OCTOBER RUN

The week end started out with Dick Moon arriving at the Red Rock camp site around noon to establish camp. Don and Deanna Stephens arrived soon after that taking a different route into camp, shortly followed by Josh Snyder from the same direction. Jim and Barbara Russell arrived around 3:15pm and set up camp including their "party room" in case the weather took a turn for the worse. Kory Coughran and daughter didn’t arrive until after 11:00pm. and soon after the rain started to fall. It literally came down in buckets along with the wind, lighting and thunder.

Everyone woke Saturday morning with no further rain but an overcast sky, but by the time to leave camp the sun was trying to shine through. Jim and Barbara Russell was found dumping the huge lake that had collected on top of their "party room" awning. We were all on the trail at 9:30am after Eddy Tarr arrived at camp. We hit the trail to "Nightmare Gulch" with six well equipped rigs. The scenery was absolutely spectacular with brilliant colors everywhere and standing water puddles all along the trail. We made our way south towards the gulch while encountering numerous puddles and more great scenery.

Entering "Nightmare Gulch" we found running water flowing from the canyon from the Friday night rain, which made the assent up the canyon very slippery. We found the canyon had changed quite a bit from last years outing, with new bolder piles and several new rock formations. At one point we found that a large bolder had dislodged itself from the canyon’s wall and had blocked the trail but there was a passable go-around that dropped you into a small lake of standing water. Easing the rigs down into the water we soon found the water was well over the tops of our tires and almost up to the headlights. Everyone made it across the pond with no major problems except Jim Russell who thought the deep water might be inhaled into his intake, but he made it without a sputter. The group proceeded up the canyon and found themselves at the top around noon and time for a lunch break in the bright sunshine. After a well deserved lunch break the group headed down into "Last Chance" canyon and eventually to "Bickel Camp" where we all toured the old cabin with all it’s mining equipment. After the "Bickel Camp" stopover we headed beck to our camp arriving at approximately 3:00pm. and found notes on three of the motor homes telling us we were on State Park property and owed the park $12.00 a night and could have no ground camp fires. Eddy Tarr headed for home as he had not brought any overnight provisions.

After Josh Snyder left for home Sunday morning, 4 rigs ventured out to explore the old "Old Dutch Cleanser" mines, followed by a trip to the old "Rock House" on the hill, and on to the "Burro Schmidt" tunnel armed with several flash lights. After a hike through the famed tunnel we all headed back to camp so everyone could pack up to head home.

A good time was had by all, with no broken rigs and great weather (other than Friday night).