Snow wheeling and 10-100s.

Hello again fellow passengers! Glad you could join us for our last trail of the 2010 Moab Easter Jeep Safari. Steve posted some pics from today which I am sure you have already looked at. There are lots more to come, but please be patient. We may even be home for a little while before they all get posted.
So our morning started off early as we had to meet the group at 7:30am for an 8am departure for the trail head. It was only about 43F when we left the condo. No longer the t-shirt and sunblock weather we had seen early in the week, but the newsletter had warned that you should expect anything from the 80s to snow during the EJS, and guess what? They were right.
The Top of the World trail is a long run, apparently not usually returning until after dark. We think we know how they could fix that in the future. We didn't leave for the trail head until around 8:20 for no reason that we could discern. We stood around forever once we got to the trail head so people could use the washroom (that is a 10-100 in CB code) before, and after, the driver meeting. We stopped for another 10-100 about 20 minutes after getting underway. Not long after we were again waiting for some people to return to their Jeeps from a self-directed 10-100. Notice a pattern? Steve said that they should have had the trail run sponsored by Depends. I think he was right...
So we get going into the 4x4in' and it is a lot tamer than the other stuff we'd been on this week. It was still interesting to me as I am still learning about picking lines, what gear to have the Jeep in for different situations, and that kind of thing. The scenery was, once again, unbelievable. We could see snow higher up and wondered how much there would be. The trail leaders were discussing the options as the snow could complicate things by making the rocks really slippery, and by turning the dirt to mud. The clouds had been breaking up so we had sunshine for a while. Then they started coming back.
We had some fun wheeling in the snow that was there. Not a lot of it, but enough to give some people some trouble on the hills. There was an old Suzuki Samurai that was definitely having some problems, and he helped the leaders decide to cut the harder parts of the trail out. We were still going to the Top, but the return trip would skip Rose Garden Hill and the box canyon in the Onion Creek area. We would be done early. That meant that we could hit the Vendor Show today and get a jump on the trip home and the possible bad weather expected in Colorado. That was about the only benefit.
The view from the Top of the World was crazy. You are 7000ft up looking down over the valley and canyons below. Incredible. We had stopped for lunch and the picture taking, and we watched as the clouds dumped snow on the surrounding areas. Then it started to snow on us, too. It was actually pretty neat. It was supposed to be 20+C back home, and here we are in Moab getting snowed on. As we were pulling away from the lunch stop someone came on the CB and said "The Canadian in the green JK. You got a coffee mug on your rear bumper". It ended up belonging to the guy from San Diego that we had been talking with at lunch.
The drive back down the trail with the snow blowing and no longer being able to see more than a few hundred yards out was just cool. Before the clouds moved in we could see for miles from the Top. Then you couldn't. Can't think of any other way to describe it, just cool. Maybe you had to be there, but I was and I think it was cool. So there. Just another reason to get a Jeep of your own so you can go there and see it for yourself. Let me know if you feel like you're gonna get pulled off the side of the cliff if you get too close. I did, and so did Steve. It's pretty crazy.
Well it is getting late and I've gone on long enough I'm sure. I know i'm leaving you hanging but I need to get some sleep before we start our journey home. We still have 3 more days of driving ahead, it just won't be as fun as what we have been doing over the last 4 days. So stay tuned because you never know where we may end up trying to rest our heads on the way home!

Life is good... very good indeed for this Jeep freak and his brother...

See you again soon we hope!