Walker Valley Jun 2022

It was a wet morning for the 6 of us. Me, Doc, Dean, Joe, and Mihai. Chris Steimel would meet up later. After the air down session, E&E paperwork, and a brief drivers meetings away we went. Straight towards Timber Tamers trail. Considering I just replaced balljoints on the XJ i chose not to try the big rock at the beginning. Doc gave it a shot and with a bit of spotting over he went. Good job Doc! Leading thru the rocky area i fought a bit .

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Walker Welcome Run Oct 2021

This is our opportunity for a “do-over”. Six months ago, virtually to the day (on 4/24/2021), we made our first attempt at a Welcome Run for our new members. As you may recall, that Welcome Run was effectively hijacked and taken away even before we got to the south gate by the Timber Tamer Trail where we were beseeched by a motorcyclist to help with his friend who was injured after crashing his motorcycle at the top of the Lower Timber Tamer Trail. Being the socially responsible Tamers we are, we went to his assistance, and stayed with him until an ambulance got there—about 2½ hours later. That meant we essentially lost most of our opportunity to actually do our Welcome Run where we had planned to share 4-wheeling skills with our newest members and candidates. Things have been busy enough that it took us another 6 months to schedule another Welcome Run—and this time we weren’t kidnapped by any emergencies to help with!

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Walker Valley Apr 2021

The Timber Tamers have been really blessed over the past couple of months to have something like 8 new people contact us with an interest in joining our 4-wheeling club. And, we have been offering an opportunity to mentor people new to wheeling to help them develop experience and skills in 4-wheeling so they can enjoy themselves more fully and more quickly. About a week and a half ago, the BOD developed an idea of holding a trail run to help the newer folks have this opportunity in a more structured setting rather than just “letting it happen” however and whenever. So, at our meeting this month we proposed to the membership having a “Welcome Run” to do just this, which everyone thought was a good idea—and we planned it for today!

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Walker Valley Feb 2021

There was a lot scheduled for Walker Valley this day,  so I thought I would get up there and help in any way that I could. Now being a 2nd shifter the meeting time was a bit early for me so I set my alarm. Casey decided it was going to be too early to cold and too snowy so she was staying home..LOL I really didn’t think we would see very much snow. Oh how wrong I would be.

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Walker Valley Work Party Nov 2019

Well, it was the second Saturday of the month, so it must be time for a Walker Valley Work Party. (And it was!!!) This was a special one, because we made plans with Jim Cahill (from DNR) to repair and re-set the kiosk at the gate for our namesake Timber Tamer trails. As it turned out, we’d had about the driest early November on record with no rain at all since before Halloween. Of course, since we had trail work to do today, today was the day for that to change, so we had our more typical November all-day drizzle.

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Twin Lakes and Walker Valley Aug 2019

Twin Lakes:

Travis, Ken and Ryan and I decided on a whim to go up to Twin Lakes in the Mount Baker national forest. Not sure if this would be an official Tamer run, But Travis and We are Tamers and Ken is a candidate.

We met up at the Shell station in Marysville at exit 88 at 8am and then traveled the two and a half hours to Twin Lakes – practically the Canadian border.

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Hefty Haul Out Apr 2019

We started out getting there a bit late, about 9:15 am. Which if you know me is a bit early for me. Lol. Kevin with the Rainier Ridge Rams was quick to ask me who was bringing the fixings for the Lunch bar-b-que, as we had volunteered to do that with our club. I must have given him a deer in the head lights look and answered I don’t know? He just looked back and said.. Your not awake yet are you? Nope I was not awake yet. It took me about 15 minutes to get awake and moving and I assured Kevin that Mike our trusty cook was going to be there to cook up some hot dogs and hamburgers. It was cold and rainy and windy as we tried to get out flags and banners set up. Catch up with everyone and touch base and get signed up with DNR for our days duties.

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Walker Valley Poker Run Nov 2018

Another day of wheeling, just like any other.  Well, maybe not…
For one thing, this day started out at 7:00 AM at Walker—a pretty early day.  (And I’d prefer not to describe it with the exact words Casey and Gary would use at this hour of the morning…)  For another thing, this was a day for us to have a Poker Run (officially a non-sanctioned non-event) where four of our clubs in the 4-wheeling community (Around The Sound, Dirty 13, Rainier Ridge Rams and Timber Tamers) came together to have a fundraiser to help three families in our midst who are fighting with that evil beast—cancer.  It’s a time we could all get together not only for a good cause, but to have some fun together in the process!

