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Preface

Read this Article before you begin this ride report. 2Wheels had shared this article with us in a previous thread called Phantom Trail

As events of the day unfolded, we related to their ordeal looking for the "Phantom Trail" and took action we thought would prevent the same result for our group. Though we were just on a three hour ride around the Laguna Mountains, we found ourselves in similar circumstances and were able to quickly recognize our vulnerability. If not for previously having read the article and understanding the lessons it contained, we may have lost precious time convincing ourselves of the seriousness of our situation.

If in this report I imply blame on any one person over another, it is a flaw in my writing style. We all willingly participated. We gained more than we lost on this trip. We will ride stronger in the future.

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Report

Sunday Morning, 8:30am, September 10th, 2006

San Diego Adventure Riders

Riders: Carguy, Bikeslut, Woodys3b, Pyro, Sandiegoland

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The meet-up was at the parking off of I-8, Pine Valley Exit. We all departed after a short wait for any lurkers. By 8:42am we were northbound on Pine Creek Road. At 8:47am we took a peak at the spur road heading north along one of the creeks, but turned back as to not disturb other users parked at the trailhead.

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At 8:55am we found the gate open to Deer Park Road and made a nice loop around Pine Mountain. At 9:19am Woodys3b had a minor get-off due to his front wheel washing out, striking his right knee (he was the only knobbiless rider of the day). The group junctioned with S1, Sunrise Highway, at 9:31am. Carguy had planned on taking us down Thing Valley Road, but being near an area that I knew that Carguy had previously explored, I asked if he could divert us over to see some of those trailheads to the north.

At 9:36am we found the open gate across from the Lucky 5 Ranch near MM33 on S1.

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At 9:44am, 1.8 miles from S1, the group paused momentarily for a GPS battery change and a few quick photos. Everything to this point was fantastic. The canyon was spectacular. We could see a little two-track road on the desert floor below us.

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Out of curiosity, Carguy decided to proceed a bit further to see if the trail continued as is, or would start to deteriorate.

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At 9:56am, less than 4/10ths of a mile later, Carguy halted the group from proceeding further.

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LESSON:

If you didn’t read this Article before you began this ride report, read it now. We were all familiar with it, had discussed it, and wanted to avoid their mistakes.

CONTINUE

Here is where the analysis begins. The difference in perspective and lack of communication equipment would put one of the riders in peril within 3 hours.

At this stop Woodys3b already felt he would have difficulty returning the same route with his Bridgestone Trail Wings (80/20 combination dual-sport tires, not knobbies) and a few of the steep sandy sections we had already dropped down.

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Woodys3b wanted to scout the trail ahead to see if there were any unridable sections below that would prevent us from hooking up to the road we could see along the desert floor.

LESSON:

DECIDE GOALS AS A GROUP. My opinion was that even if this route down was doable I think I would have wanted to assess our resources before proceeding. If Woodys3b’s concern had been more clearly understood by everyone, I think we would have all been willing to put in the effort to get his bike turned around right then and there. From what I could see of the trail descending, it was beyond my skill level anyway.

CONTINUE...

LESSON

BRING BACKUP COMMUNICATIONS. I was the only one with an FRS/GMRS radio, so we were limited to cell phones if anyone wanted to communicate with anyone seperating from the group.

CONTINUE

At 9:57am Woodys3b descended over the ridge and in a short amount to time we had no sight of him.

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Carguy and I were not at all entertained with the idea of walking down. We had talked about the article and had concluded that any thorough exploration of promising trails should be done from the bottom going up. We have also spent a lot of time in these mountains and knew we had not prepared to cover a lot of ground on foot today (not to mention we're not as young as we used to be). After Woodys3b had been gone for quite sometime (or least longer than any of us had expected him to be gone), we talked about whether anyone wanted to head down to check up on him.

LESSON:

WITHOUT COMMUNICATIONS, ALWAYS HAVE A DROP DEAD TIME FOR A TRAIL SCOUT TO RETURN. Woodys3b was clearly on a task within his means and was in no way in need of assistance. If we had been able to talk with him or knew how much more time he needed – all would have been fine.

