Everyone around here is not having fun i see.
NC Overland Rally
- Thread starter lt1fire
- Start date
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jfz80
Cruisin’
I can grab it for you Jerry. Think I may be RDU bound next week as well.
Ouch! I'm very curious to know what's going bad with yours. How long has it been since you regeared? I had a pinion bearing go bad after only 6K since my regear. Very unusual for that to go bad so quickly, and suspect it had (maybe) one bad roller that ate up the rest.
I'll follow up in the "troubleshooting" thread once I get it apart. Just bummed, this is a big hit, really wanted to be there since I'd been bugging them to hold something out here for a couple years.
But, yes, I'll surely follow up and be taking some pics...
Would have been nice to know about it earlier, could have made that the ride for the month!
- Thread starter
- #27
I posted it up as soon as I saw it (rarely in that section of expo portal lately)
I agree though if i'd know about it when the date was set.... in Jan. I would have had more concrete plans for this and gone for every day.
I agree though if i'd know about it when the date was set.... in Jan. I would have had more concrete plans for this and gone for every day.
It was a fun weekend. The presentations were amazing. The instruction was helpful. The BBQ (local to Marion) was some of the best I've had. Wheeling at THE FLATS in Marion, NC reminded me of Beasley Knob, but with more rocks/ledges - it's not a giant trail system and it's got very steep "easy" trails that become dangerous when wet. The advantage it has over Beasley is that it has a nice camping "plateau" with great views of the surrounding mountains, and it has a couple of fun "playground" areas near the main access road. The biggest downside of the park is that it has no facilities whatsoever...no water, no electricity, no bathrooms, no gatehouse, no pavilions. It's not an open pay-for-play kind of place. From what I understand, you need to contact the land owners to reserve the facility and they typically do not allow motorcycles in the park. Overland planners got special permission to allow dual sport bikes for the weekend.
I rode with Jason and Drew all weekend and we had a great time. I met a few new folks, including another FJC owner named Will. He hung with us on most of the trails, but had to take the bypasses on some areas because he was completely stock except for his Rugged Trail A/T's.
The instructional classes were good but it was hard to take all the courses in one day as some time slots overlapped. I missed Friday's instructionals, so I just wandered back and forth between a couple that interested me. If you go next year, then I recommend getting there early enough to get both instructional days into your itinerary.
Fighting for shade in the blistering heat was another challenge. The organizers set up several large tarps/shelters for the class instructors to use and for setting up a medical tent. These were invaluable. Just about every attendee also had a tarp or awning deployed to seek shade. Being up on the plateau also meant we had a good breeze later in the afternoons and it was perfect weather Saturday night.
The presentation on Friday night was from a guy named Anthony and he showed us his trip that started in eastern Canada, went west to the Pacific NW, down to see the US Rockies, the Baja Peninsula, across to the Yucatan Peninsula and further south to Panama. 18,500 miles on a stock KLR 450. MotoJournalism
Saturday night we got two presentations: one from Equipt Outfitters that took place in Central America, and Overland Experts described there Labrador to Nova Scotia trip. Amazing photos and stories by all.
Earlier on Saturday we listened to Shirley Deane read excerpts from her book, An Unreasonable Woman, about traveling from the UK to Katmandu in a Rover in 1962. She was a character and has a really engaging story of traveling abroad for 40+ years. She now lives in Winston-Salem.
I participated in the "trophy challenge" on Sunday morning and it was a fun challenge. The idea was to task your brain more than your truck on this mini version of the challenge - there was not a time to beat or any racing during this challenge. We were asked several questions about our personal vehicles such as do you have a first aid kit (bonus pt for having Benadryl), and do you know the GVWR & current loaded weight of your truck. Then we were given long/lat coordinates and told to go find the sign at that location. The funny part was they first set of coords they gave us were 200 miles away. Me and my team mate had already figured this out and started going to N35.xxxxx W81.xxxxx instead of the W86.xxxxx that was given to us. They quickly spread the word about the wrong coords to get everybody back on track. We were told that if we drove to the coords, we'd get 5pts, but if we walked we'd get 10pts. We walked and walked and walked with GPS in hand up the very steep trail 1 to find our sign.
