AR-ADV Camping Thread

Great reports and pictures. Been working 14 + hours days and weekends. Nice to see folks having fun. Kind of boring with no DHC's, flats or flying over the handle bars wrecks. Hope to make it to Big Bend when this is all over with. Thanks again for sharing.
Maybe if the weather holds we could sneak in a Mena ride before it turns off to cold. Fall foliage should be great this year.

Hey, Craig! Really missed having you on this ride... Let me know if you ever get down this way, we'll load Trevor in Jimmy's Ural and meet you somewhere for some grub.

Sounds good. really ready for a good ride.

LONG POOL RIDE
FRIDAY
Tim, Rick, XR Greg, KLR Greg, Tom and I did some warm up riding on the Moccasin Gap trails Friday. I probably should have warned KLR Greg and Tom about the type of trails these were – rocks, steep hills with tight turns, etc.


Rick minimizes tire wear by keeping one or both tires in the air when possible.


Tim was more worried about body wear more than tire wear, as was I.


Greg and Tom are wondering what the heck they are doing here on KLR’s although at least Tom is still smiling.


Turn right, Tim.


Your other right.


Greg’s KLR protested the abuse by lying down on the trail.


Tom successfully wheelied up the slope.


Tim putters up with his cheater clutch.


The yellow brick road? Okay, so it was gray, but it is still kind of odd to find out here in the woods. Moccasin Gap is for horses, as well as OHV’s, and these are definitely not horse friendly. There are at least two hills with these paving blocks.


I knew I was holding up Rick and XR Greg so I suggested they run ahead of us and wait at the trail intersections so I could keep them headed in the right direction. After our brief encounters, they blasted off down the trail in a blur.








Took a break here for some refreshment. KLR Greg had bailed a little earlier to get gas.


We had to go back over some of the rough trail we had come in on when we found the trail I wanted to ride was closed for maintenance. There were quite a few of these water holes to cross but for the most part they were fairly solid and no one took a muddy bath.




When we got to the Dover Lights overlook, there were no C130’s flying the Big Piney. I sure would have liked to have seen that.


A light rain had started earlier and began to get heavier as we headed back to Long Pool. At least there would not be any dust for the Saturday ride. One last slippery rocky section before getting back to camp.


Nathan lives close to the LRAFB and failed to mention that a C130 had previously air dropped him, his son and their gear at Long Pool. The parachute came in handy as a shelter.


SATURDAY
We met at Pete’s TAT Shak on Long Pool Rd. for coffee and donuts provided by the ARA (Adventure Riders of Arkansas). Long Pool Rd. is part of the TAT and Pete explained the TAT Shak was primarily for those weary soles that were riding the TAT. He and David, another local rider, talked about the ARA and had membership forms available for those interested in joining. There is not a web page yet but it is on Facebook.






25 riders showed up but Nathan and his son, Neth, were headed to White Rock so that left 23 for the planned ride.


I had told everyone at the TAT Shak that there would be a technical section at the beginning consisting of a few rocks and steep descents/ascents. I suggested that anyone that was not comfortable doing this section could proceed on to Pilot Knob and wait on us. This was their last chance to bypass it but there were no takers.


Once again, I let Rick and XR Greg take the lead since they liked to up the pace on this kind of trail. Near the bottom, a kamikaze branch surprised Greg and left a fairly substantial scratch/cut below his goggles. We were on our way after a little pressure to stop the bleeding and some Neosporin to ward off any nasties floating around. He is pruning David GoPro in this shot.


After a short run down Jakes Creek Rd. we turned on 93237A and headed back north to Pilot Rock Mountain Rd. There were two climbs on this trail that the rain the night before made a bit more difficult. The first one started off with some slab rock. I am not sure what the success rate was but it was not long before everyone made it up.
















As usual, Rick was in his tire preservation mode.






The next climb may have been a little steeper and it was definitely slicker. I waited at the top until maybe a half dozen riders joined me before continuing on. We were almost to Pilot Rock Mtn Rd at this point but there was one last really nasty climb that I wanted to avoid. We hooked a right on a trail that headed east and was relatively level. We stopped perhaps ¾ of the way back to PRM Rd to wait on the rest of gang.