CONTINUE...

However not knowing Woodys3b’s location, and feeling a lot of concern for him, Bikeslut decided to follow the trail on his bike a short way, essentially "walking" his bike down. It was rideable in Bikeslut's view (or else why wouldn’t Woodys3b have returned right away? Right?). But as he descended with his motor cut, we really couldn’t follow his progress by sound.

After quite some time of not hearing from Bikeslut either, we tried to reach him by phone. Although we had concluded we had signal, no phone would connect to a tower from our location.

LESSON:

TEST YOUR PHONE WITH A CALL, do not assume you can connect to a cell tower solely from the signal strength bar on your phone. Your phone has a weaker transmitter than a backcountry cell tower).

CONTINUE

I walked a contour line south across a gorge to get better view of what was going on below. At that point I saw Woodys3b returning upslope on foot. I called out to him. He hollered back that we all needed to walk down and assist Bikeslut. I had to ask him again, though it was difficult from that distance to demand an explanation why. We had no choice but to descend.

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Part way down we ran into Woodys3b coming up. He looked a tad exhausted, considering what he had just climbed back up. He explained that he had helped Bikeslut pull his bike back up to the trail, which had flipped upside down into a ditch. Woodys3b said that Bikeslut needed help pulling it back across the washout he had flown over before landing in the ditch. Pyro stayed with Woodys3b, and Carguy and I continued our hike down. At 10:44am, about a little over a third of a mile and 500 foot plus descent from our bikes, we reached Bikeslut crouching by his DRZ, which was lying partially on it’s side.

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(What you can't see from this view is the 6' ditch between us)

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I pulled out a portable ATV tow-strap from my pack and we positioned ourselves to push, lift and drag Bikeslut’s bike across the washout to the trail upslope. With enough effort to warrant our first good break, we got the bike up over the wash, upright and ready to tackle the trail back up.

At this point we discovered that Bikeslut's bike had flooded from previously being on its side too long. In short order his battery would drain as he attempted to get it started. He was able to make a call to his wife (NEXTEL) to ask her to get a pre-charged battery from the shop and deliver it to the trailhead. Water I added, have her bring cold water to the trailhead. Lunch as well, Bikeslut decided. He figured at this point he owed us all lunch.

DISCUSSION QUESTION:

Why did we continue from this point? Why didn’t we leave to get the food and water we needed to complete the task?

I believe it was because no one wanted to suggest that the bike could not be ridden out at this point… however Carguy and I both knew just walking back up that hill with our water (~2 liters each at that point) was the limit of what we wanted to exert in the heat and altitude. This and we had not made a formal assessment of everyone else’s provisions. Yet, we continued – if not just a "tad" more…

CONTINUE

We made the decision to retrieve the battery out of my DRZ, and get Bikeslut’s bike at least back up to where the other bikes were parked. This was an arduous task, considering how steep and loose the grade was. To ride it was beyond my skill level, but then again, it was not seen as "unridable" overall. Bikeslut remained to remove his battery and save energy for the ride up, as Carguy began to walk back up.

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Carguy met Pyro and Woodys3b half way up, and they took over and continued on to retrieve the battery.

After several more attempts to start the bike with a surface charge on the battery, I helped Bikeslut remove his battery. Not knowing the "relay effort" that was put in place, I walked up the hill to meet Carguy coming down, but stopped when I got within site of him where he had handed off the task to Woodys3b and Pyro. We were all beginning to conserve as much energy and water as possible, so I tucked in under some brush for shade and waited. Pyro relayed the battery to Carguy who continued on down to deliver it to Bikeslut's DRZ. Pyro and I remained in shaded postitions, standing by to help spot Bikeslut on his way back up.

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Carguy and Bikeslut got the bike fired up and the bike was soon underway. It made it to the position on the hill I was waiting at.

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After getting stopped on a steep section, Bikeslut got off on the side to help push, while Carguy pulled and I pushed from the rear fender. When Bikeslut needed to take a break I offered to straddle the bike (I’m a tad long legged) and walk it up as best I could. I was afraid that Bikeslut was expending a bit too much energy on each push from the side, being that he was also at the controls. If I could stand over it at least, I would be able to keep it balanced without getting caught up in pushing it to exhaustion.

