At the beginning of the summer, Karl's friend told him that the summer was so full he would not have any open time to use his quads and offered one of them to us. Several weeks later, before taking the heavy equipment up for a couple months of work in the Telluride area, Kirk called Karl and told him to come over and get one of his ATVs so we would have it when we wanted it. Wow. . . talk about a generous guy. Karl has really appreciated the 3 generations of Huff Excavating, not just as friends, but as subcontractors who are really good at what they do. Grandpa Buck finally lost his battle with the cancer he was fighting when we lived here the first time, but Grandma still works the phones and office. They are the same family that invited Karl and his buddy, Ayub (who was visiting from Afghanistan), to snowmobile up on Grand Mesa when we lived in Delta the first time. They gave Ayub quite the adventure and he was glowing with it when he got back.
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| stowing the cargo |
Okay, so much for the back story. Though we have had the ATV for several months, it has mostly just sat around. One time while I was visiting in AZ, Karl and Gary (retired teacher friend made through geocaching) took it out to do a little geocaching north of Delta, that was pretty rough country which Gary couldn't manage in his sedan, and was pretty slow going with the pickup. They both had a great time, but that was the end of the ATV riding until....
Labor day. Karl and crew decided at the last minute to give themselves a treat and take off the holiday. Karl did put in several hours on Sunday getting the end of the month billing out to the home office, but that left Monday free and clear.
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| checking the map |
Noon found us up at a staging area on the edge of the National Forest (Grand Mesa) loading up the Yamaha Grizzly with supper/snacks, first aid kit, water, emergency blanket and several different types of rain gear, hoodies, vests, etc. Then off we went!
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| high mesa lake and Colorado blue sky |
Karl kind of figured our route gauging it time wise with how he and Gary had done out in Wells Gulch earlier in the summer. Whole different story!!! Rock crawling, creek fording, super mud pits from standing rain water and other riders who had made really deep ruts, steep rocky climbs, and since it is open range summer pasture, occasional chasing cattle off the track. The trail gave evidence of being well used and although we did see a few other riders out in the early afternoon, we didn't see anybody after about 4:00 pm. We did see a parked quad 3 or 4 times...it is bow season for elk and the hunters were out in the trees away from the trails.
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| shadows start to lengthen |
It didn't take me long to get into the swing of leaning with Karl to help keep the ATV stable. Pretty soon I realized that I was leaning one direction or another most of the time. Then I started to laugh to myself that I was like the kids at camp meeting/VBS/summer camp/Sabbath School.."Lean forward, lean backward, to the left, to the right. Standup, sit down, to the left, to the right." Of course that naturally, led to "Oh, how I love Jesus" and the whole thing got stuck in my brain for the rest of the day!
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| kj herding the beast over an ATV size cattle guard |
We had planned to be off the mesa before dark so the headlights of the pickup wouldn't be shining up into the faces of oncoming drivers due to the weight of the ATV in the truck bed. Nice plan, but no go. As the sun started hitting the tree tops, we were over 8 miles away from the staging area where we had left the truck. On a regular up and down trail, we would have been in good shape, but that is not what the trail we chose to return on was like. Challenging is stating it mildly. The GPS and map got consulted a lot all day, and although we did make a couple unplanned detours earlier in the day, we only made one after dark. Well, we saw headlights turning at a trail we had just passed, so decided someone might know more than we did, especially since the trail ahead looked a little fainter than what we had been on. It turned out to be a trail to a camp ground and all the hunters were returning after their day out in the woods. Karl checked his map with one of the guys (this one was just up there fishing and 4 wheeling). The guy had just been up the trail we were needing earlier in the weekend and confirmed that the one we'd been on was the one we wanted. By this time it was full dark. He gave us a gallon or so of gasoline, just to make sure we would have enough, and off we went again.
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| Getting back on track after our second almost-dump. Combo of deep mud and rocks on steep incline the culprit on both. |
Grand Mesa is at 10,000 feet elevation and each time we stopped for one thing or another (usually to use the bushes) we put on another layer of the wraps we had packed in the cargo space. What had been a warm sunny day quickly turned into a chilly evening and a very chilly night. By the time we pulled into the staging area where we had left the truck around 10:20pm, we were both tired and achy, but not too chilled, thanks to our shared body heat and the layers.
One thing about it, next time we go on the mesa, our timing will be a little more informed! And, yes, we totally plan on a next time!
Post Script:
09/04/14
Doug Huff (second generation) came by the job site today. He is president of the Thunder Mountain Wheelers (www.tmwatv.org), who maintain several of the trails up in the Grand Mesa National Forest. He and a bunch of guys were up doing trail improvements a week ago and installed the cattle guard pictured above. When Karl told him we set a magnetic geocache in it on Monday, Doug got a chuckle. He occasionally has done geocaching with Kirk (third generation) and figured we had adequately initiated the new cattle guard. kj
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