Without much planning, the family packed up the RV and ATV's and joined a caravan of friends and family en route to the San Rafael Swell.
Our destination was Temple Mountain Road. We've camped here a few times already within the last 2 years and this location never disappoints. While still quite warm outside, once into the canyons, you were comforted by shade.
Some of our group decided to pursue slot canyons and hiking while the rest of us wanted to further explore the trails and areas between "Behind the Reef", "Temple Mountain", "Lil Wild Horse" and areas around those locations.
Although we left home around 4:30pm, we didn't arrive in the reef until late that evening. In the dark, I drove slowly with a flashlight out the window trying to identify camping locations that would accomodate 2x 31-34' RV's w/trailers and one truck with a bumper-pull camper.
Our camp spot:
View from our camp spot - Temple Mountain:
For the first time, my oldest had an interest in taking my 2005 Brute Force 750i for a ride. He's not ridden much, so I was worried the machine might be too much for him (even though he's 15). I gave him some guidance on how to ride, control power, switch into L or 4WD and off we went.
Wife and son riding down the trail:
We decided to explore a dry wash just opposite our camp location. According to our map, the wash would take us toward additional trails.
3 miles of riding took over 2 hours along this very washed out trail. Not only were there plenty of fun obstacles, but my nephew's 2stroke sport quad kept stalling, he killed the battery and I need to tow him to drop the clutch (to start the machine).
One of the obstances: The Steps:
Between my brother-in-law Kenny (pictured above) and I, we managed to get all the machines over without actually needing to use a winch.
Above, the wife was thinking about trying to take her 2wd Honda 350 over the top, but eventually backed out and I rode it up without use of the winch cable.
Next up was my son's BF750i. It just about sailed over the top with very little effort:
Further along the trail were even more obstacles. These came in the form of boulders and tree debris lining the entire length/width of the trail.
In some spots, it was just boulders making the trail narrow:
Many times along the trail, we took a brief rest-break to allow the machines (and people) to cool:
Some of the landscape in this area was desolate and looked like it could have been on the moon:
Along the trail, we found another washed out section. This time, it was a stretch of about 20' of boulders climbing to about 4' in height. I decided to ride up and over to inspect the trail to ensure it was passable by the rest of our crew:
Unfortunately for our group, this rock pile appeared to be as far as we could safely take our group. We turned around, went back down the many obstacles and proceeded to find another trail that took us a good 60+ miles around the area.
We rode behind the reef, around Lil Wild Horse and toward Muddy Creek. Some of the dry washes we encountered contained standing water which made for some thick mud and smelly riding.
Eventually, we circled back around toward Temple Mountain where we encountered a couple in a Landcruiser, apparently very lost and unsure of the terrain they were about to drive on. We showed them our map, told them the trail would be tricky but passable and continued up toward Temple Mountain.
By 3pm on Sunday, we had completed our riding and were back at camp. We took a break, had some fresh salsa and packed up camp.
I started the drive out, with the caravan wanting to head back home through Price (instead of through Salina/Gunnison). The wife told me I had to go West (instead of East as my Navigation system was instructing), taking us about 100 miles out of our way.
We still went through Price (via Price/Loa exit) and again got misdirected and drove through the back areas of Price, eventually making our way back to the freeway.
All-in-all, yet another excellent weekend exploring and enjoying Utah!