Pyro made it down to where we were struggling with the bike and gave me a good few pulls on a section that was a tad less steep. He helped me get some momentum, jumped out of the way, and threw the tow-strap to the side where it hopefully wouldn’t catch on the chain or some vegetation. I managed as best as I could to keep the bike rolling upslope as long as I could, but gravity, lack of traction, and probably some hesitation on picking a line through the array of deep drainage ruts hidden by the brush caused me to eventually come to a stop too. Trying to keep the engine running, I was unable to hold ground with my feet and the front brake and had to dig in and stall-out in gear to keep the bike from sliding backwards. Just sitting over the bike for a few minutes with the heat pouring out, I was also starting to feel exhausted.

Pyro took over balancing the bike and I headed back to the shade where Bikeslut was sprawled out, fire ants be damned. After a more than ten minutes of not feeling much recovery, I asked Pyro to just dig the kickstand in and come over and join us. The four of us discussed our options. Bikeslut was out of water, and out of energy. We planted the seeds for calling it quits on the bike for the day. At around 1:15pm, when Woodys3b made it back down to where we were, Bikeslut took no convincing to throw in the towel on the bike for now. Being it was his bike, and his uphill battle began with a ditch extraction, he had undoubtedly put in a disproportionate amount of effort in the recovery. Unfortunately it was too late for Bikeslut to get himself out under his own power. He had reached the point of exhaustion and was likely going to soon succumb to a heat injury.

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Bikeslut called 911, getting passed along through various dispatchers -- each of whom passed no coordinate information to the next. As fatigue set in and frustration mounted, Woodys3b took over on the phone and completed the call with the dispatchers.

LESSON:

KNOW YOUR LOCAL DISPATCH NUMBERS to circumvent delays or getting transferred around in the cellular 911 Dispatch System.

CONTINUE

LESSON:

Set your GPS to “Degrees, Minutes, Seconds” for emergency services or aircraft recovery personnel.

CONTINUE

When the emergency services had been dispatched and were in route, Pyro, Carguy and I decided to make our own progress on getting out. Woodys3b elected to remain with Bikeslut. I retrieved my battery out of Bikeslut’s DRZ, and Carguy and I gave Bikeslut a liter of water between us before heading up the hill. We still had enough time in the day to access our own situation and make an attempt to ride out under power.

I carried my battery back up the hill, probably spending, along with breaks, at least 45 minutes to climb to our bikes. The first helicopter arrived on the scene at approximately 2:23pm. Both a Fire Suppression/Air Ambulance and a Sheriff’s Spotter circled the area.

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Being higher up and out of view, I told our group not to wave, but rather point downslope to Bikeslut and Woodys3b’s position. The spotter soon circled over the smaller group, and sometime shortly after 2:30pm Bikeslut was extracted from the canyon.

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I got my battery reinstalled and covers buttoned up, and we all got our bikes turned around to attempt a ride out. Not knowing if Woodys3b had been extracted too, we followed his last instructions; retrieving his tailbag, wallet, ignition keys, garage door opener, etc. I tied his tailbag on my DRZ, and left his empty jacket and helmet behind.

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Carguy moved out first, Pyro second, and I struggled to get enough momentum to find a fresh line behind them. Every run was digging in a good size trench in the difficult spots. We were too exhausted to spot each other, and my lack of energy was translating directly to the throttle. My hesitant control was making the bike anemic. I had no balance and no processing power to attack the lines from the vegetation camouflaged ditches and gullies. The first run proved to be formidable obstacle for me.

Pyro returned down and pointed out some possible lines, but after each attempt I felt like I had run a mile. At one point I tipped over trying to turn the bike around across the eroded trail. Pyro was still moving with confidence, had a good line picked out, and offered to give my bike a go. I conceded quickly, as to not hold the remaining group back any more. In one run he rode my bike to a point it I could get started again. The three of us were back together and proceeded about another 2/10ths of a mile. This time Pyro took the lead and forged ahead.

