Paragon 5/4-5/5

[Papakeith]

Paragon Ride 5/4-5/5

Trigger did it again. He organized another great ride at Paragon!
I’m just glad I was able to make the trip.
Let me back up a bit. My ride report starts well before I actually swing a leg over my bike.
Lets go back to Weds May 1
I found out that the FWW that I had ordered three weeks prior had never actually been ordered. One of the parts guys promised it for me by Friday. Quite frankly, I wasn’t too hopeful. At work all hell broke out when some installations went haywire. And, my pickup sprung a coolant leak. There was a lot of negative mojo hanging over my head. At that point I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that this ride just wasn’t meant to be.
Wednesday night, I got an email from Jeremy at MX-Tech. “Your springs are in, I’ll be shipping them to you tomorrow. How do you want them shipped?”
I didn’t want to pony up the cash for the overnight, so I said “Ship them ground. I’d love to have them for the Paragon ride, but overnight would cost too much.”
Thursday I received another email from MX-Tech, “ Your springs will be at your office on Friday Morning. I'll cover the overnight cost. Have fun” Jer.
I was floored! The Karma scale just took a big swing in my direction! :)
Thursday May 2-
I didn’t think I had time to get the parts for my pickup, so I called a local shop, and asked them to get me the part I needed. They said they would be able to get one for Friday and I should stop by after work and get it. The rest of Thursday was fairly uneventful. That is unless you consider a whole press department loosing their word processing software an event :eek:!
Friday May 3-
Karma swing1-Trigger let me know that I was welcome to bunk in his popup camper, no need to bring a tent! Very cool.
Karma swing2- The springs arrive from MX-Tech as promised! :) Thanks Jeremy!!
Karma swing3- My FWW did arrive as promised! Thanks Scott!
Slap upside the head followed by Karma swing4-The shop never picked up my part. So I went to the GMC dealership to pick it up myself. Closed 15 minutes ago. I knew of one other GMC dealership so I headed over there spewing expletives as I went. I got there at 5:45 and even though the parts guy said they usually close at 5:30 he had hung around to finish some stuff up. He had my part in stock.
Friday night was spent putting on springs, fixing my truck and packing up what little gear I needed.
Saturday May 4-
The drive was uneventful and I got to Paragon just about 4 and ½ hours after I left lil’ Rhody.
I While I was unloading LoriKTM, OffRoadWarrior (heretofore referred to as “The Sadist”) came back to the staging area with the Canadian contingent, Hucker and Flyin_Kaw in tow. ‘The Sadist’ had taken these visitors to our country out into some single track. . . apparently minus the track.
After a brief rest all were ready to head back into the woods. Hill climbs and creek or “crik” crossings were on the menu for the remainder of the day. I was feeling out the new suspension on my bike, and I was pleasantly surprised. Just having the right springs made a world of difference.
When we got back to the staging area we found Trigger had arrived! There were also some other riders there. I’m not going to try to name names cause quite frankly, I stink at remembering names, and I don’t want to leave anyone out. Suffice it to say I met about 10 DRN members and friends of members.
The campsite was about 8 miles from Paragon (As a side note apparently Paragon is planning on building a campground that has direct access to the riding area. Saweeeeet! ) and seemed clean and friendly towards us. Well, except for the joking about shooting at us if we rode the bikes in the campground. :eek:
Tales were told around the campfire. Our Canadian friends took some friendly ribbing about the exchange rate –ay?. We all found out what a s**thawk was, as well as letting them in on the term flying rat.
By the end of the night, I was seeing imaginary contrails in the sky. I was in awe that they would not dissipate. Turns out they were power lines.

