When the clock radio alarm went off at 0600, it was still dark and I really wanted to go back to sleep. But I knew it was pointless to resist, and that I needed to get moving. There was a long day ahead, and hopefully my trip planning was going to work out properly.

And although this was my third Mountain Rendezvous, the planning had been more challenging than usual. For one thing, Plan A (starting with some offroad trails in the Angeles National Forest) had to be scrapped due to wildfires closing the area I had planned to drive and camp. This would be my daughter’s first overlanding event, so I had to take her needs into account in addition to my own. Also, my mother was in town staying with us for almost a week just before the trip. All this led to a last-minute scramble for a Plan B, researching new options, and so on.

After identifying a potential new trail to run in a different (and non-burning) area, I contacted my SoCal trail guru, Cris Mateski, to get his opinion. I wanted him to confirm I was making a good choice. It needed to be an appropriate trail for the long-and-wide Land Cruiser, not too scary for my kid, and not something with a high chance of breaking something or getting stuck, since we’d be running it solo. » Continue Reading

If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, then you know that my daughter Allison and I just returned from the 2014 SoCal Mountain Rendezvous. The four day road trip was 900 miles in length, with over 60 miles on dirt, taking four major trails to work our way to MR14. We arrived there tired and dusty, but in high spirits.

I had another great time, seeing many friends for the first time since MR13, and Allison had a blast at her first overlanding event. She made new friends with kids her age, and when I asked her how she liked Mountain Rendezvous, her answer was “Desert Rendezvous!”

Now that I’ve mostly recovered from the trip (and a day of work immediately after), I’ll start working on rolling out several new blog posts, trip galleries, and four detailed Drives with the usual GPS tracks and such, Once I fix a software glitch on my Mac, anyway… But after a quiet period, it’s time to get this blog rolling again.

Overland Expo 2014 (OX14) begins shortly. The annual event attracts several thousand enthusiastic overlanders and like-minded travelers.

The Expo is very much worth attending for instruction, sharing of information, vehicle and other displays, and of course socializing. I’d go every year if I could, but I just don’t have the budget for it right now. As a result, I’ll be living vicariously through the posts of many friends and acquaintances who will be there and sharing their experiences via social media.

In the spirit of sharing, here are some of those accounts to watch during OX14:

FACEBOOK (and Web)

• Bryon Dorr and Sarah Blessington of Exploring Elements (website)
• Lou Patterson and Nancy Patterson of Only Dirt Roads
• J Courtenay Brandon
• Luis Enrique Getter and Lacey Caughey of Lost World Expedition
• Roseann Hanson and Jonathan Hanson, the folks behind Overland Expo and Conserventures.
• Beau Johnston from Living Overland and TCT magazine.
• Jerry L’Ecuyer from Tembo Tusk
• Marcos Weskamp
• Dave Bennett the man behind American Adventurist.
• Scott Brady from Overland Journal, Expedition Portal, etc.
• Mario Donovan
• Kristina Hall
• Sandy Borden of Adventure Trio (website)
• David Creech aka Wilderness Dave
• Val Joiner from the Val in Real Life blog
• Apryl and Mitch Moerch
• Karen and Ross Addiego
• Expedition Portal
• Clay and Rachelle Croft and Rhonda Cahill from Expedition Overland and X Elles Racing
• AT Overland Equipment
• Outback Proven
• Sergio Murillo
• Sierra Expeditions
• Raquel Donati from Triple Aught Design (website)
• Christopher Bradley
• OutdoorX4
• Slee Offroad
• Adventure Tool Company
• Overland the World

TWITTER

• Overland Expo
• Roseann Hanson
• Exploring Elements
• Wilderness Dave
• Val Joiner
• Lou Patterson
• Scott Brady
• American Adventurist
• Living Overland
• Expeditionerd
• American Sahara
• Lost World Expedition
• Expedition Overland
• Expedition Portal
• Adventure Trio
• Jeanie Davison
• Greg Smith
• Defenders Northwest
• Duncan Barbour
• Nick Taylor
• Matt Beaty
• Life Remotely
• Tad Haas
• Graham Jackson

You can also follow the OX 14 Twitter list I created of these same people. That way you don’t have to follow everyone individually and can see all of their tweets combined into one page stream.

INSTAGRAM

• Overland Expo
• Exploring Elements
• Sarah Blessington
• Slyrpa
• Lost World Luis and Lost World Lacey
• Only Dirt Roads
• Expeditionerd
• Overland Journal
• Expedition Portal
• Ross Addiego
• Wilderness Dave
• Val in Real Life
• American Adventurist
• Greg Smith
• Mangai Rollin
• Cruisershirts
• Triple Aught Design
• Soaztim

That should keep you busy keeping tabs on OX14. If you know of other accounts I should have listed, by all means let me know, and I’ll update my lists. Also note that while all of these these folks should be at OX14, not all of them might be actively posting during the Expo, and some may post to accounts that are not publicly-accessible.

Not familiar with Overland Expo, or want to see more? Check out my extensive coverage of Overland Expo 2012.

Enjoy Overland Expo 2014, either in person or online!

After missing out on Desert Rendezvous again this year, I was very much looking forward to the third annual Geocache Bash at Hollister Hills SVRA. I had really enjoyed the first and second events, and was optimistic that this third year would be just as fun.

There were a few changes in store this time around. First, they were offering free camping at Area 5 for the attendees, which I intended to take advantage of. Also, this would be the first time I was bringing along the family instead of going solo.

