad rush for the fixins. Ain't
no way I'm not getting some of Deb's gumbo! Turns out
pissing off the guys I block passed was not only uncalled
for, but unnecessary as there was plenty to go around. I
even had seconds. Well, okay, thirds. But who's counting?
Great stuff! Thanks again Deb.
Waddled back to the fire where Phil had setup a sheet. No,
not the hooded one this time. It was a projector screen for
showing some DVDs. The Travis Pastrana one and some of the
vintage stuff was great. It's a wonder how Pastrana has
survived this long. Funny stuff. We did get a little rain
that evening. For supposedly being 50's and sunny on
Saturday, it was sure cloudy and cool (mid-40's). But at
least nothing was frozen.
Sunday's plan for me was to get in a morning ride and call
it a trip. Turns out many had the same idea. Met Rick
Pedersen that morning. Another recent MN transplant to near
where I live in NW Ark. Great guy. He came along on this
ride with our pretty much the normal group by then. Keith
couldn't get his bike started and I felt really bad leaving
him in camp. But we took off about 9:30 hoping for a 1pm
back to camp time.
Down Schoolhouse and up the other side to Waterfall. Then to
Jim's, Texas and the front loop with the horseshoe trail.
Cameron broke his clutch perch off in a nasty fall so I
found him a shortcut back to camp and Rick went with him. The
rest of us went by the teepee and up to the top of the
trials hill and then took the Danial Boone trail back to camp.
That is a 6 mile trail with no intersections. Mark A. is a
local AA guy that had been letting me lead all weekend. I
was getting pretty beat by now so told him to go ahead and
just wait at the end. Good decision as I was sure not at my
best through there. I was tired! Hey, I joined the Super
Senior class this year so I have a built in excuse now. I was
happy to end the trip with no major mishaps on my part.
Actually, I didn't hear of anyone really getting hurt.
Cameron's one fall had me worried as his hip landed on a
rock, but he shook it off.
So back at camp I packed everything up and said goodbye's
over the course of a couple of hours. Most were doing the
same so camp was starting to thin out a little, although
there was still a good group out riding, too. The road out
was sure a lot muddier than on Wednesday but most everything
around here has a hard bottom so no issues for me getting
out. I sure hope those Class C's made it out okay?
Sorry for the novel, but you guys know I run on at the mouth
on these RR's so it shouldn't be a shocker. I had a great
time and even though the weather could've been better, it
also could've been a lot worse. And the MN guys had left
sub-ZERO temps to come down. I sure want to thank Jim and
Deb Cook for all the work they did and Jeff Gaston for his
dedicated work at BC and for helping guide. He's such a
patient and fun guy to ride with. I also want to thank the
USFS folks for welcoming us to the area and being just a
great group to work with.
Hope to see all y'all at Wudi XI!