Sunday May 5-
The weather cooperated yet again.
Dave and Wayneo were at the park on Sunday with some friends in tow. Shaw520 and Knobbiethrower had their crew. I met PAThumper and some other non-DRNers.
‘The Sadist’ took the lead after we realized that 30 bikes on these trails were too much. We shrunk our group to LoriKTM, ‘The Sadist’, Trigger, Hucker, Flyin_Kaw, PAThumper, and me. Off we went to do the rock garden trail in reverse direction. The first obstacle we came to was the shale hill that defeated Trigger and me the last time we rode Paragon. I think three of us made attempts at the hill. None succeeded. There should be some good footage from ‘the sadist’s camera. I don’t know what is wrong with me, but I am finding myself liking the rock-strewn trails. I don’t necessarily like it while I’m in them. But, later on I smile to myself knowing that I made it through.
We caught up with another group of riders and rode for about 20 more minutes before heading back to the staging area for lunch.
After lunch we headed for the single track. ‘The Sadist’ showed us what “ignorant tight” woods is like. Once we got through one or two sections of trail like this the trail opened up into some great single track. At one point I went into a turn too hot, and subsequently tried to shoulder tackle a tree. The tree won. No real damage to either party, but I’m feeling it today. My guess is the tree isn’t.
I didn’t want it to end, but I had a 5-hour trip home. I said my goodbyes, thanked the owner of Paragon, and Trigger for a great weekend.
The positive Karma was off the charts this weekend. Proving once again, that nothing can top the quality people that DRN brings together.

Papakeith

 

[WoodsRider]

OffRoadWarrior a sadist?
You really need to visit Catraland some Sunday.
I'll introduce you to a real sadist.

 

[Treejumper]

Nice report PK! Sounds like another great ride i had to miss out on. :whiner:

 

[Papakeith]

I'll be up in July. You can earn the title from him then. :p

 

[LoriKTM]

Originally posted by WoodsRider
You really need to visit Catraland some Sunday.

And YOU haven't been to Paragon, Woods-puppy! :debil:

Oh, that's right--we heard you really don't like rocks! ;)

 

[Papakeith]

:)

 

[OffRoadWarrior]

Enter the Sadist

Sadist?!?!?!

I guess my BOFH training must be bleeding through into my trail riding. :p

I think my new trail motto is, "Nothing is impossible, the impossible just breaks a lot more parts."

The official Paragon Ride Pt II nancy rider award was a pretty close race, but RMGuy managed to disqualify himself by actually getting DIRTY so the award has to go to WoodsRider (WussRider?) for not even showing up despite weeks of talking smack. :D Although it should be noted that once again RMGuy took great pains not to join any trail group I was leading.

</TrashTalkin> WoodsRider, you dare to challenge ORW, Dark Lord of the Rock Garden's claim to the title of supreme trail sadist? I mock your powers and deride your pathetic trail ablilities. You are not worthy. The gauntlet is accepted! You shall rue the day you challenged me! <TrashTalkin/> Or Should I just tell everybody about your ride at IDR? :p

Credit to the Canadian Crew! They came, they rode, they survived. And they didn't even whine that much. They bulldogged through genuine southern New Jersey ignorant tight trees without the benefit of handguards. They rode serious rock gardens without skid plates or pipe guards. And they have good taste in music. :aj:

And a big thanks to Trigger for organizing a great ride weekend!

ORW
-----------------------------------------------
Environmentalist, old indian word for jerk with no sense of humor.

 

[Papakeith]

BOFH??

 

[OffRoadWarrior]

http://www.theregus.com/content/30/index.html
&
http://bofh.ntk.net/*******.html Sorry the filter is editing this link. If you check out the above link you should be able to fill in the ******* in this one its the B in BOFH.

Should explain everything. :)

ORW
---------------------------------------------------
I recently upgraded my LART* to 120 amps, stops complaints DEAD, kinda like Raid.
*Luser Attitude Readjustment Tool, pref cattleprod or 2x4. AKA clue-by-four.

 

[LoriKTM]

Ah, where to start...

I'd been checking the weather forecasts for the weekend religiously. It has rained either one or both days of the weekend for the whole month of April, and I was hoping for a change in the weather. By the middle of last week, all signs indicated that the weather would be picture-purfect, and my adrenaline started kicking into high gear.

I left work early on Friday, to get some last minute things done on my bike-- oil change, add skid plate & pipe guard, and change out the needle. I managed to get that done, but not test-ridden, right before Dave came home early. We then rushed to get the dog down to the kennel before they closed, and then headed over to the mall to catch the next showing of Spider-Man. :) Stopped at the store to pick up some weekend munchies, and we were home by 9pm. Got together the clothes and sleeping bags, but left the bike packing until morning.