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Walker Valley Work Party Nov 2018

Another second-Saturday of the month, another Walker Valley Work Party!!
Today four of us Tamers (Steve Sutton, Chris Leger, Lynn Leger and myself) joined forces with a large contingent from the Around the Sound Jeep Club and a number of the Rainier Ridge Rams to work on the Walker Valley trails.  My understanding was that the work needed today was predominantly to fix some trails where 4x4s had been running a motorcycle/ATV trail and improperly widening it.  Continue reading “Walker Valley Work Party Nov 2018”

Ron’s Run Clean Up Apr 2018

Since this was a single trail area, we planned to clean up, we met at Walker Valley staging area at 11am…love that extra hour or two of sleep!  There were no birds chirping and no warm sun shine, but at least it wasn’t too cold.  Gary and I met Gary Bellows, our WV DNR Rep there, along with Rock and Jeanie, Chris B, John V, Shawn N and my puddle buddy Justin.  Also, candidates Joe, Terry, Matt, Travis and Aaron showed up to help with this effort.  OK, Aaron only showed up because he wanted to wheel and none of the other 20 people he asked would go with him….we assured him we would remember this, come voting time!  Haha.

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Hefty Haul Out Apr 2018

The annual Hefty Haul Out of Walker Valley, is an event hosted by the Rainier Ridge Rams, to pick up all the trash at Walker Valley.  The Timber Tamers provide a lunch, which was sponsored this year, by Olympic 4×4 in Snohomish.  The DNR provided a dumpster, porta-potties, gloves and trash bags!  All user and clubs come to roam the trails and pick up trash, then return to staging for lunch and a raffle.

The Rainier Ridge Rams (RRR) showed up at the Rock hound pit at 7:20am, after breakfast at Billy’s Café.  They then began to try to figure out how to set up their tent, which is always an adventure!
The weather was a bit cloudy and drizzly, but not enough to deter our efforts……..yet!

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Walker Valley Mar 2018

As the leader of this run I wanted to do things a little different at Walker Valley this time.
We met up in the staging area, everyone aired down and ready to roll,  and with a few new candidates we held a drivers meeting and went thru the basics. By about 10:30 ish we were rolling towards the upper mainline trail, with snow falling and temperatures a bit chilly.

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Walker Valley Work Day Mar, 2018

The day started cold (28 degrees) and clear with bright sunshine as we arrived in the parking area at Walker Valley about 7:30 AM to get ready to repair erosion damage on the Upper Timber Tamer Trail.  (Recall that work was done almost a year ago to stabilize the Rock Garden area near the top of this trail.)  With us were four heavy equipment operators (including our good friend Jeff Stafford, who also creates the “fun stuff” for the Off-Road Expo every September).  The other Tamers group was Cosmin Stejerean and, Candidate Aaron Rozeboom.  (More Tamers couldn’t be with us because we were spread pretty thin with the Swap Meet set-up in Puyallup and the Show & Shine at 4WheelParts in Lynnwood, which other Tamers covered.)

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Walker Valley E&E Day Mar 2018

What a beautifully crisp, sunny day, to head out and do some E&E at Walker Valley!
Gary and I and Phil Jeffress and GF, headed out at 9am.  Since my ancient dog, can no longer be left at home alone, I decided I take the daily driver, and bring them with, since we wouldn’t be wheeling.  I had forgotten what it was like, yelling at toddlers in the back seat, to stop squabbling, move away from your brother, etc, and this trip was no different on the way up!

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Hefty Haul Out April 2017

Having left my rig pulled off up on the gravel – I’m standing calf-deep in brambles and thorns off the steep downside of the main road –

First note to self – “Bring leather gloves down with you instead of leaving them in the rig.”

Second note to self while barely able to move feet tangled and twisted up in brambles – “A pair of pruning shears or a machete would be really handy right now.”  (I now remember that from my last time in this position….)

Third note to self – “I need to remember to bring some of the younger buckaroos and buckaristas along with me and show THEM the lower side of the road where trash should be getting pulled out!”

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Walker Oct 2016

Today, was not so usual for us.  Our normally prepared events, were interrupted by another matter on Friday, so Saturday morning at O’Dark Thirty, we discover neither rig had gas, and the  Zuk had no spare tire or winch attached.  OK, we will need to leave a bit earlier than planned to get gas….then, we discovered that both the trail rigs Disco passes had expired!  Well, we certainly can’t go out without those, so I jumped online to purchase online, and have our confirmation #’s on hand, if asked.  At the disco pass website, I find a message saying “I’m sorry, we are not able to offer Disco pass purchases online right now, please check back at a later time”.  Well, this won’t do as we need to be out of the house in a few minutes to get gas, and still get to WV before our 10am meet up time.  So, out of the house we run, so we can gas up, then stop and get disco passes.  At the gas station, we find that Gary has forgotten his wallet at home.  Hoping this is not how the rest of our day will go, I run for Disco passes, while Gary runs for his wallet, and we meet back up at the Ace Hardware parking lot, to blow the Pop Cycle Stand! Continue reading “Walker Oct 2016”

Walker Valley EnE Sep 2016

The Tamers put together an E&E day at Walker Valley, for Saturday the 3rd of September. Members, Chris and Ashley Brown initiated this event, and the rest of the Tamers showed up to help.  We were un-sure if this being a holiday weekend, would be a good day or not, but as it turned out, it was an Excellent day for E&E!  We were even asked if we would be back for the rest of the weekend. Continue reading “Walker Valley EnE Sep 2016”