Almost time for the warm gloves

I love autumn riding! Cooler weather, fall foliage, crackling campfires. It’s a little bittersweet, though, as it means the riding season’s coming to an end for the kids and I, while Stu’s gearing up for snowmobiling and four-wheelin’ in the snow.

Saturday morning we all scraped the frost off our seats, thankful it was a balmly thirty-one degrees, and headed out to the Blueberry Hill Inn & Cafe for breakfast.

The weekend was capped off with a rousing game of Pictionary (with slightly adapted rules so it could be played by almost twenty people sitting around a campfire, of course). My team was ahead, but when I returned from putting the kids to bed, something had gone awry and we were in the hole, never to catch up. Sadly, there are no pictures of the often hilarious artwork because there’s never photographic evidence—what happens at the campfire stays at the campfire.

Trust me. When the shouted-out guess is “Shoot me in the ass and then ride my dog”, you know the drawing was that good!

In between breakfast and Pictionary, we got a little bit of riding in:

Anybody remember Younger Bear from the movie Little Big Man?

Riding Jericho

Halfway through our vacation, we decided to pack up the kids, machines and gear and head over to the Jericho Mountain State Park trails.

We’d heard a lot of negativity about the trails but, club and local politics aside, we had a great day. The views are amazing and and make up for the fact it’s mostly logging roads. (Although there are several trails meant for advanced riders.) While it’s probably not a great trail system for “the guys”, so to speak, it’s a good day trip for a family.

I’ve got my fingers crossed they’re able to get access to Berlin, though, because they need access to food and gas. Mostly food.

Here’s the pavillion up at the scenic view area. It was the perfect spot to have a snack while the guys looked over the map. Behind them you can even see the cement foundation for the outhouse they’re building. That’s right! A real outhouse for those of us who can’t pee on trees!

View from the pavillion:

Rodeo and some R&R

Soon we’ll be heading up for ten hopefully awesome days at BigRock Campground. First up—the North Country ATV Rodeo. We always have a blast watching the mud runs and this year they’ve come up with some new events that sound like fun.

Then, at some point, we’ll make a day trip up to ride the Great North Woods ATV Club trails in Pittsburg. While Stu likes their trails a little more than the kids and I do, it is a nice trail system and they have beautiful views.

Some friends from the New Durham Valley ATV Club will be spending the next weekend up there and we look forward to seeing them again.

The rest of the time will be spent riding and reading and relaxing—the three Rs of a great vacation. Hopefully we’ll have some fun stories and great pictures when we get back!

Support Wounded Warriors this Labor Day!

If you’re looking to ATV in New Hampshire for Labor Day this year, check this out:

Big Rock Campground is sponsoring a Pig Roast Sept 5th. The food part of the PigRoast will be from 4 to 6pm. The day will be filled with guided trail rides starting from BigRock Campground at 9am. The North Country ATV Club will have their tent up and be selling their t-shirts, jackets and memberships to the Club. All proceeds from the PigRoast will go to the Wounded Warrior Project. Advance ticket sales can be made through BigRock Campground. Tickets are $7.00 per person for the meal.
Call 603-922-3329 or email bigrock1@localnet.com for more details!

Labor Day at BigRock Campground is always a good time and you can help support a great organization at the same time!

Dear Honda

The battery placement on the 2005 Rincon sucks. Being out on the trail, just about as far from the campground as one can get, and having my Rincon start cutting out while its display flashed some kind of alien heiroglyphics at me didn’t make me happy. Nor did my having to hold the machine on its side, at about a 45-degree angle, while my husband worked to tighten the battery cable. Especially since we had to break out the King Quad’s tool kit. Tell me, do any of the tools you packed in the Rincon’s tool kit fit any of the parts on the Rincon?

Fortunately, the roadside wrench-turning was successful and we went on our way because the Short Kid had a toga party to get to!

4th of July weekend: part 3

Needless to say, it rained off and on most of the holiday weekend. Not a suprise as it rained off and on—mostly on—for an entire month. As you can tell from the previous posts, however, a few showers didn’t dampen anybody’s spirits.

It didn’t keep us from riding, either. NO DUST!

4th of July weekend: part 2

Because not everybody at BigRock Campground rides a Honda Rincon, they occasionally need to rest. What better way to spend a day than a luau-themed pig roast?

Honestly, if you want to spend a Fourth of July camping and riding your ATVs and playing in the pool and enjoying great food, people and fireworks bursting overhead, you want to spend it at BigRock.

Campfire, BigRock style! Bring your own 75′ marshmallow stick!*

Forget the riding gear—it’s time to luau!

You’d think the Short Kid would have an advantage when it comes to the limbo:

But flexible, he’s not. He wasn’t one of those babies who sucked on their toes. Hell, he wasn’t even one of those babies who could touch their toes.