After a pretty long wait, we were still missing 6 or 7 riders and I was getting a little worried. I told everyone else to head on and I went back. At the trail intersection, I found Vic dutifully waiting for the next person to show up before proceeding on. He said Tom’s KLR was having some traction issues with the slick conditions. I told him to go on and then Tom showed up, no worse for wear. I rode on and found Fletcher and Dusty at the top of the hill. They said Tim and Zach were the only ones left so I headed back down the slippery slope where I found them about half way up trying to get Zach’s DR moving again. He finally found some traction and away he went followed shortly by Tim.




We finally got back to PRM Rd where the others were waiting. I do not see anyone smiling in this picture. I was kind of afraid there might be some folks unhappy about this loop but if anyone was, they were too polite to say anything.


So off to Pilot Knob we went where there was barely enough room for all of the bikes.




Jim rode up from New Orleans and I believe he is telling his wife he can see the Huey P. Long bridge from here.




We were down to 21 riders after this break as Vic needed to be home around 3:00. He and Doug headed off to Oark for lunch. We continued west to Hwy 123.


I do not know if anyone noticed but I bypassed another loop off of Pilot Rock Mtn Rd. It was a fun, relatively easy ride on ATV trails but we were running a bit late. We followed Hwy 123 north to Ft. Douglas where we crossed the Piney and turned left on to 5881. The next obstacle was Hurricane Creek, which was not much of an obstacle as the water level was fairly low. There were various methods of crossing ranging from minimal water displacement to “who is behind that wall of water”. I am one of the minimalist.
























I think Zach and Rick get the award for most displaced water.




We stopped at the “car wash” for a group photo. It is interesting what you see sometimes when you zoom in on a pictures. Phil (on right) looks like he is really giving me the evil eye(s) and Eric is still on his pegs even though everyone else around him appears to be stopped.




Next stop was this overlook off of Parker Ridge Rd. that provided a nice view of the valley that the Big Piney runs through.






That is the road directly below us.


You did not want to build up much momentum on the way down or you would be back on that road.


Jim on the miniature Hawksbill Crag (aka Whitaker Point).


And my daughter and some friends on the real thing a couple of years ago for those that are not familiar with it.


We continued up Parker Ridge Rd. where we took our second detour of the day and continued on to Deer. A short jaunt east on 16 and then south on 7 to Cowell. From there it was east on Forest Road 55 to Mt. Judea for lunch at the Eagle Rock Cafe and gas. According to Mr. Garmin, we arrived at 1:04 pm and left at 3:05 pm. Two hours for lunch! They were not quite prepared for 21 folks to show up at once in addition to their normal customers.






I believe we lost 7 more riders after lunch. I thought Trey was going to get gas but he was actually heading back to Fayetteville. Glad you could make it. Brett and Jim wanted to ride the Hwy 123 twisties so they bailed. Fletcher, Dusty and I cannot remember who else headed back to Long Pool so they could get a jump on their rides home.

We headed east on Hwy 74 to Bass where we picked up the dirt again.




The next stop was on the Richland Creek bridge.




Eric relaxing next to his trusty 1200GS. I think the only time he sat down was when his speed dropped below about a ¼ mph. The rest of the time he was on the pegs.


After a brief break it was on to Falling Water Falls.




When we crossed Hwy 16, Phil and Dave bailed to go back to the TAT Shak to load up and head back to Little Rock. We turned down CR 1008 and wound our way down to the North Fork Illinois Bayou.


The last challenge of the day was this section of Boyd Rd where it crossed the North Fork Illinios Bayou.














Looks like what’s left of our crew is still smiling so I hope that means they are still having a good time. After this break, I picked up the pace quite a bit (for me anyway) to make sure we got back before dark. We hit Long Pool Rd just as the sun set. I do not think we could have had a better day for a ride – cool temps and no dust. I hope everybody enjoyed it as much as I did.

Man, the ride reports and pictures are great! Almost makes me feel like I was there! Thanks to everyone that posts them. With any luck, and a bit more planning, I'm hoping to make some rides next year.

Thanks again.

