Twas a great EJS (pics)

Well, we got in at 3:00am this morning and I thought I'd give you MY version of the Safari.


Moab Rim and Kane Creek Canyon
Hell's Revenge
Golden Spike
Boulder Alley
Lower Proving Grounds


Friday: We got there last Friday and met some kids from Colorado with an XJ and a TJ. The XJ was immaculate with a 14 bolt rear and 30 front (think 25"track width). The rear shocks were taped on (this is true). No headlights (just 1 fog light taped to the center of the bumper bar). And other sweet mods you'd have to see to believe. I wish I had pictures of it.


Saturday: Metal Masher. I almost rolled once. After he busted both 260s and both front axles I ended up pulling old 1430 (that's what we call him) up Rock Chucker, Mirror Gulch, and Widow Maker (all on Metal Masher) because he didn't want to use the bypasses. Ater we finished that trail we went and fixed his junk with the only parts we could find, both front axles and a 260 on the left and a 297 on the right. I ran Potato Salad Hill at the end of the day.


Sunday: Moab Rim in the morning and Kane Creek Canyon in the afternoon. The wife and I met up with OneTon and TC, the only other members (thanks to all who said they'd be there and weren't), 2 other XJs, 2 Rookiecons, and a TJ. I made it up the optional ledge with no problems (hey TC, can I have your Atlas and ARBs since you dont need 'em? :wave: ).



We had a great time and drank some beer :cheers: and ate burgers at the cabin while TC worked on his front end :repair: .


Monday: Hell's Revenge. The rain made it a little slick but after it dried up it was great. TC worked on his front end again, twice :repair:



.

OneTon tried to instigate me into doing every tub on the trail (the bastard). I blew a tire sliding into a tree trying to get around to Mickey's Hot Tub. While changing it a built Zuki rolled in it

,

which didn't help me one bit :shiver: . I made it out of Mickey's without help and had to retrieve my teflon leaf pads from the murky sludge (can you say axle wrap from hell? slap slap slap). No breakage. I ran Tater Salad again that evening.


Tuesday: Golden Spike. After OneTon couldn't find the way to Poison Spider, I had to take over before we ended up in Grand Junction. Great time, no breakage. After changing my shorts from a VERY near rollover, things got fun.



We shot the shit with Walker Evans at the Crack



and after he left we moved on to Double Whammy where right out gate a buggy rolled and dumped the liquid contents of his tranny out so we could slip and slide and get all oily turning him back over.



We never did see him make it up because we moved on after I made it with no problems (hey TC, get some sleep the night before next time and maybe you'll find the line :wave: )



. That night OneTon tried to instigate me (again) to run Tater Salad in the dark. "No thanks Jackass, I'd rather not push my luck and miss "that" trail tomorrow. I said no!".


Wednesday: "That" trail and Lower Proving Grounds. Before the day started, I got to meet Willie Worthy in the City Market parking lot (thanks Dan)(what a treat). Moved on to Super Secret after Hinkley figured out his busy schedule and as OneTon already said, great run, nuff said.



And Mark just looked funny.





Me and Hinkley (er, I mean Hunter Hinkley) ran Lower and I only used my passenger side for a crutch once ( :smsoap: thanks OneTon Jackass)



and changed my mind on the waterfall after OneTon talked me out of it (wait a minute, isn't he supposed to be the instigator?) And young Hunter didn't even want to use Sean's spotting :laugh: . He had better lines than Hinkleberry.



Afterwards we went and drank beer :cheers: outside Marks mobile Taj Mahal in a monsoon (he didn't want tracks inside :laugh3: ) with him, (Big) Dan, (Little) Dan, and Sean while Hunter played XBox. Here's Hinkley installing his new prototype rear rag top.




Thursday: The wife and I left Mecca and returned to our haven.


We had a great time despite the morning rains and we took almost 200 pictures and video.


Thanks OneTon, TC, Dan, Mark Hinkley, and everyone else for making the the best trip ever.


Oh by the way, Sean, If you want your shirt you lent me you'll have to come down to Disney next month and get it.