The next challenge was to navigate the "playground" area without hitting any of the pvc poles they planted in the ground. Some you had to pass between and some you just had to keep to one side or the other of your truck. The yotas all did exceptional. Then we had to scale a large hill climb that had some loose dirt. If you got stuck you had to use the Max Trax (properly) to get out. None of the yotas needed the Max Trax
At the top Clint was overlooking the playground and tallied our totals up to that point. His parting words were, now go back to camp and bring me a spare lug nut from your kit to get your final score. I fared pretty well, only missing my vehicle weights. There was a tie for first but since they only had one grand prize, they asked a tie-breaking trivia question of those two guys. What year did Overland Journal first publish...2007. So that pushed me to 3rd place and I won a year (Wint/Spr/Sum/Fall/Gear) of 2010 Overland Journal back issues and a 40% off card for Mountain Khaki's.
y'all remember Karl? He was there.
Anthony's KLR
Looking down at the camping plateau from the hill climb section
more photos on my FB page.
I rode with Jason and Drew all weekend and we had a great time. I met a few new folks, including another FJC owner named Will. He hung with us on most of the trails, but had to take the bypasses on some areas because he was completely stock except for his Rugged Trail A/T's.
The instructional classes were good but it was hard to take all the courses in one day as some time slots overlapped. I missed Friday's instructionals, so I just wandered back and forth between a couple that interested me. If you go next year, then I recommend getting there early enough to get both instructional days into your itinerary.
Fighting for shade in the blistering heat was another challenge. The organizers set up several large tarps/shelters for the class instructors to use and for setting up a medical tent. These were invaluable. Just about every attendee also had a tarp or awning deployed to seek shade. Being up on the plateau also meant we had a good breeze later in the afternoons and it was perfect weather Saturday night.
The presentation on Friday night was from a guy named Anthony and he showed us his trip that started in eastern Canada, went west to the Pacific NW, down to see the US Rockies, the Baja Peninsula, across to the Yucatan Peninsula and further south to Panama. 18,500 miles on a stock KLR 450. MotoJournalism
Saturday night we got two presentations: one from Equipt Outfitters that took place in Central America, and Overland Experts described there Labrador to Nova Scotia trip. Amazing photos and stories by all.
Earlier on Saturday we listened to Shirley Deane read excerpts from her book, An Unreasonable Woman, about traveling from the UK to Katmandu in a Rover in 1962. She was a character and has a really engaging story of traveling abroad for 40+ years. She now lives in Winston-Salem.
I participated in the "trophy challenge" on Sunday morning and it was a fun challenge. The idea was to task your brain more than your truck on this mini version of the challenge - there was not a time to beat or any racing during this challenge. We were asked several questions about our personal vehicles such as do you have a first aid kit (bonus pt for having Benadryl), and do you know the GVWR & current loaded weight of your truck. Then we were given long/lat coordinates and told to go find the sign at that location. The funny part was they first set of coords they gave us were 200 miles away. Me and my team mate had already figured this out and started going to N35.xxxxx W81.xxxxx instead of the W86.xxxxx that was given to us. They quickly spread the word about the wrong coords to get everybody back on track. We were told that if we drove to the coords, we'd get 5pts, but if we walked we'd get 10pts. We walked and walked and walked with GPS in hand up the very steep trail 1 to find our sign.
The next challenge was to navigate the "playground" area without hitting any of the pvc poles they planted in the ground. Some you had to pass between and some you just had to keep to one side or the other of your truck. The yotas all did exceptional. Then we had to scale a large hill climb that had some loose dirt. If you got stuck you had to use the Max Trax (properly) to get out. None of the yotas needed the Max Trax
At the top Clint was overlooking the playground and tallied our totals up to that point. His parting words were, now go back to camp and bring me a spare lug nut from your kit to get your final score. I fared pretty well, only missing my vehicle weights. There was a tie for first but since they only had one grand prize, they asked a tie-breaking trivia question of those two guys. What year did Overland Journal first publish...2007. So that pushed me to 3rd place and I won a year (Wint/Spr/Sum/Fall/Gear) of 2010 Overland Journal back issues and a 40% off card for Mountain Khaki's.
y'all remember Karl? He was there.
Anthony's KLR
Looking down at the camping plateau from the hill climb section
more photos on my FB page.
Nice writeup Rick. Might be a good place to have a joint club event. Wonder how much it costs to rent out for a weekend?
I have Brian McVickers' (OvJo Dir. Business Development) business card, so that we could swap notes. He hinted at wanting a park with more facilities...and we have recent experience with one of those 
It would make a great park for a joint event, just have to find out the details from him so we know how to contact the park owners.
It would make a great park for a joint event, just have to find out the details from him so we know how to contact the park owners.
- Thread starter
- #31
I have Brian McVickers' (OvJo Dir. Business Development) business card, so that we could swap notes. He hinted at wanting a park with more facilities...and we have recent experience with one of those
I had already been tapping this idea for next years cruising the carolinas event. Talked to the owners in a few emails but didn't get a price set in concrete.
