Starts out as nice very warm clear day, the plan was to start at Loon Lake and make Rubicon Springs by dark to meet with some other folks. Many people take two days for this so we had to hustle to make it. Didn’t get many photo ops because my shotgun toy group was small & quick; we pretty much didn’t stop much for breaks just lunch or the jams/breaks on the trail. These are the ones from day one before the sluice and my front drive shaft going sloppy.

In the queue for Gatekeeper a couple of more built rigs than mine took a few tries at the last spot past the large boulder squeeze so I thought, hum this is going to be fun! I decided to go for a bit different line & try to climb the large boulder in the middle with my driver’s side rather than go around and ride the wall on the tipper line.

Walked right up to the boulder spot, but couldn’t get up the 1st couple of tries because of rear diff clearance and/or tire grip. After reposition several times finally made it up and was on the slider but my spotter told me that the rear spring hanger wasn’t going to clear so I had to throttle and bang trough. Actually got a cheer for the galley of on-lookers and some nice comments about my redesigned rear bumper [caught it coming off the boulder], something about uncharted terrority for a X, and my unusual line. Overall I thought it was kind of a ugly since I didn’t make it cleanly with the different tries in all but in the end I was happy to make it. The rock garden after the keeper was short, interesting, and a bit tight in some spots before the turn down onto the slabs.

Slabs are pretty short with a couple of drop, climbs, cracks,etc we played around on few optional ledges before making the turn west into the dirt up hill. After twisting around through some more rocks the trail descends into a creek bed area before starting up the grade towards walker rock.

The walker hill climb has some very loose dirt and a nice couple hundred-foot section of rocks before the last step section past the rock before things get tamer. I cleared the hill pretty quick and had some wait time for the rest of my group that was caught beyond some others who went for wheel stands, got themselves a bit too sideways and/or high centered.

The next major obstacle is the little sluice box the most famous of them all and something I always wanted to try. I didn’t really think I had a chance with only 33’s and nobody else did either, what but I wanted to see how far I could get. Once you’re past a certain point you're irrevocably committed.

As luck would have it just before the sluice the CV on the front drive shaft went sloppy and started to bang around after a non-descript easier rock pile climb; my front driver side tire lost grip on at the top and slid off, that side drooped a lot and I ended up clearing the obstacle. Was really surprised that the CV went sloppy on this one considering I was crawling, not jammed, etc and had done much tougher stuff before hand. But those are the breaks sometimes, I’m not going to speculate or complain about the drive shaft, the maker is going to do some analysis and give me a recommendations and I’ll go from there.

In the end I didn’t make my goal of completing the trail in a day in a half but rather limped back out/down under my own power to fight another day. I really wasn’t disappointed much because I still managed to have a great time and know I gave it my all despite the situation. I was actually carrying spare front axles, rear drive shaft, etc. I thought I might be able to use the front shaft from the pathy but the CV was too large to clear the X member and skid. At the time I wasn’t that concerned but next time I think I’ll make some mods so I can use that as a back-up or something along those lines.

I’ll be back again before the summer’s over and finish what I started!

BTW sticker for the 1st person that gets how my title relates?

In case you're lost:



Waiting in the queue at gatekeeper:



Just after gatekeeper, kicked the bumper back in place after the pix, just to smack it again later :-)



Waiting to climb a ledge on the slabs:



Testing out some flex, for the poser of the day:





My favorite one of the day:



Top of the ridge before dropping down to Ellis creek on the way out to Wentworth.