ATV 41

I can’t believe it has been almost 2 months since my last ride. Work , honey doo’s, weather, more weather, have screwed up my riding. The other issue is I am almost out of places to ride (LOL). I really like riding in the snow but trying to get accurate information on what is open and what is not is about impossible. I couldn’t get anyone to ride today and the wife couldn’t ride (Freeze Baby) so I went myself just to do some scouting.

There is no snow in Payson no matter what they tell you it’s NO SNOW ! I also confirmed there is no snow in Pine or Strawberry. As soon as you get up on the Rim – SNOW and lots of it !

The gate closed (below) is at Pivot Rock, the snow is 2+ feet deep. The snow is also very firm, you can walk on it. An ATV would stay on top if it,, but,,, the gate is closed. I assume the entire forest is closed.

I headed back to checkout some other spots. About 1 mile North of E Verde Estates, I always seen people going into the woods. I pulled in once but the client-tell seemed a bit ,,, scummy. Other times when I passed it looked like the same crowd. Today no one was there. Check out the grave site???

This picture of the mud on my tires is what is still stuck on after going all the way up Black Mountain (on 1 map) . There must be 100 mountains named Black Mountain in AZ ????

OK,,, Enough of this place so I moved on to my next scouting area. Just south of Sunflower, I noticed a road that you can only get to from the south bound side of 87. Some of these roads were mucky, but sandy mucky , not sticky mucky.

Don’t know if you can see it but I found a road that goes up the side of the mountain. Not dangerous steep, just 2nd gear steep. With the big zoom I can see my truck !

Oh Boy ! I see more safe trail, steep but safe steep , 1st gear steep, but not flip over steep. I have to watch what I am doing. #1- I am alone #2- It’s getting late in the day. Warning! Warning! Will Robinson (only 50 + get that). Anyway in the picture below you can see the trail I just came up. I had to cool it with the pictures and head back. You can see the shadows indicate the sun is about to expire on me. I did make it back to the truck with out excess speed and was able to load without any flashlights.

This was a scouting trip and I did my scouting. It looks like there is more to see here. I just don’t know how much.