2019-03-23 Little Moab Do-over run
On Saturday March 23, several FR4x4 members and friends gathered to run Missouri Gulch, Illinois Gulch, and play on the Little Moab / Moab Hill obstacle for the anniversary run do-over gathering. For context, the anniversary run was officially last weekend, but a spring blizzard dumped a bunch of snow on the area the Wednesday before the run, which resulted in many folks changing or cancelling their wheeling plans. A group from FR4x4 did wheel last weekend and had a good time snow bashing, though they were unable to complete the entire trail loop due to the deep snow.
Apologies in advance for getting names wrong or forgetting them altogether. We had many, many new faces and rigs yesterday, and I'm not particularly good with new names when there are only a couple to remember.
Yesterday, Jackie and her daughter were joined by Trent & family, Jeff & dog, Matt, Evan & crew, Ben & crew and Isaac (? red Tacoma). Along the trail, we apparently picked up two additional folks after departing little Moab.
We met before 9 in Sedalia (nearly everyone was early and anxious to wheel), and departed the gas station at 9:30 without Isaac, who had not arrived. We stopped halfway to the trail head at a public campsite restroom, where we met up with Isaac and continued on our way to the trail. We arrived, aired down, and were on the trail at approximately 11 am. The parking lot was quite full, and Evan had previously warned that another group of up to 50 Jeeps was expected on the trail today. We proceeded directly to the Little Moab obstacle, and found about a dozen rigs already in the area playing on the hill. We played at the hill for a couple hours with no significant incidents. We watched some of the other rigs on the trail experience some damage (a broken locking hub on a built up Tacoma, a crunched bumper on a newer 4runner, and a land rover that nearly rolled over sideways). I think our only casuality was a plastic running board piece on Ben's new-to-him 4runner.
I think every rig in our group made an attempt at the hill obstacle. Every rig that attempted the hill ultimately succeeded, despite the muddy, slippery conditions.
After playing on the hill, Evan led us out of the trail on a loop back to the parking lot. We encountered deep, fresh snow on a long north-facing descent. Most rigs slid slowly down this hill, while Evan broke new trail. This was the only section of trail we drove where snow covered the entire trail width. In other places, there was snow packed on one side of the trail, but two tires were always able to find dirt. It was along this stretch that we realized we had picked up two additional rigs (a white JKR and a nicely built late-model Tacoma).
We stopped briefly for a mechanical issue -- Ben found his rear passenger shock was not bolted to the frame mount correctly, but we did not have appropriate hardware to reattach it. After proceeding a short ways, we also encountered some dead fall that slowed our progress, as we had to clear a couple of ~4" diameter trees from the trail. Shortly after this, we left the snowy section and stopped for a group photo. Our new additions (JKR and Tacoma) lined up with the group for a photo, to everyone's amusement.
After the photo, we quickly returned to a graded dirt road and made our way back to the trail head to air up and depart.
Snow was light, the temperature comfortably in the 40s and 50s, and the sun was out. It was a beautiful day to be out on the trail with good company. I do not have any photos from today, but I hope this thread starter helps to motivate the addition of photos from the rest of the crew.
Thanks to all for coming out, and Evan for leading the group through the trail.
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