Desert Trip 2016: Trip Report

[Larry]

Sunday, June 12th 2016 Continued….

So after airing down our fearless Trailboss Bill got us all fangled up on the wrong lead in trail to Kelly Point where we wasted well over an hour driving in circles. I don’t know if I would actually call it a total waste as I would rather drive around in circles out in the back country than drive somewhere with purpose in some metropolis. In any event, pretty much the first 100 miles or so from the highway to Kelly Point is just a wash boarded dirt road with mud puddles here and there. Coming out on Wednesday we actually passed a convoy of VW test cars and a VW Commercial van in various stages of camouflage about the area where this picture was taken (those cars would never actually make it all the way to Kelly Point). I could tell one of them was the European version of the Passat, which is a different body style than the North American Passat (ya, I am a car nerd of all sorts and makes…LOL). The Van wasn’t an American offering either. Very interesting to see them testing in the AZ Strip!

With views like this all day long…

HOT Dog!

As we started to get work our way up into the higher elevations of the Grand Parashant National Monument area. It’s an odd mixture of mountain like trees with desert like flooring. Very weird

We stopped for lunch at this really cool old cabin. At this point we are probably 5 hours from the nearest paved road, which would be Colorado City, AZ with the worst 35 or so miles to Kelly Point still in front of us

I guess nice people have left rations behind over the years. Check out how old those damn peas are!

22 miles isn’t far but it sure is when you are rolling along at 3 MPH with a few bursts of 20 MPH sections. This section of the Kelly Point trail isn’t technical but it isn’t a Subaru road either. The road is riddled with rocks and the brush and trees are very overgrown.

Several hours pased the cabin we stopped to compare maps and figure out where we would camp this night as it was obvious we were never going to reach Kelly Point at a snails pace

So we mushed on chasing the long shadows for as long as we could. About 10 miles short of Kelly Point we realized we were running out of daylight so we pretty much just set up camp right in the middle of the road. The sign-in box way back at that cabin several hours ago logged the last person in as a National Park guy like 7 days prior so we weren’t too worried about plugging up the road.

These guys were looking for a place to pitch some tents and tie hamocks. I remember walking up saying “WTF are you guys doing??”. Didn’t realize Mr. T got a picture of that moment. LOL

These guys found a small hole to squeeze a few trucks into

And I found a spot across the road in this hole.

We had a great time eating dinner and partying it up in the middle of the road until it started raining like a SOB. Man, we had a great time. Odd, there wasn’t a cloud around with all stars lighting up the sky but it was raining like mad long enough to have people scrambling around putting rain flies on their tents. Then, just like that it stopped…. The dusty trucks were now all mud balls. LOL

That is it for Sunday

 

[Larry]

Monday, June 13th…

Monday morning we all took our time packing up camp and hitting the trail knowing we had 10ish miles to Kelly Point where we figured we would just stay there for the day regardless if it took an hour or 4 hours to get there. We figured after driving this far…we’re going to stay there and enjoy the place!

Pretty much right out of the shoot the trail got much more interesting, over grown, rocky and rough for the majority of the ride to Kelly Point. Not rock crawler crazy stuff, but rough enough to keep the riffraff out. With some mud I could see this being a much more interesting as there were a never ending supply of twisty washouts to crawl through.

We all weaseled and sawed our way through trees, trees and more trees for a few hours. These aren’t soft leaf trees….. these are hardy, dry, hard…paint pruning trees…for miles!

This was actually one of the more open spots

Then BAM! Suddenly there is an opening in the trees with the Grand Canyon greating you right in the face. Can you imagine being on a horse or wagon blazing trail for weeks or months only to hit this huge road block. Wow..

Don was the first to leave camp and the first to arrive at Kelly Point. If I recall we got there just before noon, which made the entire trip here 1.5 days from the nearest paved road. Crazy, a day and a half to get here. I don’t care who you are, that’s pretty remote! You’re not going to find a remote place like this anywhere in the Midwest or East

my spot…

A room with a view

Even Cole was like… “Damn, that’s a big damn hole!..where do I even start to bury a bone?”

Had many beverages on the edge enjoying the view. This is better than sitting on the beach in Hawaii to me

Even the shower house had a killer view

Shower house. We got into camp too late the night before for showers so a shower was a treat

Mr. and Mrs. T took mid-afternoon naps in their hammocks

We all ate a great dinner

The sunset was incredible. Pictures really can’t capture the grandness of it all. The best part was the silence and there was NOBODY other than just our small clan. Probably the biggest annoyance was the fact we hadn't had cell service for a day then we get to remoteass Kelly Point and have full bar 4G Verizon service blowing in from Vegas or somewhere. Listening to Andy ot Mark watching Netflix in their tent that night somewhat killed the ambiance... I won't lie. I only bitched about it after I called the girls at home, checked my email, forums and Facebook

 

[Larry]

As nice as it was, it got pretty dang chilly overnight. These suckers got up for a sunrise shot and froze their butts off..

Meanwhile, I’m still up in my nice warm bed looking at the sunrise through the overhead camper bed window

On to some videos of the lead in... Video camera view... Wear headphones for the best audio and a second pair up your nose to sell the exhaust

K10 GoPro

Finally the end of the trail. The last minute is the best where the trail meets the big hole

More later....

 

[AgDieseler]

Beautiful spot y'all found. What were the daytime highs?

David

 

[Larry]

Beautiful spot y'all found. What were the daytime highs?

David

Not bad....like upper 90's. It was well over 100 later in the week when we went to Southern UT

 

[AgDieseler]

Not bad....like upper 90's. It was well over 100 later in the week when we went to Southern UT

And probably zero humidity? Heat index is actually negative?