Saturday morning, up at our normal work-day time. Get showered and pack the last of the essentials, then up to load the trailer. We were on our way by 7:45am. Made it all the way to Hazleton, where we stopped for gas. Picked up a couple sandwiches, and we were off. Except the truck wouldn't start. No buzz, no click, nothing. Crap! Dave tried a few more times. Nada. I had visions of the weekend being spent at the repair shop. Dave tried again, and the truck fired up. What the?? Must be the starter, hitting a bad spot. I've seen it on just about every car I've owned, sooner or later. Well, we drove the last couple miles to the park, and parked the truck. Dave turned the iginition off, and then on again. Nothing! "What do we do?" I said. Dave says-- "We go riding! We'll worry about the truck later..."

We get out and the first people we meet are Hucker and Flyin_Kaw, all the way from Canada. We start unloading bikes and gear, and then meet knobbiethrower and rohnman. We all start talking and exchanging stories. We get geared up, and the six of us go out for a late morning ride. I must say, I did warn Hucker that he was forewarned about following Dave in a trail ride, as Dave has been known to find some ah, shall we say, interesting trails. Most people turn back when things get ugly. Dave will forge ahead, as long as he still sees a trail. Hucker was not to be deterred, and joined right in our merry little group.
We headed down to the valley for a few warm-up hillclimbs. Unfortunately, Dave took us right to a dead-end trail. Hucker had the unfortunate position of being behind me as I got stuck trying to make it over a mound of stone chips, and I dug an 8" hole and showered poor Hucker with rocks trying to dig myself out. Luckily, we ended up having to turn around since the trail dead ended. We then headed out to some known trails.
There, we introduced the Canadians to "real" woods riding! They had smiles and full of stories about "wait until we tell the guys what we rode through!" Then, it was on to the single track. We rode a bit more than what we had found back in March, and there we found the "ignorant" tight sections. Again, poor Hucker and Flyin_Kaw didn't know what they were in for. MX bikes and not a handguard between them, they plowed on through saplings that were not meant for bikes with handlebars wider than 25". When we got to the end of that trail, we realized it was probably meant to be ridden the other direction. After that little jaunt, we all decided it was probably time for a trip back to the pits, and a bite of lunch.

When we got back, Papakeith had rolled in and was unloading his new bike. Shaw520 and his crew had also arrived, and we spent several minutes making introductions. PAThumper also came over and joined in. The place was filling up! After lunch, we went out and found some more rock gardens to play in, and more hills to climb. The rock-strewn "Turtle" trail proved to be more enjoyable as a climb than a descent. Went back to the pits, and it was getting late, so we decided to head to the campground for some serious drinking and BS'ing. Luckily, our truck decided to be nice and started right up for us. We joined the camp caravan and were soon at the campsite, setting up for the evening. Many thanks to Trigger, for borrowing a pop-up camper for Papakeith, Dave and I to crash in that night.

Sunday morning we awoke bright and early. Well, most of us except for Shaw and his group! ;) We had a quick breakfast of whatever was lying around, cleaned up camp and drove back to Paragon. There we found RM_Guy unloaded, and Wayneo426 and his crew arrived shortly after. I told Wayne that I expected to see some mud on his bike (unlike the ride at Modena!), and he assured me that he would drop it in a mud puddle just for me. Unfortunately, I didn't see him later in the day to see if he made good on that promise! We got the bikes out and geared up for another day of riding. By the time we were ready to go, I noticed RM_Guy had already taken off with his group. Hmm. Papakeith noticed the same, and commented that he thought RM_Guy was avoiding us, so he wouldn't get caught riding with "The Sadists" group. Pretty obvious! :think:
We had our own little following again, and added PAThumper to the mix. This time, we had to find the rock garden trail from March and run it backwards so Hucker and Papakeith could have another run at "The Hill". Papakeith almost made it, and Hucker gave it a couple valiant attempts. PAThumper even tossed his DRZ400 up the hill, which everyone was convinced would be the bike to do it. Alas, The Hill won over everyone, and we moved on for more rock garden crawling.
After lunch Sunday, we took another contingent out-- a large group of us started out, and then one group split off to do some fast jeep-trails. The rest of us again followed "The Sadist" into the ignorant tight single-track, going in the "right" direction this time. It was somewhat easier, but still difficult to maneuver. At a jeep road crossing, Trigger bowed out-- he was getting overheated and needed to clear his head on some fast roads, so he took off in search of the other group. We continued on, and rode the single track to it's finish. Phew! We collected the group, and headed back to the pits. Hucker and Flyin_Kaw were already changed into street clothes, and some of the DRN's had called it a day and left. We finished up the day with a short trip out to the pond section, with RM_Guy leading Dave, Papakeith and myself. A couple hillclimbs and a few laps, and we headed back to the pits.
We changed back to street clothes, and had another person there take a picture of the small group that was left. We'll have to do better about getting pictures done early, so we can get everyone in the group.

