Walker Valley Mar 2019

At the club meeting, Thursday prior to the club run, we asked for volunteer to lead the group. No one raised their hands so I said sure I would do it! But seeing though I am a 2nd shift worker we would start at 10am, LOL. I got a few hmms and haws and I double checked if anyone else wanted to lead but no one stepped up.. Ok cool.. 10am it will be.

It had been a while since Casey and I had been up to Walker Valley so we googled the time to get there and it showed about 90 minutes. It actually only took about an hour.
So we got there early and found Shawn in his Teal jeep already there with 3 little ones running around have a great time. We got ourselves aired down hubs locked in and as we got ourselves ready others trickled in. We even got to chat a bit with our favorite DNR guy, Gary Bellows, as we waited.

We ended up with 10 people in the parking lot with Dave on his way and meeting us a little later. Ed and Katie, Karl VP riding shotgun with Kurtis Messmer and his 3 little ones, Chris G in his new to him XJ, John in his (RocDoc), Travis B in his red 4 door JK, and candidates Marc C and Chris L. and of course Casey in her MissCreant, and me in my MissUnderstood.

We started off heading down to the southern main gate and it is just easier to get the larger rigs thru. Sure enough everyone made it thru just find and we headed up to the Timber Tamers trail. We saw where they had replanted some trees and drained a big puddle and made the trail worthy to crawl thru again.

As we headed up to the upper portion of the Timber Tamer trail I just had to try my hand at crawling over the big rock and test my new transfer case gearing. Karl was good enough to spot me after a couple of attempts and got me up and over. A few others went around the big rock but those that wanted to crawl over had Karl spotting for them and getting them over. For the most part, Karl got everyone over it.

We headed up to the rock garden area of the upper Timber Tamer trail and I got a chance to get out and scout which trail to take up and it looked as though they were all about the same. I clunked and banged and crawled my way up thru the rocks and got up high enough to park and get back to spot. There were a few large rocks that were loose and being moved around a lot as each person went passed and towards the end of the line we were having troubles getting passed these rocks… Stupid rocks anyway…LOL.

Some of the guys opted for the trail to the left and it proved to be a little better. We finally got everyone through that are with everyone pitching in and helping out which was great. Kudos for team effort by all!! We made out way thru the Easy Valley Connector and at which time I could hear Dave on the radio calling for us. He would meet us over by the easy valley and logging road which sounded great. We got everyone parked around the Ridge Ram rock crawl trail and had lunch and watched as people took turns going thru the rock areas and having fun.

After lunch we proceeded to Ridge Ram trail and did that without too many problems. Everyone seemed to do fine. We headed up to the Skills area where Ed has HAD to try his rig up the “V knotch” or “Butt Crack” and he gave it a good shot. But just couldn’t get the right traction. There was snow on the ground up in that area and I’m sure having wet tires did not help at all. Next it was Travis’s turn to try and he too gave it a great shot and got some good photos but just couldn’t quite get it. Not to be outdone Kurtis had to give it a try. He had Karl watching the kids as he tried and got SOOO close to making it up, but in the end we pulled cable for him and got him up and over.

We left that area and went along Humps and Bumps to the upper “New play area” where all the big Rocks are. We heard there was a sink hole up there, but we couldn’t find it? Everyone was having fun crawling over the big rocks that they couldm getting poser shots of the rigs etc. I even had Casey pull the MissCreant up onto a rock to check her flex and latest bump stop mod I did. It is a good place to just play.

From there we decided to head down the mainline into the tighter upper gate. No one really had too much of a problem except Travis. I knew we could get him thru with his 4 door JK as we had before. And sure enough with just a tiny scape and about a 10 point turn we got him thru. We all headed back to get aired up, loaded up and back home at a decent hour with light still available. I think it was a good run with total of 11 rigs it went VERY well and we kept a flow going. Thanks to everyone who was there. And thanks for the helping each other out..

This truly is a great Club!

Gary M
TT256