Within minutes Pyro was well out of site. He had proceeded ahead and caught up to where the Sheriff’s Spotter helicopter had landed. The sheriff instructed him in absolute terms to not head back down for us -- but rather to wait and call for emergency services not one minute past 5:00pm is we did not show up to that location. After that would be too late to dispatch someone to fly in.

I caught up with Carguy on a sandy grade where we would both ultimately leave our bikes for the night. He signaled me to go ahead. Knowing my condition and that I might destroy the track, I preferred that he go first, but he insisted. Later I found out, that although he certainly would have made a better go at it, he too was just getting exhausted on the bike, as he was beginning to cramp up. I made three or four attempts to reach a switchback, but on all accounts could not get within 10 feet of hardpack. Woodys3b had caught up walking to us (he had decided to not even attempt to ride out). I asked him to hold the front of my bike stready while I would pick the back up and scissor walk the bike upslope out of the deep sand to some hardpack just 10 feet away -- a task I could normally do with ease. I could not move the bike 2 inches upslope. Woodsy3b gave me the knod that it was time to leave the bike for another day. I rolled the bike back down and found a firm spot out of Carguy's way to dig the kickstand in. I retrieved a snake bite kit and some sentimetal tools, but left all else to nature (first aid kit, rain jacket, spare tube, etc.)

I apologized to Carguy for the condition I left the track in, and within minutes he had secured his bike too, burying his rear wheel in a ditch I had made just minutes before. Without momentum or our ability to give even a minimal push, he voted to join us and stick together as a group on foot.

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At Approximately 3:40pm, Woodys3b, Carguy and I began at worst case, a 2 mile walk (along with 750 feet of elevation gain) to S1 with no more than 0.5 liters of water per person. We took breaks often, but did our best to continue making progress. Carguy was continuing to cramp up, I was secretly monitoring my heart rate, while Woodys3b was mum about any issues. We discussed whether Pyro had taken it upon himself to go ahead and fetch water, which had been a suggestion of mine for someone to do as early as noon. Unbeknownst to us he had been instructed by the Sheriff to wait at a position about only about 0.4 miles from we had just left our bikes.

At 4:20pm I had just started to feel my first cramps in my left thigh, when Woodys3b spotted Pyro waiting for us. Without water, we made a quick decision to shuttle out on Pyro’s KLR. It seemed to be between Carguy and I to go first, but Woodys3b suggested I go first and try to arrange a ride out from the road.

Pyro had me back on S1 at 4:38pm. With still no ability to make a cell call, I tried to flag down the first car, which simply roared on by. Across the road a man in a pick-up was coming out of the Lucky 5 Ranch gate and I asked him about whether he had cell coverage. He offered to run me down the road until my phone connected. I managed to get a call to my wife, who was able to take off immediately with a full tank of gas and all the water she could grab. When I returned to the trailhead Woodys3b was just getting carted out. I saw some water in the rancher's truck and asked if I could purchase them for the guys coming out. He happily handed them over and wouldn’t accept a dime for them.

When Pyro rolled out with Carguy in tow, we all had water to drink and a car on the way.

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Pyro had made a good effort throughout the day, but had not found himself in the circumstances to have depleted his body of energy and water like the rest of us had. Woodys3b had walked the farthest and had helped pull the bike out of the ditch; Carguy and I had pushed and climbed with the bike the farthest. Ultimately those factors, and his youth, kept Pyro from succumbing to the effects of exhaustion. Either that ladies, or he’s just one tough hombre! Regardless, his ability to get his bike past the obstacles that defeated us, saved each of us from a little over 1.5 miles of hiking -- which would have been a lot of hardship to say the least.

Now who wants to go rough-road 2UP'ing with Pyro. No bottoming out now!!

=====

Pyro

hearby recieves the

2006 Golden Doo-Hickey Award

for Excellence in KLRdom. :D

On all rides for the next fiscal year, he shall

receive a free glass of ice-water at any place

we eat lunch, and will get preferred parking at

any locations that we park on SDAR rides.