All in all, an excellent weekend. Our truck even started up right away for the ride home. You know it's been a good weekend when you're just a bit tired and sore, and on the way home you realize you haven't worried about work, or your house or anything else during the whole weekend! :cool: :)

 

[WoodsRider]

I'm not the Sadist I refer to. The person I'm talking about would put us all to shame. He did me in yesterday.

I wish that I could have gone, but the alternative was divorce court. :eek:

The weekend of 6/22-6/23 is still a possibility though. ;)

 

[OffRoadWarrior]

Well, thats different then. I'll just heap the usual and expected amount of abuse on you, instead of the gargantuan pile of pain I was planning on. :)

You gotta get your crystal ball fixed woodsy 'cause you definitely should have skipped that race and come down to Paragon. I was riding as a course marshall during our scrambles that same weekend and conditions were super ugly. I think Lori had the better deal going quietly insane in the sign-up tent.

Have to check our calendar for late June, are you planning on riding the Ithaca Dirt Riders Speedsville enduro?

And who is this sadist you refer to?

ORW
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You only die once, but if you ride hard enough every Sunday you'll wish you had on every Tuesday.

 

[Hucker]

Man, where to start!! Friday night, 12pm, thinking of getting some sleep before the 3am departure to Paragon. Well go figure that I had about a million things to do, and by the time bedtime rolled around FLYIN_KAW was in my driveway hooking up the trailer. I think I fell asleep somewhere on the I90E, woke up at the I81S junction then cursed that damn highway the rest of the way. We arrive @ Paragon at around 10am or so and find no vehicles, no nothing with DRN stickers. We got our trail passes and while walking back to the truck Lori and Dave were just pulling in.

First time I had ever met any DRN'ers, plus I got to see a orange bike up close! Ronman and knobbiethrower were unseen to us and came up about 5 mins later. Papakeith pulled in and this actually started to look like a spodefest. I was drooling over the 500 in the back of PapaKeith's truck and was assured a "ride" on it before the weekend was up. Me and FLYIN_KAW kept on getting weird looks of insanity from everyone, stock MX bikes, no chest protectors, no hydration systems, no bark busters, no pipe guards, skidplates, no nothing. Baggy pants at that!! We start off on our ride and I was super pumped to be riding with a bunch of DRN'ers. We rip down the road and into this little valley. A couple of nice bug hillclimbs await us, with OffroadWarrior handy with the helmet cam. We rip up and down the hillclimbs for 15 mins or so then off to the "hell ride".

LoriKTM warned us not to follow Dave into the woods, cause we would never come out again. I was 3rd in line behind OffroadWarrior and Knobbiethrower. Man, did they ever ride fast, it was unreal and how fast they would disappear infront of me. We rode for about 2 hours, with frequent stops inbetween just to make sure the pack was still together. I heard them mention some about a "rock garden" and "the Turtle" I found out later in the day what they meant! We ended up in this insanely tight, ignorant little forest of death if you ask me. For the life of me I couldn't get my bars inbetween 2 tree's without having to "swim" them through, one bar end, then the other. my clutch hand became so sore from trying to control the MX machine underneath me that I almost gave up. The worst part of the "hell ride" was we'd get about 15-20ft from the road, then Dave would just lead us back in. What torture!! We ended up on the road, I took my gloves off and my knuckles were just tore to bits. Homemade bark busters I called them. Papakeith, Knobbiethrower and Offroadwarrior got a kick out of leading us through that really tight stuff. OffroadWarrior rated that to be about a 8.5 on a 1-10 scale so I knew now, what "real" woods riding was like.

