Rock Crawling with NorCal Jeeps…

NorCal Jeeps headed out to Rock Creek for some off roading.  Joe was our trail leader, the 3 other Jeeps followed. The trail followed the Power lines, so we went as far as we could until we hit a locked gate with a group of trailers, not sure if it was a campsite, or a temporary rv park, but it stopped us.

We doubled back along the Power Lines and some of us did some extreme rock crawling and some of us videoed the rock crawling.

Joe & Teresa (White YJ) and Jason & Michelle ZTRLTOY (Grey Jeep) were the Rock Crawlers. I love watching them; with a lift and some bigger tires they had all kinds of fun on the trail today. Great place to check out the flex in these Jeeps.

Having a stock Jeep limits you to some of the rock crawling we did, but we, I had a great time out on the trail.  I am always up for a challenge, I am ready to go again… 😉

 

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Oregon City Covered Bridge

After visiting Phantom Falls today, we turned the Jeeps toward home.  Just down the road maybe .25 of a mile is a sign saying covered bridge!  Who passes up a sign like that?  We sure don’t, so we took a right turn and about .5 down the little country road we came upon this little covered bridge!  Being crazy Jeep people that we are, we parked all 3 Jeeps for a photo op.

I checked to see if there were any Geocaches in the area, to our surprise there were none!

I siezed the opportunity and placed one here, and after doing some research I found out that this is the youngest covered bridge in the state, built 1983.

My Geocache: GC6CBV1 Covered Bridge (Traditional Cache)created by Cali~Bear.

“Oregon City Covered Bridge, built in 1984, can claim it as the newest covered bridge in California. The bridge is near the Oregon City, CA, State Historical Landmark #807.”

Oregon City Covered Bridge, Oroville, CA – Covered Bridges on Waymarking.com.

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Phantom Falls – February 28, 2016

Its all a luck of the draw to be able to visit Phantom Falls. Conditions have to be right, so we decided that this was a good time to try our luck.  Hiked just over 1.5 miles, maybe a little more because we were Geocaching too, and there it was!!  Beautiful, and the wildflowers that were blooming also added to the gorgeous terrain here.  Its a moderate hike through lava rock and a high water table resulting in some muddy areas that almost suck your shoe off, but the day we arrived was just right for a hike down to the Falls.

Link with maps and weather to Phantom Falls: Phantom Falls hike
YouTube link to a great video of the Falls: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMeQqPt43f0

There are a total of 5 falls in the area, we saw 3 and picked up 7 Geocaches.

These are a few of the Caches we logged:
GC5P2KF Katy’s cache (Traditional Cache)
GC1BZ9C Table Mountain basalt (Earthcache)
GC5P4Y7 Table Mountain Wildflowers (Multi-cache)

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Thank You S.R.R.

Had the best time ever last weekend with the Shasta Rock Rollers.  This group knows how to rock and roll!!  We met up on Fenders Ferry while they unloaded their off road vehicles and then we took off up the road from there.  Took the right turn into Madrone campground and it was uphill from there. We stayed on the Curl Ridge Trail all the way up to North Fork Mt and had lunch up on the old North Fork Lookout site.

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After lunch we headed down the Garden Jeep Trail –   Steep and overgrown, these 2 seaters made it look like a walk in the park.

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70+ miles later we were back at the parking lot, what a day, that was pure fun… thank you SRR!

Ocotillo Wells SVRA

http://www.planocotillowells.org/

URGENT– This is the most important post of the year! SHARE with everyone! Do you love recreating in your desert? Do you have an interest in how Ocotillo Wells SVRA is managed in the future? Then GET INVOLVED! The General Plan process can be confusing, but you can get your questions answered at these open houses, and more importantly you can leave YOUR feedback! You, the visitor of Ocotillo Wells SVRA have valuable input, but without you, YOUR voice will not be heard. Do you want someone else to make decisions about your desert park without your input? http://www.planocotillowells.org/

Sean’s New Jeep!

Had a great time today out exploring the mountains of Northern California.  Sean came up to take delivery of his new Jeep and we just had to go off roading and get some dirt on it.  He picked a 4 door Rubicon in the Baja Yellow with all kinds of options on it. The destination was Harrison Gulch Ranger Station up on Knob Peak – see the link for the posted Geocache we placed.

GC5PGXW Harrison Gulch Ranger Station at Knob Hill (Traditional Cache) in California, United States created by Cali~Bear.

Cali~Bear up on the Lookout

Sean’s New Jeepy

Going Topless!

https://www.facebook.com/events/895618907148953/

This is what I am looking forward to next!  Our Going Topless Event in May!!  Are you joining us?

Meeting Place: 1104 Stockton Ave. south Lake Tahoe CA 96150

This is a National Event with local Jeep enthusiasts doing their own local events, if you have a Jeep then join us!!

