Brody
August 2nd, 2009, 02:39 PM
LaDawn and I went down to this Friday afternoon. We got to a nice camp site on the Bald Mountain Gulch Road and set up our camp, planning to meet at the specified Johnson's Village meeting time at 9AM. Here is our report:
We got to Johnson's Village well before 9AM expecting to find a slew of Toyotas staging for various trail runs. There were none there. We waited around and finally a solitary Yota showed up.
You guys here for the Toyota Jamboree?
Yup. We are going to run Carnage.
Where is the main staging area?
Uhhhhhhh, I guess at the different trailheads, man.
Where is the main Jamboree being held?
Some forest Service Road.
Another try with another Yota guy:
What happened to the posted Johnson's Village meeting for the Jamboree?
I guess it got changed.
And yet another:
Where are the people staging for the separate trail runs?
At the campsite, I guess. People have already left for the runs for today.
What happened top the Johnsons Village meeting time?
Dunno....
This actually typified the responses we got trying to find the location.
We headed back to Carnage/OCG trailhead to maybe hook up with some folks from the Jamboree. There we found a couple of Toyotas, but they were there to just run Carnage. We waited around a bit here, then decided to go back to Johnson's Village to maybe locate someone we knew to run a trail with, passing a large group of Rovers.
We waited around again, saw no Yotas and decided to try the OCG trailhead again. Still the same crew there. We then decided to just run Antero, but on the way out ran into a line of 8 or so Yotas (all of the Yotas we saw the whole weekend, BTW) that included Bear and Bren. They said that the "event" was being held off of FS 376....somewhere. We followed them back to the trailhead, hoping to hook up with someone running OCG as I didn't want to run Carnage. My comment to LaDawn and the 'photographer' for the "event" was that so far, the organization of the "event" looked liked it had "gotten done by a couple of really stoned Boulder buttonheads." LaDawn said that the "organization" was both a joke and stupid. I added that it was "pretty damn lame".All of these comments got mentioned quite a few times during the course of the next day and a half.
Anyway, we met up with some nice folks, watched Bear and some other rigs do the start to Carnage, and did a nice run of OCG. We also helped right a flopped Rover and talked to the Rover folks for a bit. They all knew Tye and it turned out that Tye and Mador were at the big (and organized) Rover rally in Leadville. We went to the top of Carnage and walked down to where everyone was doing some of the obstacles and watched there for a bit, finally hiking back to the top and driving out.
Our plan was to go to the "Toyota Jamboree" meeting and set up area that we finally got the directions to. "Watch for a large cairn where the road splits. Turn there and follow the road until you see a "Toyota Jamboree" sign." Drive and drive. See cairn, turn and drive. See many vehicles parked in many, many camping areas. Did not see a single Toyota sign, or anything suggesting that any kind of "event" was being held here. No Toyota signs, no vendors signs, trailers, tow rigs...nada...Repeated all of the previous comments as to stupid, lame, clownlike, etc. Went back to camp.
We had a nice dinner, packed up in the AM, and drove a nice casual road back back to 285.
We watched Bear and Bren learn why Carnage is called Carnage...and why it takes 7-8 hours to run .8 mile of trail, even with a set up rig.
We saw a nice big International Harvester sign for their big meet this weekend, complete with an arrow....how novel! I bet that the folks going to the IH event actually managed to get there...
The Rover folks actually had a real STAGING AREA set up from which to organize trail runs...another real novel idea..
The FourMile area in BV is a BIG area. Having an event of any kind in that area without specific information given out...like mileage, etc...is really bone stupid.....repeat...BONE STUPID...
Having a supposed 'big Toyota' event with no signs or arrows to get people to where they need to go is also BONE STUPID.
This event should've been labeled " Toyota 4x4s meeting somewhere in the woods in BV area to run trails...sometime, somewhere. Good luck".
We actually saw many more IHs and Rovers than Yotas. The number of Yotas we saw were no more or less than what you see at any 4x wheeling area. Impressive turn out, uh huh, you betcha...
Anyway, Jamboree, my ass....and anyone's toes that I stepped on...I ain't gonna apologize. You did a bang up **** up (British slang for something done really crappy) job here and hopefully learned something from it...