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(Pyro slathering on the sunscreen... :D )

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It was supposed to be less then "A Three hour tour, A Three hour tour". It is funney how that makes sense now? I guess I am dating myself.

This was a ride origanally posted by Rideorange that I was going to join.

Sunday morning 8/10

I haven't rode in a couple of weeks and wokeup early. I decieded to ride Bear Valley until everyone showed at 830.

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It was quite brisk in the morning.

Leading it is hard to take pictures without stopping the ride. So feed off Sandiegolands pics. Started off with some trails in the Laguna's and ended up looking for the trail to the desert floor from Laguna.

I have looked in this area before for the route down and didn't find it. Today, Riding along I saw a faint trail. I doubled back to investigate. The other 4 riders followed.

We got to a point and I stopped.

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This would have been an easy out from here. I asked If WE should continue from here. Nothing but thumbs up!!

It was very inviting.

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It was one of those trails you have heard of and never found until now, almost exciting.

At this point I did not feel we were in too far. We could have made it out without much effort. Because no one had been in there for some time the SAND/DG had a crust for the ride down that we quickly pulverized with five bikes on the way down.

Then we got here. Sorry, I woosed out.

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Keep in mind these pics do not accurately show the steepness/gradient, Crap, IT IS STRAIGHT DOWN!!! I had a hard time walking down it!

Looking backup did not look so bad from here.

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Well as Sandiegoland had mentioned we were called to help the down rider. Long walk down a steep hill to find.

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Here is where Bikeslut pointed to the ditch were he ended up in, Woodsy3b had helped him out of.

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Here is where I expended most of my energy trying to pull a motorcycle up hill in the sand.

For all the Keyboard riders that think it would be easy, just post and I will lead you there to prove yourselfs. Sorry, It was not easy.

With Bikeslut Depleted Sandiegoland took over with the up hill climb.

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This is where the bike ended up after a gallant attempt.

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From here I was getting wooped big time.

911 call, someone to cover the down rider and the quest out. Sounds Simple?

We agreeded to Woodys3B staying with bikeslut until the choppers arived.

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The rest of us started out. 3 men trying to ride up 30% grade in loose D.G. exausted.

We rode to this point and had to take a break again. Looks easy Huh?

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The water did not come into play until the hike out. I tried one last effort to get the Honda out with little help and ended up diging it in here for the week.

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We agreeded to work as a team and walk out before sunset. We walked out for what seemed to be 10 miles to meet pyro who gave us a ride to pavement.

Here Sandiegoland thanked the pavement gods for getting us out.

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I/we got my bike out a week later with the help of Sandiegoland and owe him a great debt of gratitude, Thanks :D:D:D:D:D:D .

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From Men's Journal: "Ernest Hemingway believed a man should venture 'past where he can go, out to where no one can help him.' which is, appropriately, as succinct a description of the spirit of adventure as one could want."

I'm glad everyone made it back.

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Great job on the write up guys, and thanks for the cool award! I wonder if I can put that on my resumé . . . :D

This is an accurate account of the events that took place that day, and I'm not sure if there is anything I can add to it. It is very true that the photos don't do that trail justice. It was quite steep, the dirt consisted of 6-12 inches of super soft powder in some sections, and at the spot where Carguy stopped the group (thank god!), that knarly rut to the left of the trail just got deeper and deeper as the trail got steeper. I am pretty sure that if we had all continued riding down beyond this point, we all would have been in a heap of trouble. It turned out that we were already in a bit of trouble, we just didn't know it yet.

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I was worried about being able to make it back up the steep and loose sections that we had already covered. It was starting to get very hot, and the dougnut I had for breakfast at 5:30am was long gone. Shade is very hard to come by out there, but what little shade we could find was literally a life saver. Special thanks to Woody for suggesting that I crawl into this spot while waiting for a sign of life from below.