If so, that's quite the opposite of much of Texas right now. Keep posting. I'm enjoying vicariously.

David

 

[GWeakland620]

Absolutely breath taking view! These trip reports are the main reason I want to build a dual purpose camping/towing rig. I would love to spend a couple weeks on back country roads in AZ and UT.

 

[campfire]

Absolutely breath taking view! These trip reports are the main reason I want to build a dual purpose camping/towing rig. I would love to spend a couple weeks on back country roads in AZ and UT.

Exactly.

 

[Tnsejed]

Great trip report!

 

[Blue85]

This just has to go in the next calendar:

 

[GWeakland620]

This just has to go in the next calendar:

I'll 2nd that motion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[FOR MUD]

In on this.....Sitting at my deck at work.....Envious.

Thanks for this thread. Have fun and be safe.

 

[BlazerFarm]

Reading this from work. Man, what a cool trip and a very nice write up. Thanks for sharing it.

 

[Larry]

And probably zero humidity? Heat index is actually negative?

If so, that's quite the opposite of much of Texas right now. Keep posting. I'm enjoying vicariously.

David

Well, at 5:06 PM Monday night it was 98.5 degrees inside the camper with 12% humidity. It is usually a few points more humid in the camper than outside so it was probably 9 or 10% outside, which is still a bit high for the area. Usually we see 6 to 9% in the desert but it did rain like a SOB the night before.

 

[Larry]

Tuesday, June 14th…

Tuesday morning we all took our sweet time loading up the wagons with the destination of Toroweep as our goal for the day. Toroweep is another magnificent Grand Canyon overlook. As the crow flies, Toroweep is only 34.4 miles East of Kelly Point but it will take every bit of an 8+ hour day to get there from here. Sooo…..we’re off like a turd of hurtles.

This is the overview of the day’s route…need to go East but that will mean a ride North then East then back South. In actual trail miles, we’re probably talking 80 to 100 miles

Mrs. T piloted the Polar Bear Suburban off the Kelly Point peninsula for a while. She had a great time so I hear. I didn’t know about this until several days later when we were at my house downloading pictures. LOL!

Being the pretty much the first truck in the day before with the closest position to the canyon, I was the last mofo out of camp that morning as I had to take a 149 point blind turn in reverse around 875 trees and 5095 rocks to get out of that spot. Everybody bailed on me and I didn’t have a spotter to help back out of there so I was like wayyy behind the caravan. It was like a 10 minute ordeal just to back out of that place. Note to self….install a back up camera. Since I was bring up the back of the pack I took my sweet time stopping for pictures and refilling my beverage.

Once I reached a somewhat open spot that wasn’t so claustrophobic with trees I was really curious to see how bad the tree scratches were. Ya, they were as bad as I though…

I caught up with these clowns after a while only to find them poking at their truck with huge sticks. Come to find out they got accosted by a swarm of wasps after whacking the wrong tree with an elephant ear Super Duty mirror. They said they both evactuated the truck while it was still in motion like the truck was one fire and ready to blow. This was funny chit watching this go down…..

Shortly after I ran across Mr. and Mrs. T..... I am not really sure what was going on here but just the expression on his face made me appreciate the fact my spouse was at home, 700 miles from me and I was traveling solo for a week

Then we ran across another cool old cabin once we hit the trail that ran East towards Toroweep

Another shameless group selfie at the no-name cabin

It was a very pretty drive!

Just as we found the trail headed East towards Toroweep we ran across these Nat Park guys doing fire mitigation work. First people we’ve seen in the past few days. Apparently we were the first for them too as they were very chatty and happy to see some new people

Continued….

 

[BlazerFarm]

Love the pinstripes.

 

[max 02]

Great pics and story as usual!

So the Gas FJ 80 in the worst on fuel.

They get around 12 mpg I think.

 

[Larry]

Great pics and story as usual!

So the Gas FJ 80 in the worst on fuel.

They get around 12 mpg I think.

I doubt he is getting that given how heavy it is loaded. More than bad MPG I think his issue is more about a small fuel tank. His 80 is fricken cool though! Even the interior is like brand new. He is also contemplating a 6.0L swap to help with the fuel economy and power. It's a pretty underpowered rig right now.

Continued with Tuesday….

The road isn’t technical by any means but just rough enough to slow us down to a snail’s pace for miles and miles

As we mushed on we stopped by the Mt. Trumbull School house. Lots of history behind this place. As I understand it, The National Park Service and local folks maintain this place. Really neat

T and his wife played on the ground equipment

The road also passed by one of the Bundy Ranches

22 more miles to go to Toroweap

13 more miles to go…

Toroweap Ranger house

Cool old floor jack

This old grader is pretty cool too

And when you reach the end this is your reward. Toroweap is much prettier than Kelly Point by a long shot. The only downside to Toroweap is the fact it is more accessible with a lot more visitors per year. I think there are around 6 to 8 campsites here and we got the last one. At least they are spread out far enough where other campers aren't really even noticeable

Bill is never scared of living on the edge

Pretty cool to crack open a beer and just sit there and take it all in while trying NOT to become another person like THIS GIRL

Here is a video of some of the last 5 miles or so from the Rangers station to the end. This section does have some rough parts which helps keep the riffraff out. Last time we were here some dude came rolling in with a VW Jetta. It was pretty funny as the oil pan was smashed to bits and leaking oil. The kid had no concern in the world about it either. This year there was a Harley parked close to the camp ground that you can see in the video. I couldn't imagine riding an iron horse into this place

Continued……

 

[livid4dirt]

Awesome to say the least

 

[GWeakland620]

Still very cool.