So, as usual for a wheeling run, good run, good people, good times, good scenery.
Absolutely a totally lame 'event' and extremely disappointing...
We got to Johnson's Village well before 9AM expecting to find a slew of Toyotas staging for various trail runs. There were none there. We waited around and finally a solitary Yota showed up.
You guys here for the Toyota Jamboree?
Yup. We are going to run Carnage.
Where is the main staging area?
Uhhhhhhh, I guess at the different trailheads, man.
Where is the main Jamboree being held?
Some forest Service Road.
Another try with another Yota guy:
What happened to the posted Johnson's Village meeting for the Jamboree?
I guess it got changed.
And yet another:
Where are the people staging for the separate trail runs?
At the campsite, I guess. People have already left for the runs for today.
What happened top the Johnsons Village meeting time?
Dunno....
This actually typified the responses we got trying to find the location.
We headed back to Carnage/OCG trailhead to maybe hook up with some folks from the Jamboree. There we found a couple of Toyotas, but they were there to just run Carnage. We waited around a bit here, then decided to go back to Johnson's Village to maybe locate someone we knew to run a trail with, passing a large group of Rovers.
We waited around again, saw no Yotas and decided to try the OCG trailhead again. Still the same crew there. We then decided to just run Antero, but on the way out ran into a line of 8 or so Yotas (all of the Yotas we saw the whole weekend, BTW) that included Bear and Bren. They said that the "event" was being held off of FS 376....somewhere. We followed them back to the trailhead, hoping to hook up with someone running OCG as I didn't want to run Carnage. My comment to LaDawn and the 'photographer' for the "event" was that so far, the organization of the "event" looked liked it had "gotten done by a couple of really stoned Boulder buttonheads." LaDawn said that the "organization" was both a joke and stupid. I added that it was "pretty damn lame".All of these comments got mentioned quite a few times during the course of the next day and a half.
Anyway, we met up with some nice folks, watched Bear and some other rigs do the start to Carnage, and did a nice run of OCG. We also helped right a flopped Rover and talked to the Rover folks for a bit. They all knew Tye and it turned out that Tye and Mador were at the big (and organized) Rover rally in Leadville. We went to the top of Carnage and walked down to where everyone was doing some of the obstacles and watched there for a bit, finally hiking back to the top and driving out.
Our plan was to go to the "Toyota Jamboree" meeting and set up area that we finally got the directions to. "Watch for a large cairn where the road splits. Turn there and follow the road until you see a "Toyota Jamboree" sign." Drive and drive. See cairn, turn and drive. See many vehicles parked in many, many camping areas. Did not see a single Toyota sign, or anything suggesting that any kind of "event" was being held here. No Toyota signs, no vendors signs, trailers, tow rigs...nada...Repeated all of the previous comments as to stupid, lame, clownlike, etc. Went back to camp.
We had a nice dinner, packed up in the AM, and drove a nice casual road back back to 285.
We watched Bear and Bren learn why Carnage is called Carnage...and why it takes 7-8 hours to run .8 mile of trail, even with a set up rig.
We saw a nice big International Harvester sign for their big meet this weekend, complete with an arrow....how novel! I bet that the folks going to the IH event actually managed to get there...
The Rover folks actually had a real STAGING AREA set up from which to organize trail runs...another real novel idea..
The FourMile area in BV is a BIG area. Having an event of any kind in that area without specific information given out...like mileage, etc...is really bone stupid.....repeat...BONE STUPID...
Having a supposed 'big Toyota' event with no signs or arrows to get people to where they need to go is also BONE STUPID.
This event should've been labeled " Toyota 4x4s meeting somewhere in the woods in BV area to run trails...sometime, somewhere. Good luck".
We actually saw many more IHs and Rovers than Yotas. The number of Yotas we saw were no more or less than what you see at any 4x wheeling area. Impressive turn out, uh huh, you betcha...
Anyway, Jamboree, my ass....and anyone's toes that I stepped on...I ain't gonna apologize. You did a bang up **** up (British slang for something done really crappy) job here and hopefully learned something from it...
So, as usual for a wheeling run, good run, good people, good times, good scenery.
Absolutely a totally lame 'event' and extremely disappointing...