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By the time Carguy, Sandiegolands and I finally made it back to our bikes to attempt the ride out, I was down to my last swig of water. I looked up at that first hill we had to tackle and told myself that I have to make it. Seeing Carguy do it successfully gave me some confidence. When I finally got going it went much smoother than I expected, which gave me a huge boost. Once we were back underway my strategy was to get as much momentum as possible and keep the bike moving at all costs. I barely made it up over the next hill and it took every ounce of sauce that I had left in me. Luckily that was the last difficult part of the trail.

When I reached the top of the trail the sheriff helecopter was parked on the adjacent hill. I immediately rode over, thanked them for coming, and asked the status of the airlift. They informed me that they had taken one man out successfully, and that the other guy was walking out. They were unaware that there was actually 3 guys still trying to make it out of there.

The two Sheriffs wanted to know what my situation was, so I explained everything. They gave me a Gatoraid and asked what my plan was. While chugging down the gatoraid, I started to tell them that I needed to head back down a little ways to help my friends get out of there. They immediatly disagreed, telling me that my face was red as a tomato and that I looked beat. 'So now what's your plan" they asked. My head was swimming and I was feeling delerious. The blazing heat, dehydration, overexertion and lack of food had taken their toll . . . I honestly did not know what to do, so I told them that, and asked if they would help me figure out my next move.

They instruced me to sit tight and wait, giving me a 5pm deadline on calling them back in for backup. I asked them to do a flyby on their way out to check on the rest of the team's progress. They agreed and flew off, so I crawled in under a bush and waited. 15 minutes later they flew back over and I saw one of them signal a thumbs up. "Awesome, we're going to make it" i said to myself. I thought I heard motorcycles approaching several times, but they never arrived. About an hour later I heard voices and jumped up out of the bushes. I thankfully greeted all three remaining riders, and the rest is history.

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Whew!!!! Gald to hear that you all made it out okay. You guys deserve lots of credit for realizing your situation, and taking the right action to prevent any possible tradgedies. On my ride today, I cruised along Sunrise highway and was trying to picture where you guys went off at. I certainly don't want to try it.......some of the trails I saw going down off S1 were pretty knarly, but where abouts did you guys go? The write up was great!!! Not to put more importance on the writng as the adventure itself, but you probably have put the thought in alot of riders minds about thinking ahead on the trail, and weighing the risks invovled with our sport. Hopefully this adventure will help others down the road. :D Here's to getting back in one piece :D Rick

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Wow, what an ride guys. I'm glad everyone made it out OK. When I first started reading this I thought to myself "Wow I'm lucky I couldn't make it that day" but then I thought to myself, maybe if I had been able to make it we would of had more manpower and supplies to get out of the situation or it just could have been more carnage. Either way after thinking about it I'm bummed I missed the ADVENTURE. :D

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Postlog

The recovery effort of Bikeslut's DRZ400S by helicopter, and Woodys3b's DR650E and my DRZ400S from the ground is loosely documented at ADVrider.com - stuck bike.

As Carguy mentioned, we returned Saturday to recover his bike. Carguy and I returned refreshed, rehydrated, and delivered ourselves within 3/10ths of a mile of his bike by 4WD. We lifted his bike out of the hole, and together he walked it under power about 25 feet to harder pack.

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We caught our breaths for a moment, and just like that, off he went - all the way to terra firma!

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=====

My current speculation of this road we dropped in on, from the cut* and proximity to ranches at both ends of the path, is that this was a cattle trail. Someone might have run a bulldozer down it sometime ago to clarify the track (or for fire fighting), but it has clearly been abandoned for years.

*The way the trail cuts to the desert indicates this is an old track. Nothing like this would have been permitted anytime recently. There is a similar road leading down the east side of Volcan Mountain, from Simmons Flat to Arkansas/San Felipe Canyon. Phillip Rutherford himself told me once it was for running cattle off the mountain in the Winter.

