I headed out very early Friday morning to meet up with TrailGhost (Jami) and his FJ Cruiser for a 9:30am meet time, 3 1/2 hours away...
We met up at the Eldorado Outpost just before the park entrance, great place to pick up whatever you might need including your $5 trail pass, a map, and helpful advice, we thought we had everything we needed. We were also joined by some folks off of subaruforester.org, one in a Forester, one in a CRV, nice folks, but it didn't last too long for them.
Right at the trail head there was a big mud hole, I do not play in mud holes, but I decided to go through a little corner of it, resulting in the first mishap of the day.
I was just going to run my spare, but oversight on my part, steel spare takes different lug nuts than my alum. rims. Probably would have worked, but I wasn't comfortable with it, Jami and I hop in the FJ and head back to the Outpost for a plug kit. While I was fixin' tires, the Forester and CRV played in the mud, but Jami will have to provide the visuals for that.
Mishap #2, Forester rips off his belly pan just after getting on the trail, yours truly (and my tools) to the rescue.
A small steam crossing and hearing our Forester and CRV friends approach/departure angles being tested told me that things were not long for them.
About 1/4 mi. into Falls Dam trail...
...we sent the non-Yotas packin'
We didn't even do the rocks, we took the bypass, that was enough on its own.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qu2SZ-RIaSw
We thought this was an 'easy' rated trail, says so on the map we got at the Outpost, turns out to be a 'moderate' trail. Lots of rocks waterbars and plenty of deep mud holes, we took the bypasses around most of them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY0dNeaWyuE
Mishap #3 and thank fully the last on the day, I got a little stuck on this section...
...results.
We only ended up doing this one trail, thinking it was 'easy' we decided to stay off of the 'moderate' trails, but next time we'll hit more and cover more ground. Another pic and videos, and Jami should be following up with more.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnxS4lep-18
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQtW6u4f4_4