Porcupine Rim-Moab

In October of 2006 a group of guys went to Moab to bike the White Rim Trail. The White Rim is a fairly easy trail with amazing scenery. The trail is about 100 miles long, depending on where you decided to have your shuttle pick you up. I've ridden it a couple of times and loved it.

We had a great trip planned that had been in the works for months and months. The White Rim is in Canyonlands National Park and has some very strict rules for biking and camping. Several months earlier we were able to reserve campsites for two nights, and were ready to complete the trail in 3 days. This would gives us an opportunity to get some hiking in along the route as well, including a hike out to the confluence of the Green and Colorado rivers.

We drove down in two different groups on Wednesday and were going to bike the trail Thursday through Saturday, then come home Saturday evening. The first group went down Wednesday morning, and the second group went down Wednesday afternoon. I was in the second group. About half way there we got a call from the first group telling us that the White Rim Trail had been washed out by a major rain storm that week and had been closed. I thought they were kidding, and didn't fully believe them until I pulled into Moab.

We were disappointed, but how sad could we be, we were in Moab with bikes, camping gear, and 3 days off work! When in Rome...! We decided to bike some day trails and set up camp in the Sand Flats area, which is by the Slickrock trail. One of the trails we biked was Porcupine Rim. Most of us had ridden the trail at least once, but it really is one of the best trails in Moab.

The storm had passed by Wednesday and we had pretty good weather for the trip. We slept under the stars, but at 5:00 or 6:00 on Saturday morning it started to sprinkle, at we got a little wet.

I added links to 3 videos on You Tube of this trip. This first video is a 7 minute compilation of the trip. The videos aren't great because they were taken with a still camera.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BK5ixb4Z5jQ&feature=channel

These next two videos are included in the compilation video, but I think it is so funy that it's worth listing separately. On Porcupine Rim there's a little jump made of sandstone that someone built years ago. We were going off the jump, then hiking up and doing it again. One of us had a great idea (?) to lay down under the jump and the others could jump over them. Two of us did the jumping. The first video is of me jumping over a guy named Brandon. I didn't realize he was going to lay his bike down between his legs until I was close enough to the jump that I couldn't back out. Luckily, I cleared him and his bike. The second video is of a guy named Dax who didn't quite have enough speed to clear both Brandon and his bike. Make sure you have your sound turned up on the second video, you can see how much compassion we have for poor Brandon, we didn't ask if he was okay until we had stopped laughing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twx8qfUz2k8&feature=channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fvt6QvuRjnU&feature=channel