 

FRIDAY AFTERNOON  – Coming from Redding/Corning:

Jan Lowry is leaving Anderson at 1:00 pm – Meet at Bobs Market, there is a gas station with ice and snacks there.  Heading south we can have additional pickup points for those interested in going Friday.  Let me know

SATURDAY MORNING  – Coming from Sacramento:

Here is some info for those that are going to be convoying up on the 16th. Everyone will be meeting up with Alan Whitehead at the Sportsman’s Warehouse at 2344 Sunrise Blvd. Rancho Cordova, CA 95670, there is a Denny’s, McDonald’s, Carls Jr., and Scottys Coffee for those of you who want to breakfast. For gas, there is a Shell, a Chevron, and a AM/PM. With a possible stop at Fresh Pond, we will be leaving The Sportsman’s Warehouse at 6:30am, if no stop at Fresh Pond, then we will leave at 7:00 am. There is Raley’s at the “Y” in Tahoe for gas and last minute forgotten items, or a 7/11 near Bob and Beckie’s house

Black Butte-y is #10,000!

So honored that my best friends and fellow geocachers SeanStafford&GCWidow invited me along  to capture their 10,000 cache!!  Sean wanted to hike the Black Butte, with this Geocache as his goal: 

GCJJGZ Black Butte-y (Traditional Cache) in California by MtnMike

I am posting the honoree pictures first, as this was our goal for the hike.  Sean and Melissa’s #10,000 Geocache!  I was honored to be present!!  Scroll down for pictures of the beautiful hike to this goal.

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Today is the day!  We set our GPS‘s towards Black Butte and head out.  The weather looks great, we have water, snacks and Sean is hard to hold back at this point.  Sean and Melissa had attempted this geocache on a previous trip up Black Butte, however they encountered some muggles (non-geocachers) on the path down to the cache.  For whatever reason they would not move, not having much room to maneuver up there, and not having another way to the cache they had to abandon the goal.  This was not going to happen today, Sean was going to get his cache, and nothing was going to stop him!!  We parked at the trailhead, which was also a challenge to Sean and Melissa on their first attempt.  They never found the road into the trailhead, so they ended up hiking another mile just to get to the trail head.  This day is already off to a great start!!

To the top of Black Butte!

Here we go… change the shoes, grab the water and we are off.  Melissa is in the lead, she was soon out of sight!  Sean and I are stopping to take pictures and making sure we are well hydrated.  The views are immediately gratifying.  Its a gradual hike up, the elevation gain is 1850 ft.

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For more information here on the trail: http://mountshastatrailassociation.org/trails/west-of-mt-shasta/black-butte/)

Picturesque Muir’s Peak (Black Butte, 6500 ft.), northern California, U. S. A., by H.C. White Co. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Sunset over Black Butte (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Black Butte, California. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Looking out from the Black Fox Fire Lookout

What a treat this was!!

I knew that this would be a great place to Jeep up to and I wasn’t disappointed.  After Sean (a long time friend and fellow geocacher) and I found all 601 Geocaches on the LPPT (Lemurian Playground) Power Trail we pointed the Jeep towards the direction of the GC3632G Black Fox (Look-out) by xpm-robin and Chinookcapt and made our way up.

The clouds began getting darker and darker, hoping it wouldn’t rain we crept slowly up the mountain.  We were soon looking across at Mt Shasta, Elevation 14,180.  We were not up that high, Black Fox is only 6,504 ft but it felt like we could reach out and touch the clouds they were so close!!  What a fun drive up here.  When we got to the lookout, Joel invited us up.  This lookout is an active fire lookout and Joel showed us around the tiny space he has called home for 20 years!  Imagine that!!

While we were there he had an actual call come in about a fire in his district.  This was the highlight of our weekend caching trip for me, I am sure Sean thought so too!!  Couldn’t top this so we headed back down and called it a day, but it was all great.  Caching our way through 601 caches on the LPPT, discovering all the treasures along the way.

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Hoodo through the rocks

GC49AE Hoodo, through the rocks (Virtual Cache) mtnsteve.

This has been on my radar for a long time, for some reason it just looked like it was going to be a hard one to locate.  Looking at the maps and the access in to the area, so Cantseem and I set our sights on this one, it has long been on his radar too!  I go to pick him up and doubt is written all over his face… hmmmm he is wanting to change up our plans.  Nope! We are going, it’s what we planned so lets G-O!!  🙂 🙂 🙂

Gotta say that it was probably one of the best days of Geocaching that I have ever done!  It was beautiful!!  The access in was no problem, however it would be in the winter with snow on the ground.  So glad we stuck with our plan, now I have a smiley 🙂  there!!  We were able to grab 2 others in the area too:

GCGFBB SkyHook (Traditional Cache) by MtnSteve and Sequel

GCB3F4 Come and Get It (Traditional Cache) by Mtnsteve and Sequel.

The CO does an awesome job of maintaining these caches up here!  I liked this trip so much that I am putting together a Jeep run with my Geocaching family back up to the area, I want to get the other 2 caches in the area too!!  So stay tuned, its gonna be a day of off roading, Jeeping and Geocaching in a couple of weeks, before the snow flys!!

Sign up here if you want to come along: GC4KYN6 Off-Road Geocaching Adventure (Event Cache) in California, United States created by Tru2Cntry.

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