Limbo rule #21: Lose the hat before you’re committed to how low you can go:

This is a shot of the limbo winner. I guess if I was folded up like a backwards napkin, I’d grimace, too. He was awesome:

You’ll find the seasonal campers are very friendly at BigRock! Very. Very. Friendly.

*Dear Fire Marshalls: That really wasn’t a campfire. That was the pit being prepared for the pig roasting, I promise. Really. Our usual campfires are at least half that size.)

4th of July weekend: part 1

Because wrapping up all the awesome that is Fourth of July weekend at BigRock Campground in one shot would result in an epic blog post so long your fingers would cramp from scrolling, I’ll do several posts over the weekend. First up, my youngest sister, M, who joined us for the weekend.

She has a cute pink 110cc machine of her own, but her riding has been limited to a sandpit type area someplace and her own backyard. When faced with the NCATV trails, which she hadn’t seen before, she opted to leave her 110 at home, claiming she just wanted to ride in the box with Stu.

It started out that way:

Once we got out to an easier part of the trail, however, she was ready to give it a shot. SK generously agreed to take a turn in the box so M could take a turn on his Sportsman 90:

That went well for a while but, needless to say, an eight-year-old boy’s only going to share for so long. Eventually he wanted his machine back, but M was having too good a time to go back in the box. It’s a big jump from 90cc’s to 700, but Stu coached her through a few miles on his King Quad:

Fortunately for her, TK wasn’t in the mood to ride so, after the first day, M was able to abscond with his 300 Hawkeye for the rest of the weekend. It’s a nice steady machine—and fully automatic, which her 110 isn’t—so she was able to have a good time and boost her confidence on some of the hills without worrying about shifting. She did really well for a rookie!

Because of all the rain creating some very fun puddles and mud, I can only imagine what her mother thought when she opened M’s bag of laundry, but what’s a little dirt in the washer?

Part 2 tomorrow…

And yet we camp anyway

(This re-run was the follow-up to the previous post. Also from June, 2005.)

To follow up my camping DON’Ts, I’ll do my camping DOs, because temporary blindness and exploding beer bottle & bug spray rockets are just a small part of it.

When camping:

DO laugh with your husband when he pulls back into camp on his 4-wheeler like a little boy, muddy and wet and telling stories about getting stuck and flying over rocks and how much “nut” his new machine has, because he’s fresh off a 60-hour work week, and the scheduling says he’ll hit 70 this week.

DO take time from trying to be a full-time mom, full-time home office manager and full-time professional writer to sit with your friend, who has a day and half free from the full-time job with commute she works while keeping up with a husband and two grown sons to sit and play Scrabble and giggle together over all the naughty words you can spell.

DO sit and close your eyes and know that hours away your house still holds ringing phones, jammed fax machines, lost permission slips, misplaced blueprints, book edits, comma addictions, unanswered emails, and a full calendar and know that there’s not a damn thing you can do about it right now. Bask in the “No service” signal on your cell phone.

DO laugh with your children when they want to hear more stories and play horseshoes and run around the playground and splash in mud puddles and find good marshmallow sticks, because they probably hear “Not right now. I’m busy.” even more than they hear “I love you.”

DO have a roaring campfire to sit around. The best, funniest, most memorable stories are told around a campfire, and nary a “Shannon did you…” in sight.

And, of course, DO bring extra bug spray, because the neighbor’s son will pour yours into the beer bottle and stick it in the fire.

Adventures in insect repellant

(Occasionally, to fill the gap in between weekend adventures, I’ll post entries from another online journal I’ve kept. This re-run is from June 20th, 2005)

A FEW CAMPING DON’TS:

DON’T accidentally throw the bug spray in the cooler. That makes it very cold.

DON’T turn your head to respond to a question while spritzing one’s head with bug spray. While mosquitoes will stop attacking your mouth, the lingering aftertaste is horrific. The temporary blindness sucks, too.

DON’T continue to choose the campsite up in the woods at the top of the hill all by its lonesome, then complain when 11pm rolls around and you have to hike to the bathroom in the dark. And, while hiking back up the hill with a tiny flashlight, do not get spooked and start running if, like me, you don’t run regularly. When you finally reach the safety of the campfire and flop, gasping for air, into your chair, your husband will roll his eyes and call you a dumbass.

DON’T sit around a campfire with a bored, younger crowd. If said crowd should decide to pour bug spray into an empty beer bottle, put the cap back on and set it in the fire, DO run like hell. DON’T do this if you ever want to see the cap again.

DON’T decide to have a last night campfire with with leftover, wet wood. While you will chase away the mosquito problem for a twenty-mile radius, you and everything you brought with you will reek so badly of wet-wood smoke, your cats will hiss and spit at you when you return home.