I had to work until 9pm the night before the event, but  luckily I had time earlier in the day to get the Land Cruiser packed for the weekend. I was reminded that there’s not a lot of difference between packing up for a week-long road trip or an overnighter. Sure, there’s more food and clothing for a longer trip, but all the basics – tent, sleeping bags and pads, camp kitchen, table, recovery gear, etc. – are there for both.

The morning of the event, we awoke early and made the drive to Hollister Hills SVRA, stopping for some to-go breakfast and coffee, and filling up one of the gas tanks in the Cruiser. The weather was overcast in the morning but not too cold, and it quickly warmed up into a beautiful day. Arriving at Hollister, we signed in, filled out the disclaimer forms, and received our event logbooks before attending the morning welcome and briefing. The GBA volunteers also loaded up everyone’s handheld GPSs with the waypoints for the event geocaches.

When that was over, everyone headed out on the trails, except us. Since we were camping overnight, we claimed a free camping spot and set up our tent, and unloaded the majority of our camping gear into it so it wouldn’t be bouncing around in the back of the Land Cruiser all day. Most of the camping spots were taken by another group of offroaders (more on this later) and in an amusing coincidence we ended up in the exact spot I had camped here before, at the 2011 Overland Rally and Workshops.

With the camp basics out of the way, we headed out for the Hudner property. The trails there range from wide and open ranch roads to narrow hillside paths. We found ourselves spinning wheels in loose dirt several times, so I opted for low range, and engaged the lockers for traction probably three times. We were nicely off-camber in a few places too, enough that the seatbelts locked up more than once. It was nice to have some challenges like these throughout the day. We also enjoyed the green hills and natural scenery along the way.

Besides having fun at the event, one of my goals for the day was to map out the Hudner trails I’d not yet been on, if possible. Unfortunately, it turned out that there was an electric fencing wire set up along much of the property where there was cattle grazing underway. We mapped out the first trail, which was narrow and a little tricky in spots, and had obviously not been driven for weeks or months, when we reached one of these fence wires and were forced to backtrack.

Fortunately there was a short bailout along the way so we didn’t have to run the entire trail in reverse. From there we were back on the main trail and headed over to find our first geocaches of the day on another side trail. We picked up a group of new geocachers behind us, and together we searched and found a few of the geocaches before it was time to head back to the staging area for lunch.

After a relaxing lunch (hot dogs, chips, etc., all free, courtesy of HHORA again) we decided to concentrate on finding the closest geocaches in the Upper Ranch area. This led us along several of the lower trails I’d not driven before, some of which were very encroached by massive amounts of poison oak. I squeezed the Land Cruiser through as best I could, making a mental note to wash it off thoroughly after we returned home!

We had some long searches among the woods and vegetation but eventually managed to find each of the caches we were searching for. Allison spotted nearly all of them, so she’s developing quite the “cacher’s eye” for finding those pesky caches. Eventually it was time to return to the staging area and turn in our logbooks. Each cache we found held answers to questions within the logbooks, and the more answers you had correctly logged the more raffle tickets you were awarded, up to a maximum of seven tickets. We’d earned six each.

At the raffle, they asked for a kid to volunteer to pull the tickets and call the numbers, and Allison stepped right up. She did a great job, other than the fact that she didn’t call any of my ticket numbers! She did call one of her own though, winning a tow strap… Now what an 11-year old girl is supposed to do with a tow strap I’m not sure, but afterward she happily offered to trade it to me in exchange for ice cream. Score!

Raffle completed, there were the closing remarks and thanks, and the attendees dispersed. We made a run to the on-site store over at the park’s Lower Ranch area to pick up some firewood and “Hey look! Ice cream bars!” We then returned to our Area 5 campsite and settled in to relax. I think we were the only Geocache Bash folks to opt for the camping option.

We had hamburgers, chips, and muscat grapes for dinner, followed by s’mores for dessert. A fierce, cold wind had kicked up by this time (thank the gods for good stakes to tie down the tent and awning) so we retreated into the tent pretty early.

Unfortunately, the camp area here wasn’t mostly deserted as I had hoped, and the group of offroaders who surrounded us were loud and ill-mannered. They sped through the campground, creating dust clouds that swept over the camps. They yelled, swore, wrenched, blared music (sometimes three kinds at once), ran generators, revved engines and partied – all until 1am. It wasn’t until then that I could get any real sleep. We were resigned to it and took it in stride, but the next day even Allison was recounting stories of how bad they were.

On the plus side, we were all very comfortable in our sleeping bags and once the unholy noise died down we slept great!

Fortunately the other group were mostly gone early in the morning and we were able to have a relaxing breakfast, along with plenty of much-needed coffee. When the last of the group departed, they paused near us to say that they were abandoning their remaining firewood and that we could help ourselves, which was nice. After breakfast we took our time packing up and duly loaded up on firewood before heading home. It had been a very fun weekend and Allison in particular was eager to do it again, and we’re all looking forward to Geocache Bash IV next year.

The Geocache Bash gets bigger each year, with over 80 attendees this time and they’re hoping to reach 100 next year. It’s a fun and totally free event, including lunch and the raffle, as well as access to the Hudner property which is normally not accessible. It’s a great opportunity to have a fun day in Hollister Hills, and very much worth a try if you’ve not done it before. I think it’s a good sign that I see many of the same people returning each year.

Geocache Bash III Photo Gallery