Forevers off-road adventures

Mini Moab/rainbow falls trail report.

Checked out rainbow falls trail, aka “mini Moab” on February 11 of this year. What makes this trail great IMO, is its shorter length and easy accessibility. The main trail is an easy going dirt two track, with offshoots for more challenging obstacles along the way. The whole trail can be done in 30 min or less if you hustle. This allows something for folks of all build levels /skill levels to try, and it also means you’re not getting bounced around for hours on end.

every other vehicle there was dual locked, with two of them being on 35s and 37s respectively. I definitely felt outclassed with my open diffs on 33s. But I had fun regardless.

Damage report: none specifically this time around, thankfully. Though we did have to winch out two trucks from a deep mudhole, and I had to get winched out of a tricky spot as I was literally stuck between a rock and a hard place ( a tree in this case).

 

Been there a few times with my wranglers. Great place to hang out and off road. Now I have dirt bikes and ride those areas on them. Haven’t taken the 4Runner yet but maybe in the future.

 

I have no experience with what I’m about to say but I’ve asked about it in here, pretty sure that if you don’t mind taking your bottom back seats out and leaving them at home then you can set things up so that you don’t need to lay crooked. And they say it’s extremely easy to take them off and put them back on. So you’re 6’1”, hopefully someone could confirm this, or correct me and tell me that my measurements are off.

 

I haven’t tried removing the seats yet, maybe eventually I will give it a go. I did end up building a platform bed that elevates us above the wheel wells and the bottom back seats. So that allows me to fully stretch out, but only if I take the front seat head rests off. So removing the back seats might probably wouldn’t get me much more room unfortunately. Our friends run RTTs, and honestly it’s the way to go.

 

Nice! I gotta get my bike tuned up for summer. What do you ride ?

 

Removing the seat bottoms is fast and easy, as is putting them back in. Just be sure to get the bolts threaded correctly before turning.

 

Quick trail run followed by a camping trip at Switzerland trial in the beginning of March this year. Temps were well below freezing at night and the wind was horrendous, so it was probably the quickest morning pack up I’ve done thus far. Still a good time none the less

 

Yankee hill attempt #2. April, 2024.

this was my second attempt at Yankee hill with friends. I first went for it at the end of December, which I posted about here. Once again, we got sidelined by snow. Made it further than last time at least.

It got somewhat sketchy toward the end. All of us were sliding around the trail, narrowly missing trees and eachother. Had to call it a day.

 

Moab.

Spent a long weekend camping midway through April of this year.

to sum it up; beautiful, unique, at some points surreal. I’ll let the photos speak for themselves.

P.S.
remove your front sway bars guys. Such an improvement off road.

 

Does your group have room for another Colorado 4runner? Just got mine this year.

 

Always! Are you in the Denver area ?

 

Room for another one? I’m in Aurora.

 

Absolutely! Feel free to message me directly and we can exchange numbers. Got a trail planned for tomorrow and the 15th as well as far as I know

 

Yep, south Denver suburbs.

 

Ditto, rampart range ?,

 

That’s the closest spot I’ve found to my area. I’m in Littleton.

 

Yep… starting Sedalia and going south and west.. lots of easy to medium level trails…

 

Anyone here who’s interested in getting a trail run in, feel free to message me directly and we can set something up !

 

Headed out to the northern sand dunes near the Wyoming border at the beginning of last month. Camped out, rode friends quads, ate good food. All in all, a good time. Makes me miss riding my dirtbike. It’s been down and out of action almost two years now. Gotta get back on and ride.

 

I was at Rampart this weekend with the dirt bikes.

 

Heck yeah. Rampart looks like a great place to ride. Definitely on my list.

 

This trip was a fun one. Attempt #3 to complete Yankee hill this year, about a month ago. Our group made it to the big staging area right before the rocky hill climb. Long story short, Subarus, 35s, and rocks don’t mix well and the Subaru ended up bending a tie rod. Our group attempted a trail side fix, to no avail.

I came back with a trailer to get it loaded up. Conditions weren’t ideal, as the 70 degree daytime temps deteriorated to about 34 degrees in the midst of a blizzard. The Subaru on 35s was too wide for the trailer, so we brought a smaller set of tires in order for it to fit. Trying to load a vehicle with no steering wasn’t easy. But after about 2 hours we got it secured.

Now for the fun part of towing the rig back home. I was without a doubt overloaded, as I had a forester and a double axle car trailer behind me, a full set of 35x12.5 MTRs on the trailer as well, in addition to all the extra tools we brought along, plus a fully loaded car of 4 people and 3 dogs. So yeah, heavy indeed. On top of that, I had to tow this heavy setup back down the trail, through the rocks, ruts, and mud, back to the pavement. And then from there through the mountainous regions of I70. While I wouldn’t recommend anyone try this, the 4Runner came through.

A quick 2 hour trail turned into a 14 hour day, but we got it done.

 

I’ve got a 2023 KLX140R and a 2023 KLX230R. My kids can ride them so it works out. Maybe someday I’ll upgrade and get a KX but for now, these are a ton of fun.

 

I’ve heard a lot of good things about the 230R.

 

For the money, you really can’t beat it. Dual disk brakes, fuel injected and plenty of power for an average person. It’s definitely not a race bike if you are looking for that but otherwise it’s a great bike.

 

Quick slaughterhouse gulch trip at the end of may. The trail was easy enough, with a few hard lines to keep things interesting. I kissed my rock sliders against some of the obstacles a few times, that was the extent of it.

 

Pretty sure MTNRUNR and I live in the same place... I see that rig around all the time!

 

yeah he wheels pretty hard for his setup, we ran iron clads a few weeks ago.

 

Solo trip to Bard creek trail up above Georgetown. Headed up there at the beginning of this month. Easy, stock friendly trail with good camping spots.

 

Ironclad trip in the beginning of June. This trail is an offshoot of Bunce school road. Short, rocky, and fun.