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I'm going to start by thanking everyone who turned out for this, it wasn't our biggest event by any stretch but we all know small groups have their benefits.

 

So after a good nights rest on Saturday, aided by a heck of a lot of good campfire food, ribs, steak, slaw, desert, you name it, the four of us left standing for wheeling on Sunday got a pretty early start.  We were all checked in and paid up by about 8:30, the line on Saturday was hideous, it stretched halfway across the parking lot, we had a quick driver's meeting just before 9:00 and hit the trails.  The group consisted of:

Chip Woods, member, TJ on 33's

Rich Martinez, member, JK Rubicon on 35's, with Brooke and Jay as passengers

Ed Salas, member, TJ on 35's, built for 37's

Virgil Moore, member, XJ on 37's I think, with his son Bradley as passenger

 

So grab your Rausch Creek map and follow along on what you missed.  We headed out before the crowds and went straight towards the south property via green B to green E to green S to run the purple (blue-black) portion of Snakebite, which we were going to run Saturday but opted for another trail instead.  We parked for a bit and walked through black Camelback and all of us said "nope".  After that little stroll we headed onto Snakebite headed west-east and just did our thing.  There was one instance, where I admit, I did giggle and clap my hands, that is a great trail, lots and lots of fun.  I was a little envious of the 4:1 transfer cases in the other three rigs, I was probably 50 yards ahead of them the whole time and practically staying on my brakes the whole time to stay that close.  Other than Ed blowing a bead on his passenger front tire the trail was uneventful.  In standard OCC fashion we had him fixed up and running again in no time.

 

After finishing the purple portion of Snakebite, we opted to stay off the rest of the trail which is black, and headed north towards Lake Christy to let the kids stretch their legs and play around a bit.  Getting down into and back out of the beach area was easy enough, and we continued west, running green S backwards for a bit to hit green 21.  Green 21 is a nice, meandering forest trail, great or taking it easy or for a new driver, and takes maybe 20 minutes or so to run.  It has a few little obstacle which we all handled with ease, as well a short black option towards the end which we avoided.  We had the option of continuing onto purple 22, but since it was past noon at this point we opted to head back towards the east property and hit some trails closer to camp.

 

We came out of green 21 onto S, and followed S north easterly and turned right on green S3, then left onto S again, and followed S northerly to green E, to a right on green D, and followed that to Crawler Ridge.  When we got to Crawler Ridge Rich went first, taking a moderate line on the far right, followed by me, Ed, then Virgil.  Ed took a bit of teasing for showing us what line not to take, and I think this was the only part of the day anybody took pictures.  We all made our way back down Crawler Ridge by a variety of lines, with gravity playing a bigger part of getting me down than any sort of finesse or skill, and ended up back on D.  At this point Rich and Virgil took a right onto blue 2 and headed towards Pole Line and Ed and I turned left onto blue 2 and looped around on the west side of D, meeting up with Rich and Virgil on Pole Line.  This was the first time I've run 2 in that direction and I commented on the CB how interesting it is that a trail can be completely different running it in a direction you're not accustomed to.

It was pushing maybe 12:30 or 1:00 at this point and we were all bushed and still needed to pack up and drive home, so we headed down Pole Line to B, taking B back to camp.  We checked out, packed up, and made our way back to our respective homes.

 

A couple of non-wheeling comments; the weather was great, partly sunny, maybe 60, great doors off weather.  And for the nature lovers, there was an abundance of these really cool looking birds that I felt the need to point out whenever we saw them.  Bright bright fire engine red with jet black wings, they really stood out in the green leaves of the trees.  I did a little research on Monday, here's a link: Scarlet Tanager. Funny part is their song, you can hear it in the link, you could hear either them or some other birds all weekend long, and as we were motoring along you hear one of those buggers start to chirp and I'm thinking "uh oh, what's broken; nope, stupid bird" over and over.