Bohawk,
Nice pictures of a great ride. Mrs. Ice would like to know what camera you were using. Your pictures do make this state look good.

Thanks. Fortunately, we have a pretty photogenic state. My camera is an Olympus TG-1, which is one of their tough series of cameras - shock proof, dust proof and waterproof. I have tried out all of these features and it seems to be holding up. It is a little big for a pocket camera but it is easy to hold on to with my gloves on. I usually shoot in the automatic mode but it has quite a few others modes, as well.

Oh yeah, I usually shoot at max resolution so I can zoom in on the good stuff. Then I resize them for the ride report, which is one of the reasons it takes me so long to do these ride reports if I have a lot of pictures.

I skipped out after lunch, looks like I missed some fun. I still had plenty of fun on the first half of the ride. It was good to see everyone, thanks to everyone involved in organizing the ride.

Great ride report and photos Bo! I thought I would post the video of the track downhill from Treat Rd to Long Pool Rd Friday afternoon when it started to rain. This is pretty much the whole track.

<iframe src="//player.vimeo.com/video/77462377" width="500" height="281" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen></iframe>

I thought some of you might want to see what you missed on Friday. It sure was a gas!

Had a great time riding with you guys. Thanks bo for the good track.hopefully be posting some video soon, still editing. I'm ready to go on another ride. My daughter just got her brace off her leg so we're going riding. Kristen is 12 riding a CRF 150 R. 2 more years before she can ride with us on dual sports.

I enjoyed riding behind you and watchin you wheelie your way along most of the day. I guess you were in the tread saving mode as well. It was all good..... except the hour wait for our lunch. Hope to see you and Chris at a lot more of these rides next year. And eventually your daughter. Take care.

That route from Treat to Long Pool was a blast. My son and I, came down it before the rain set in and I saw some of my track in your video. I was nervous for you, when you come up on the sloping rock shelf, particularly knowing it was raining. The camping spot there at the end, will probably be a great campsite for kids wanting to ride right out of camp. We really enjoyed riding the MG area and are looking forward to riding there again.

Thanks for sharing...nlp

Thank you all for the good time and great fun and all the pictures... It was a great ride - glad i didn't skip out on any of it... some of it had me sweating (literally) from exertion (its a lot of work to keep 530lbs balanced out in some of that slick stuff...

Sorry I didn't hang out Saturday night after dinner... I had a headache all through dinner, then ate too much greasy food and had a rough night. I apologize for not getting up in time to ride with everyone on the way south to Lousiana... I ended up making it into Lafayette pretty late.

Great pace later in the day... Just enough for me to goof off a bit but not enough slack for me to screw up real bad :) Just right!

Sorry about all the rock slinging... I felt bad, but not bad enough to stop... hanging the ass end out on that bike is WAY too much fun, and I was just starting to get comfortable on it.

You guys rock... I'll try to make it out next spring on the KTM. The BMW was fun, but the KTM is Funner-er. lol

Wow! I'm impressed with the roads that you take your son riding on. Probably has no fear huh! Good for you! He will be quite the rider when he reaches his teens!

Good to see you again Eric! Sorry you were not up to par Saturday night. It was probably all of the highway riding the night before. That would for sure give me a headache. Hope to see you again at some of next years events.

if there are anymore rides planed for around the TAT shack. someone shoot me a message. i just picked up a xt250. i've camped a lot on Indian creek & done a lot of riding on my rhino. i am looking forward to hitting some of these trails on that bike.!

I'm in Conway. There will plenty of fun rides coming up. There are about 9 guys in the Little Rock area.

I'll apologize for being off topic up front, but this reminded me of a possible situation I've got coming up.

A friend of mine is going to F1 race in Austin in November and offered to pick me up and take me if I could get to Little Rock. If anyone knows of someplace where I could park my bike and gear from the 14th to the 18th, I'd be grateful. He's coming over I-40 to I-30. Close to the interstate would be good, or I guess as long as I could grab a cab it would work.

If anyone has any ideas, please shoot me a pm. Thanks, Steve

Hey Tim, you have a schedule for camping this year? You told me I didn't have an excuse because I have a new bike.

Yeah.
What Charlie said