Anyone interested in an ODT Offroad "club"?

[biker_bill]

It's been a little while- maybe 3-4 months. It was pretty tame. It seems like they grade the road and make it passable for a Porsche 911, then months of rain go by and it's all tore up and fun. Then they grade it again. When we went, I could have (and may have) stayed in 2wd.

The place that's been popular as of late is Charlie Creek, between Hiawassee and Clayton. I don't know where to turn to hit it from the Clayton side, but if you go east on 76 in Hiawassee, it's off of Upper Hightower Road, a few miles on the left towards Clayton. It's mostly a rough dirt road with some steep hills and a river crossing. Tray Mountain is mostly dirt roads with one decent unmaintained road that can be challenging for a stock truck, fun for a stock locked rig. There is basically one obstacle of washed out that can make you lift a tire, and depending on the line you take, you can lift a tire a few feet. Heading east on it, you can use the downhill nature to compensate for open diffs. Heading west up it, the open diff jeeps are stacking (and leaving) a lot of rocks to get up it.

**If one doesn't know trail etiquette, it's considered polite to remove the rocks after you stack them and make it over the obstacle so that the spot is a challenge for the next guy/group.**

Oh it was definitely washed out when I went through.
I remember there was a tree that fell from the high side and I had 1/2" of clearance as I eased under it.
Seemed like something only a crazy person would do to me.

But I guess if it wasn't a new truck (10 years ago) and was a vehicle I had just for that purpose, it would have been a lot more fun....

 

[Salmonfacesalad]

Rock crawling big and little rigs is way more expensive than this gun hobby.

In.

 

[ItBeMe]

Just as soon as I steal a 4x4 you can count me in.

 

[biker_bill]

I would be interested.

View attachment 842937

South of Dahlonega is Hwy 52.
Between Hwy 19 and Amicalola Falls is a sign for Nimblewill Baptist Church, turn down that road.
That road T's (if you make a right and a quick left on the dirt road thats 28-1 in the National Forest)

But make a left at the T.
A couple miles down the thin paved road is another dirt road on your right going uphill, go up there.
Continue all the way to the top, that's Nimblewill Gap.
At the top on your left hand side you'll see a road, that's Old Bucktown Road.
When I was there it was really challenging.

If there's something in your way, you're going to have to move it.
It's a steep drop off on the right hand side, there's no going around it, bring a chainsaw just in case.
There is no going back up, backwards either.
There's only one place to turn around that I recall on the whole road and it's where an old fire watch tower was located.

I'd never go down there again in my truck, I'm nearing retirement and it's too important to me.
You want somebody to ride along and bring a chainsaw, let me know and we'll put it on the calendar....

 

[lostgeorge75]

Some good trails still exist in TN, and there are some fun parks up there. AOP is in South Pittsburg, west of Chattanooga, as is "The cove".

I loved the Cove and Dodd before they shut ut down but nothing beats Moab.

 

[harrycalahan]

Id be down to play the role of a spotter/field mechanic SOLGardener

 

[BamaBrad]

All these pictures of these cute broncos and jeeps fleexin. I love it.

 

[SOLGardener]

Allen- you're welcome any time. BTW, I'll PM you about some field mechanicking.

 

[SOLGardener]

I don't have any really good pictures because I'm always driving, but this is AOP in TN. It was a little wet this day. We rode all of the moderate trails and the difficult trails. Some were pucker factor for a big fat auto tranny 80 as I slide down hills hoping to not hit trees. One thing the 80 doesn't have is downhill descent control that comes with a manual tranny.

It was on this hill that I found out that my front e-locker wasn't engaging consistently. Not a good thing at all. Just down the hill were some very big rocks and the hill is much steeper than it appears.

And here's an unstaged poser pic. One of the other guys hopped out to take pics as we passed through this section. I didn't stop for the pic, he just snapped a good one at the right time.

Here are a couple shots from The Cove in TN.

http://i407.photobucket.com/albums/pp151/08customstar/DJI_0030_zpsbbhy9trf.jpg
http://forum.ih8mud.com/attachments/p1000197-jpg.1185651/

 

[SOLGardener]

a couple of videos from The Cove