Dave took the lead and not 100 yards into the trail we were up to our doors in some nice rushing water. That cleaned our tires nicely for the first obstacle, a decent size rock with varying degrees of difficulty depending on which line you took. Dave took the middle line, I stayed to the left which was a joke and everyone else followed suit, taking the easy line on what turned out to be the only worthwhile rock obstacle of the day. More on that later. Reed, in his stock TJ, had some trouble with clearance but with a little tug we were on our way. There was one more good-sized rock outcropping in the middle of the trail which had enough room to drive a Greyhound bus around each side but our fearless leader Dave manned up and went over the rock. Actually he did get caught up a little and needed to pull some cable after his 36’s dug a hole halfway to China. Contrary to the last trip the Rubicon was the savior instead of the saved in this case. Dave hooked up to my hook and we coaxed him out no problem. Yaron and Mike also tackled the rock, walking over it with hardly a hitch.
We then moved on in search of more rocks to climb, but no such luck. The trail, although beautiful and scenic, didn’t provide much of a challenge. We did find a lot of fairly deep water along the way though. At one point I followed Dave into a waterhole forgetting the height difference and was almost up to my headlights in some mucky water. That was fun watching everyone behind us take a dip. We took a lunch break to rest our organs from the bumpy trail. This trail had tons of rock just not big enough to do anything but stir up our innards. Marc cleaned some lumps of mud of his rig with a stick while we chowed down and BS’d. We continued on after lunch and crossed a paved road which led into a steep downhill with a nice turn that provided a little excitement. This was followed by a water crossing into a Steep uphill climb that was slippery with snow in the beginning and loose sand as we got to the top. Dave’s girlfriend navigated the water nicely and after a few attempts, found the long pedal on the right and powered right up to the top of the hill. The rest of us also shot right up, with Yaron making it look easy and Andy, Mike's sub walking right up the hill. The only small snag was Marc R getting caught in a very loose sandy hole, once that problem was cleared up we moved on. We covered a lot of ground and crossed 2 more dirt roads, took a detour through the woods off the side of the powerlines, crossed some more water and then it was time for an executive decision. As the reluctant "trail leader" I decided that it was time to have the local boys get us back to the beginning of the trail so we could redeem ourselves on the one and only decent obstacle.
We full throttled back to the nearest dirt road and Local boy Chris in the other Rubi led the convoy back to the trail head . . . caught some interesting looks from the locals as we passed through some small towns. Back at the trailhead we all decided to attempt the hardest line except Reed, who opted out and Mark who stayed back, aired up and prepared for a long journey back to Westchester. Dave once again made it look easy and then it was Yaron’s turn. There was a very tricky part to get around before getting positioned to go up the larger rock. Yaron had lost power steering at some point during the day so he was fighting a major battle maneuvering around. After banging around for awhile in a valiant attempt to conquer the obstacle, his CJ suffered a blow that required a reverse tug by me, once again paying my dues for Mark S. tugging me all over Paine Hill. After tugging Yaron off the rock he inspected the damage and found some sort of Taco shaped object in place of his drag link!! We got him down safely and as he replaced it trailside, I made my attempt. I jockeyed around, found a nice line and took it straight up the middle, testing the limits of my silly hockey puck suspension lift. I made it up and over and out of a steep lean to the left side that had this driver craving slim fast.
Chris the local had some clearance issues and ended up taking the left side line after tattooing his skidplate a few times. Mike was up next in the e-Jay and a combination of a very capable rig and some big balls got him over the rock like he was sleep-walking. By this time it was pouring rain and it was getting late. We crossed back over the rapids and aired up and reconnected for the ride back to the truck stop. Yaron had successfully mended his steering and we grouped up and headed out. The decision to do the first part again saved the day (except for Yaron) and left us with a good feeling as we left the trail. Back at the truck stop we ran into a local kid with a lifted TJ who said he was dying to run the local trails with a group. He also said there is a ton of LEGAL wheeling in the area and gave me his phone # for next time. We parted ways at the truckstop and headed back to NY in a downpour after a quick pit stop at a Denny’s in CT. All told we covered a lot of ground and had a great time bouncing around with our fellow Northeast Rednecks. See ya next time!
