Boy sure was a busy day at Anthracite Saturday! Greg led the group with me riding shotgun and navigating(????). had eleven trucks hope i get them all right- from the capital city group we had Stump and Chis in their 40's, Jeff in his expedition Taco, and Felix in his white 80. From our club there was John and his wife, Vince in the lexus, Greg in the taco, Blair in the blue FJ, and Andy in his 4runner. Quite the diverse group. Got to the lot in AOAA around 8 and enjoyed a box of Dunkin Donuts coffee, donuts, and a few bags of McDonalds breakfast sandwiches.
We were on our way to the western reserve before 9. Wound our way up into the trees on the left side going away from the office and found a short black trail to play on. Tried another black but got turned back by a large tree that had fallen across the trail. From there we did a lot of narrow trails on the way out to the ridge area. There we ran into a small group of buggies and had a bit of a traffic jam at one of the short black trails. Not everyone elected to do the black, and Blair had some excitement in the beginning of that trail when he lost a bead on his right front. got it up in the air using his hi-lift and with the help of Crusha's onboard air tank got the bead back on the rim and the tire filled with air. Had to pull a little cable to get Blair over the biggest obstacle. little did we know that was an omen of things to come!
After that we did several of the blue trails and as it was after one by that time we headed downhill. Decided to try a few new trails that neither Greg nor i had ever been on. Followed the mad and I got us to a dead end in a cul-de-sac next to the big stripping pit! Had to back a few trucks out of it and then we decided to tackle a hill about 150 feet long (someone jump in and correct me on the length if need be). It was narrow, tree lined, and was that black wet dirt and rocky. Everyone had to winch up- some got further than others but every truck that got up and over with the help of the cable made it worse. Looks like we created another one of those hills at AAOA that are just about impossible to get up without a winch.
Once over the hill we wound our way downhill through a tight trail, tough to navigate the bigger trucks through this section. from there it was find your way out to the main trail and head back to the gate. yes the gate that gets locked at 2PM, the one we didn't get to until about 3:30!
All in all we spent more than 6 hours in the western section and didn't even scratch the surface ion the amount of trails that are over there. truth is takes a half hour at best to get out to the better trails and at that there is much more that is further from the gate,. Hard to figure how you could get all the way out there, enjoy some wheeling, and be back to the gate before 2PM.
The lot at AOAA had a lot of trucks in it, and a s***load of trailers and ATV's. The camping area is pretty neat especially if you like shade- it's nestled in a tree-filled section. There were lots of campers and trailers in the camping area I'd guess it was maybe 50% occupied. A few of the Gotham City guys were supposed to have been at AAOA Friday and Saturday to check out the trails and the camping facilities but I didn't see any of them there. There is talk of the coal mine event being based at AAOA sometime in the future but we'll see how/if this develops.
Lots of pictures here starting on page 5:
Fall Crawl 2017 - Oct 13-14 - Rausch Creek
We were on our way to the western reserve before 9. Wound our way up into the trees on the left side going away from the office and found a short black trail to play on. Tried another black but got turned back by a large tree that had fallen across the trail. From there we did a lot of narrow trails on the way out to the ridge area. There we ran into a small group of buggies and had a bit of a traffic jam at one of the short black trails. Not everyone elected to do the black, and Blair had some excitement in the beginning of that trail when he lost a bead on his right front. got it up in the air using his hi-lift and with the help of Crusha's onboard air tank got the bead back on the rim and the tire filled with air. Had to pull a little cable to get Blair over the biggest obstacle. little did we know that was an omen of things to come!
After that we did several of the blue trails and as it was after one by that time we headed downhill. Decided to try a few new trails that neither Greg nor i had ever been on. Followed the mad and I got us to a dead end in a cul-de-sac next to the big stripping pit! Had to back a few trucks out of it and then we decided to tackle a hill about 150 feet long (someone jump in and correct me on the length if need be). It was narrow, tree lined, and was that black wet dirt and rocky. Everyone had to winch up- some got further than others but every truck that got up and over with the help of the cable made it worse. Looks like we created another one of those hills at AAOA that are just about impossible to get up without a winch.
Once over the hill we wound our way downhill through a tight trail, tough to navigate the bigger trucks through this section. from there it was find your way out to the main trail and head back to the gate. yes the gate that gets locked at 2PM, the one we didn't get to until about 3:30!
All in all we spent more than 6 hours in the western section and didn't even scratch the surface ion the amount of trails that are over there. truth is takes a half hour at best to get out to the better trails and at that there is much more that is further from the gate,. Hard to figure how you could get all the way out there, enjoy some wheeling, and be back to the gate before 2PM.
The lot at AOAA had a lot of trucks in it, and a s***load of trailers and ATV's. The camping area is pretty neat especially if you like shade- it's nestled in a tree-filled section. There were lots of campers and trailers in the camping area I'd guess it was maybe 50% occupied. A few of the Gotham City guys were supposed to have been at AAOA Friday and Saturday to check out the trails and the camping facilities but I didn't see any of them there. There is talk of the coal mine event being based at AAOA sometime in the future but we'll see how/if this develops.
Lots of pictures here starting on page 5:
Fall Crawl 2017 - Oct 13-14 - Rausch Creek
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