Cool pics.
Looks like Mark got his new doors on.

Jes

Nice pics!

Great write up!
Awesome pics!!

Okie Terry said:

That night OneTon tried to instigate me (again) to run Tater Salad in the dark.

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He did't learn his lesson from last Oct. I see.

Looks like you guys had a lot of fun!

Okie Terry said:

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it was nice of hinkley to teach xjguy how to drive......

Beezil said:

it was nice of hinkley to teach xjguy how to drive......

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:laugh2: :laugh2: :laugh2:

This thread sucks.
BIGTIME!
Alright Okie I take back every nice thing I said about ya, (that is if I woulda said anything nice).
Tell me one thing, where's the pics of me strapping yer arse after that Einstein line into the tree? Hmmm.TC
BTW, it's called Beauty Sleep, you should take a tip from Rip Van Winkle.

TC said:

This thread sucks.
BIGTIME!
Alright Okie I take back every nice thing I said about ya, (that is if I woulda said anything nice).
Tell me one thing, where's the pics of me strapping yer arse after that Einstein line into the tree? Hmmm.TC
BTW, it's called Beauty Sleep, you should take a tip from Rip Van Winkle.

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I never said I needed help backing out of that stoopid tree. OneTongue wanted to feel like he was important so I let him. That friggin' tree jumped out and bit me but I never said I was stuck.

BTW you need more of that there beauty sleep, Rip Van Wrinkled.

what tree?

I thought you guys said you were in moab?

Beezil said:

what tree?

I thought you guys said you were in moab?

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There's a pine tree in a small depression just across from the entrance to Mickey's Hot Tub.

The only friggin tree on Hells revenge and I slid into it.

The only solice came from the fact that the broken branches on it said that I wasn't the first.

awesome pics and write-up..... what would you geusstimate the total attendance on the bigest day was?? i have heard that 1000 rigs on saturday is not unusual, but seems a bit steep to me.... i may hit the EJS next year if i cant do it in october.

mike

sidriptide said:

awesome pics and write-up..... what would you geusstimate the total attendance on the bigest day was?? i have heard that 1000 rigs on saturday is not unusual, but seems a bit steep to me.... i may hit the EJS next year if i cant do it in october.

mike

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Thanks Mike.

I left Thursday morning to avoid such a crowd. I get fidgety when I'm around too many people and I start shooting.

While the census for this years EJS seemed way down, I'm sure Big Saturday was still an impressive sight.

TC or OneTon would be able to let you know about the actual size of the Sat. confusion as they stayed for it.

By the way, Tim, did your daughter ever get to have a birthday or is she still waiting?

It's hard to say how many rigs were there, many of them are non-registered . Red Rock would have the numbers. It was kind of a weird year, we didn't see the normal groups of similar vehicles this time like Mogs, Landrovers, Military etc.. There were tons of Buggys and buggified Jeeps this year, I wouldn't be surprised to see them outnumber the other types of rigs soon. I did a last minute T-shirt dash while the BIG Sat group left town so I didn't see much of it. It's neat to see all of those 4X's at once but I've never run the trails on Big Sat, we usually leave right after or more often the day before.
My daughters b-day is this fri the 16th so I'm good. TC

I hate to be an ass, but I am sorry I didn't show on Sunday. Daylight Savings messed me up I think, or I just didn't set the alarm right.
But I talked to another XJer who was there specifically for that and he said one XJ showed up . . .

We waited around for an hour just for you people that didn't remember how to tell time. Oh well, it was a good time and I like small groups anyhow.

PC-UT-XJ said:

I hate to be an ass, but I am sorry I didn't show on Sunday. Daylight Savings messed me up I think, or I just didn't set the alarm right.
But I talked to another XJer who was there specifically for that and he said one XJ showed up . . .

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There were 4 XJs on that run plus some other lesser models. Like OneTon said, we waited an extra hour AND we sent someone back to City Market after we had already gotten to the trailhead just to pick up any stragglers that missed the time change.

Don't feel like an ass, because shit does happen, but you missed a great time on those two runs that day and the whole rest of the week.