Day 3 of the Weekend @ Paragon! Well, day 2 for us, but you get the idea. The park was barren today! There was a group of three mild EBs that got into the park before we did, and off into the trails. We hung around waiting for somebody, anybody, set up decently so we could run some harder trails, and ended up waiting till about 11am when Bill showed up. We tried with no avail to hook up with the other guys, so he went back to Red Ridge w/ his brother Matt to get his big bronco so wed have a third vehicle and be able to get into the park. Of course, that one had a busted front axle shaft, but park staff didnt need to know that! We decided to get right into it, and went down Valley over to a new trail called Confused (Black 2). Dawn wanted to drive, so i said ok, and hopped out to spot her thru the trail. She did pretty good; other than wacking the front right corner lense she didnt really have any problems navigating the trail. From there she drove down Cherokee Ridge, over to Sherbert Rocks (another Black 2). Me & her alternated driving on that one before i took back over for the day. There's some awesome climbs on this one! Dawn came down an awesome one, and then i (following matt in bills rig) went up another awesome one. Wheelbase prevailed and i was able to get up the harder line. Right after that we ran into the other group of EBs, so we BSed with them for a couple minutes and then headed over to Rabbit Run (now rated as a Black 2). This is a badass trail. Its all uphill. Windy, narrow, lot of big rocks, just awesome. At the top is a series of rock ledges all close together, and all muddy, which makes for a slippery ascent up to the exit! ...if you can make it. im told no one was able to make it up the entire weekend. Until we got there. The decision was for me to go first since if i couldnt get up it oh well, but if i did, and Bill couldnt, he could use me as a winch point. So up we went. And damn if it aint a sweet trail! The top is hard. Took a bunch of tries & alot of wheelspin...but we did it! First truck of the weekend (and by now the weekend was about over) to comquer the trail im told. Matt was driving Bills, and they HAD it, damn i swear they had it and then BAM! the rear driveshaft let loose. That was 2 in 3 days!! So we used mine as a winch point, and with great difficulty winched him up to a point where they were able to finish in front wheel drive. From there we had to go back down into the park to get Bill's big one, which was down on 37 just before Rabbit Run. So, with time against us, we went down turtle to turtle's tail over to 37, which is an access rd. But, on our descent we realized the big guy would never make it back up that way in 2wd, it was just too steep and rocky. So we decided to go back to Cherokee Ridge and take that back up to Valley. Well, Cherokee Ridge is a one-way for the second half, as its a steep descent. Which turned into a steep rocky ascent for us! The big guy didnt do so well, and i ended up hooking a strap and pulling him allll the way up and to Valley! Talk about an exercise in pain! Fortunately the bronco held up fine, and we made it back to Valley w/o any problems. From there we hooked back up with Matt, and the 3 of us booked it back to the parkinglot to arrive at 4:59PM. What a day of wheelin! |
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