4/8/2017 Day 3 (or Day 1 for Mandi)

The basic plan I had in my head was to hang out locally awaiting Mandi’s arrival at the Canyonlands Airport just outside the north end of town. However she wasn’t due to arrive until 2:20 pm and the rest of the group was gonna hit Top of The World, and after some discussion, I believed I could tag along and bust out early and grab Mandi then maybe catch up to the group. First mistake, never go with plan b when plan a was solid. Second mistake falling asleep with my green lights on with a 5 year old battery. Had to jump start the Jeep before we could all get started, but hey it was 5 yrs old, and I hadn’t been gentile on it being a single battery system.

I carefully watched my time guesstimating how long it would take to get out and back to the airport… But I was drunk with Moab fever and over anxious to play on the red rocks with the group. Now we had amongst us 3 rigs on their first ever outing to Moab, and for some their first real wheeling besides some snow. This proved to eat up the clock, and as I feared I initially made good choices on timing, but fell behind in my calculations and not only turned around too late, but let my trusty GPS lead me another 20 miles east up onto the highway with 60 MPH headwinds.

Things might have been fine had this been a year earlier, and I was still running 37 inch tires. Moving to 40s meant day to day power was a little less, not to mention having to fight 60 mph headwinds for 30 miles back to the airport, and Mandi’s flight was early due of course to the aforementioned headwinds, that were then tailwinds for her flight. So I was a good 30 minutes late, and her ride was not a comfy easy ride again due to the winds.

This made for a rough reception at best, so I took her to a late lunch early dinner at the Peace Tree a place I’d stopped at before on a bike trip, not realizing it was a crunchy place (sorry tree hugger place). After eating we mozied out to our temporary haven in paradise the Moab KOA, the others got back and I lost Mandi to the girls. Must be beer 30, thank goodness! We had a relaxing night prepping for the next day just our group on Metal Masher!