Seeking snow with fellow Uralisti

You see, the plan is to take the rigs to Grant, CO on Valentine's Day and participate in the Elephant Ride I'd mentioned in the previous posting. The meeting place was O'Brien's Cafe in Sedalia, located on US85 and CO67. Everyone arrived around 10AM and before we went in for breakfast we got this shot:

Over coffee and breakfast, I got to know my fellow Uralisti a little. They'd all ridden together before it seems and all seemed eager to go find some snow. More on each couple in a moment.

Deana and Jay with their '07 Patrol, Jay works with a mapping company which provides data for GPS manufacturers such as TomTom while Deana works in IT support for a different company. They bought their Ural from Unique Rides in Fort Collins, CO. Jay's first ride on a sidecar rig was the day he picked up his Patrol from the dealer! He's undergone the ABATE sidecar training course since then though and it showed in the way he and Deana handled the rig on the curves.

photo courtesy of Deana and Jay

Julie and Craig

After the dissappointing amount of snow we found on Bee Rock Rd, I suggested we try Rampart Range Rd which was just a few miles further west on CO67. 

 Entering Jarre Canyon on CO67, heading towards Rampart Range Rd

We got there with no issue only to find the road was closed!   Dang, strike one. We mulled things over in the parking lot and decided to try Dakan Road since John aka Spat said it went into the hills and met up with Rampart Range Rd.

photo courtesy of Julie and Craig

 Checking the map at the Rampart Range Rd parking lot, yeah, that's snow

 So we mulled things over again, trying to figure out options. I happened to mention that Perry Park and its rock formations were close by and since no one in the group but me had been there, that's where we headed to next. I was hoping for snow where I'd been forced to turn back before, but at the very least, we'd have nice rock formations to admire.

 We got back onto CO105 heading south and about ten minutes later were turning west onto Red Road Rd. We went past the housing subdivision, past the Perry Park Country Club and turned onto Wauconda Drive, past the houses nestled amongst the rocky ridge formations and turned left on Country Club Drive where the undeveloped portion of the subdivision exists. The road turns to dirt here and we set off for some exploration and snow seeking.

We briefly chatted with the gentleman in the light blue jacket who walking his dog while we parked in front of Camel Rock above. He told us there might be snow further on up ahead but to make sure not to intrude on a local farmer's land as he could get quite upset. 

Third time was a charm and we found some snow, not very deep but very slick in spots due to it combining with mud. We went past several of the large rock formations in Perry Park and soon were at the point where before I had always had to turn back when on two wheels. Not this time though! I was in the lead and managed to cross a deeply rutted section of road, almost getting stuck a couple of times on mud. 

John made it look easy! He didn't even spin his pusher tire as I did.  His rig has selectable 2WD which locks the pusher and the hack tire together, much better traction apparently than my fulltime 2WD that uses a slip differential.  Mine performs better on pavement because of this but there's always a tradeoff.  I get less traction on dirt, but when engaged his 2WD makes it really difficult to steer so you use it just to get out of tight spots.

Then Craig and Julie crossed handily and here you can see Deana and Jay as they successfully negotiated the first major obstacle:

Turning around, we came back via a different trail back to the first major obstacle. We had some discussions but in the end we all negotiated it just fine with no issues. Here's Craig and Julie taking the "harder" route instead of the easier route the rest of us took: 

We went through every trail we could find, the snow was there but not very deep at all. However the amounts of slippery Colorado mud we found almost everywhere made up for it in terms of practicing on iffy traction conditions! 

Of the group, only myself and the Patrol ridden by Jay and Deana got stuck on deep ruts. I really thumped something on the underside of the sidecar but I could not find any damage. The three men and myself on the rig got Natasha out of the rut she was hung up on easily enough.

 

photo courtesy of Deana and Jay

Natasha after we freed her from the rut, man I was glad the guys were there to help get her unstuck! 

 Craig and Julie

 

 

 

photo courtesy of Deana and Jay

Check out the rich colors on the rocks, we were there at the right time of the day for it

Making our way out of Perry Park, I elected to try the "new" road that was being built as a secondary way into Perry Park. It was nice and flat though a bit muddy in spots. We road in a line formation, with some space in between each rig as the rigs were throwing up clods of mud as we shed the stuff that'd collected while on the muddier trails.

photo courtesy of Deana and Jay

Leaving Perry Park on the "under construction" road

photo courtesy of Julie and Craig
 Back in Sedalia at the end of the ride....four rigs went out, four rigs came back, its all good

It was great to see and hear other Urals and their riders, those newer machines are nice and quiet and their riders seemed quite happy with their machines.

Two of my previous rides to Bee Rock:  A ride to Bee Rock in the snow  and Riding to Perry Park's rock formations and visiting Bee Rock

Here's a link to more pictures of John and Cookie's Rig:  LINK

Here's a link to Deana and Jay's photos for today:  LINK

Here's a link to Julie and Craig's photos for today: LINK

Ride Safe.  Ride Aware.