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I'm glad you all made it back :D I appreciate the excellent write up, specially with a perspective on learning from mistakes (good and bad decisions taken). As a newbe rider, I tend to just put myself at the hands of who ever is leading, without proper tools or emergency equipment. It is a good lesson to be much more prepare for this type of rides, and make sure we all communicate well with each other about our intentions (including energy level or security). Sometimes, when riding in a group, even at my age, there is some peer pressure to continue or not to question decisions in different situations (that happened on my last ride where some suggested to continue through a very hard single trail, and I was feeling without energy due to the heat). So, YES, it's important to speak up, assess, and communicate with the rest of the group... I guess the important thing is to learn, improve, as to make adventures that are fun, but also safe. I plan to read this write up multiple times to learn.. Thanks to all that posted about this adventure and situation! May we continue making adventures in a responsible, safe and fun way!! :D

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.

.......... BOY, THATS THE BIGGEST FISH STORY I'VE EVER HEARD...........

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THANKS JOHN.

Actually john had been keeping me updated the whole time,

Man I cant believe I wasnt there for you guys, that day, or with all the recovery of the bikes, I really do have a sence of letting you guys down, especially you john, we havent missed a ride together since we joined last year,

sure glad you stopped everyone when you did,, this ride was alot like the klr canyon ride, except it only took a couple of hours to backtrack up and out of there.

"GREAT" write up D' Land , you should make a cd-rom out of it.. but could'nt help but think i was watching a old dragnet episode, with all the time entries and all,, actually your post from the very first ride I went one, really is what sparked me up on getting into posting, ,,,,,,,,, keep'em comming.........

PRYO, how much you want for that Golden DooHicky, I've replaced mine allready with the eagle mikes, aftermarket one,, but its not Golden, and I just bought it,, I didnt "earn" it,, good job on ridin that KLR up and out of there, of course now your going to have to take me there , just to see if i can make it up and out of there on my KLR

.....ANYONE ELESE WANTA GO.......

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I e mailed this link to a good friend of mine at work, gary brady' who does custom off road fabracation, and had just done some work for one of the guys that was on the "real" phantom trail ride, i asked him to foward this link to him so they could see that there story has really done some good...so one or all of them should be reading this post very soon..

ATTN; JOHN MARKING AND OTHER PHANTOM TRAIL RIDERS..

A HUGE THANK YOU FROM GETTING YOUR STORY OUT THERE,

............ FROM ALL OF US HERE AT " SAN DIEGO ADVENTURE RIDERS "

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Right on KAW-EE ! We can set it up as a mini Pikes Peak style event for KLRs only, and do time trials. A day or two of that and all that loose dirt will be gone, and then we'll have to find something harder! mawAHHAAHAHAHAHAH . . . actually lets skip that idea. I am curious aboutt some of the other trails up top there that we didn't get to see. I have a feeling Carguy knows miles of good stuff around there.

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Well

Somebody on that site apparently knows Eakins... I don't even know him, and I can tell he's an a-hole.

IF one of you guys are a member over there, you can assure them I am not a noob... 35 years riding dirt bikes, 25 years riding street bikes, never been in a helicopter, ambulance, etc. before. I had a gallon of fluids with me, and about 5000 calories in my backpack. My bike got wedged in a ditch, and I expended too much energy getting it. Yeah I made a HUGE mistake.

As far as gear... uh... I am on a DRZ with lower (14/47) gearing, D606 tires below recommended psi, with Maier bark busters, case savers, radiator guards, jet kit/airbox mods, rim locks. I am wearing moto boots, knee pads (oh wait; I gave those to Woody after he hit his knee), elbow pads, chest protector, wrap around prescription shades (I am legally blind without glasses) helmet , gloves... What am I missing?

And... THEY can't give Pyro crap for now wearing foot protection! Only WE can give Pyro crap for that... which we already had...

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I've done SAR stuff with Civil Air Patrol in the back country of San Diego. 

We don't have Civil Air Patrol in San Diego! Don't get me started on CAP in Imperial County.

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I wouldn't disparage anyone for remarking on the story. Some will relate to our experience, some will learn from it, some will "know better."

Anyway, if we wanted to be beyond reproach, we would've used our screen names... err, wait a sec.... uh we did! :P

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It is very interesting how people overanalize information without all the facts.

I have said in the past. If you think you could do better, ringup and I will show the way! B):P:blink:

Lets ride!!

P.S. San Diego is not a Country, it is a County!

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