T-Dubing in Rabbit Valley, Colorado

Enroute to Hotchkiss, CO for a small gathering of Uralisti that starts next week.

I setup up camp at the group parking lot for RVs as my usual spot was occupied as I arrived shortly after 9AM.

I would end up, finding a better spot about two miles further north from the group parking lot, and have the place to myself with great 4G coverage since you could see the nearby cell tower.

Not bad eh?  I-70 is just on the other side of the hills

in the background but you can't hear the noise from 

the traffic inside the URRV.

During today's riding, I rode pretty much all planned routes.  Managed to drop Yagi not once but twice.  The first time as I climbed a particularly rocky and steep (I should have turned around before then but at that point I was committed).

I picked up Yagi, got her turned around by using the "spin her on her sidestand" technique and shakily made my way back down and eventually off of Trail 3.  I would stay off the "trails" as this point and stick to roads meant for cars too.

Not to say those roads were all smooth and easy, they had their sections but more "maneuver room" for avoiding problems.

The second time was while exploring roads near the Castle Rock campground, found myself stopped by rocky ledges as I neared the base of one of the rocky ridges.  Got Yagi turned around safely and spotted the detour route, trouble is I didn't have enough momentum for the initial steep portion, stalled Yagi and down we went.  Dammit.

No blood and no damage this time either, just a little spilled gas again.  I got her up and backed up a bit then successfully gunned the engine and up the detour only to find the rest of the road looking much worse.  So I turned around and wandered about some more.

The above picture shows the furthest out point where I turned around, there was a broken down Toyota Tundra behind me when I took the picture, apparently a flat tire as the truck sat abandoned with the tire pump still attached to one of the tires.  Too bad, it still had the "new title" registration plate, so its a new truck.

Exploring trails, I found camping spot S5 atop a bluff, nice camping location except for the strong winds that were blowing today.

I then moved down to another campsite I spotted from atop the bluff, no signage so can't tell you it's number.  However, you can see the bluff I'd ridden to from there:

Retracing my route, I stopped for a shot of what I assumed is Castle Rock:

Turns out, there's a sandy loop trail all around Castle Rock so of course Yagi and I rode around it, here she is at the base of the rock:

What I found most interesting were the wind carved holes in the sandstone that composes Castle Rock.  Here's some closeups:

I kept riding, passing a couple more campgrounds and finally reaching the dry river bed ( I think) that is part of the McInnis Canyon area:

Made it back to the URRV with no issues, after finding a better site, packing things up and repositioned Uma accordingly.

The wind would continue to howl the rest of the day but it was fine when you were out in the sun.  In the shade however, you could get chilled pretty quickly.

Yagi is proving to be quite the surefooted goat, it's only my own lack of skills that are causing the falls really.  Still, I think I'm learning.