We headed back to the staging area for a lunch break and some refreshment. Me and FLYIN_KAW finally got to open up our bikes and ripped back to the staging area in a friendly little race, luckily for me he over shot the turn and I tucker her in there :) After lunch, some more introductions we headed out for "the turtle". I had no idea what the hell this thing was but, they way they talked about it, I knew I was in for it. We had a really brutal rocky down hill then into this giant rock garden. It was like riding in my worst nightmare. Big rocks, I mean BIG nicely strewn everywear, just enough for me not to be able to pick a proper line. I followed Papakeith and figured out that the 500 was capable of throwing baseball size roost at me. I'm thinking Papakeith needs a sign on his back "Stay back 200 meters" ha ha. We did some more putting around and finally called it a day with probably one of the best runs of the weekend. My first run up this garnly uphill loaded with rocks that took a good 7-10 minutes to make it to the top. I got to the top with a huge smile on my face, blabbering like a idiot on how awesome it was.

Back to camp with Trigger leading the way pointing out the window and rocking out to some country music! :aj: We setup camp and the yanks had a little fun while we tried to unload our bikes. They all just stood around and laughed at us!! They must have thought we were crazy because we wanted to let the "pressure" off our forks for the night. Bench racing that night just about made me pee my pants. Every 5 minutes Trigger would ask "What do you call this in Canada?" The one thing (I can't say here) almost put me in the fire I was laughin so hard. Then we awed the crowd at just how much a Dunlop D756 was in Canada. We got many offers to take used tires, and Ronman was going to hook us up with some nice deals across the border. The night finished at about 1am, with the beer running out. Off to bed, only to started laughin cause Ronman was sawing the whole forest down!! I guess we were laughing just to hard, because Papakeith mentioned it to us the next morning. I wake up to Knobbiethrower leaning over the top of our tent with camera in hand. Trig's american flag had "somehow" been stolen and placed on one of the "Canadian" bikes. That was good for a couple of laughs. I've never had syrup injected sausages before, but there's a first time for everything.

Back to Paragon with my badly leaking countershaft and another day of great riding. Papakeith offered me his spare hydration system and I glady accepted. We made it down to one of the really hard hill climbs that LoriKTM and OffroadWarrior talked about. If I didn't try it, I knew I would have regretted it, plus I had to give my new DRN buddy's something to laugh at. PapaKeith had the first and best attempt at the hill. His front tire was about a foot short of the top before traction became a problem. He got turned around and it was my turn. I gave it my all, and ended up about 3-4ft from the top, I had to use my superhuman strength to get the bike turned around. Once down, I turned around and tried the beast again, not even close this time. Finally got her back down, parked it against a tree and fell over. OffroadWarrior had the impromtu interview session after the 2 failed attempts. I don't even remember what I said. I think I did pretty good for the weekend until I decided to dump my bike in a creek. RM_Guy was telling me that I got water inside. I refused saying no way, I picked the bike up fast enough. Go figure that 2 gallons of water comes shooting out after I get it started up. Me and FLYIN_KAW wrapped it up at around 2:30, just beat down after 2 days of awesome riding. We got back to the stagin area, cleaned up and packed up. Waited for the rest of the DRN crew to arrive for the group photo and then departed.

I have never met a better group of people to this day. You guys have no idea how much we appreciated the invite. The ride on the 500 will be carved into my brain (thanks Papakeith) along with the 4 pounds of mud you roosted on me through that giant puddle :) OffroadWarrior is definetly the BOFH, I will admit to that. Knobbiethrower liked to "ease" into my back tire any chance he got. LoriKTM gave me a rock shower in the first hour of our ride, and kept warning me about OffroadWarrior. ( I should have listened). RM_Guy was worried that the trail he took us on wasn't hard enough! :) All in all it was the best ride I have ever had in the past 2 years of riding my bike. You guys were great hosts, and now I have a whole bunch of people I consider my friends. Thanks alot and I can't wait to do it again....

 

[FLYIN_KAW]

The other half

I guess it is time for the other KRAZY "FLYIN_KAW" KANUCK to speek. Well lets just start this thread off by saying I wasn't supposed to come due to a cash flow problem. I quickly solved that problem by selling my dirty KDX 240 :whiner: , the bike I should have taken to Paragon. I also sold my mustang, and got my profit sharing cheque from work, all at the same time. WOW what a mouth full!!!!!!! Anyway needless to say, my money problem was solved. After getting the cash I got a new brake lever and sweet ignition cover, the only thing I kept wiping clean on the bike. :) Now I was totally pumped to go. All week I talked about going to Paragon.
My work week prior to the trip was afternoons so I knew sleep was going to be an issue. MONDAY,TUESDAY is it FRIDAY YET, WEDNESDAY, THURSDAY it's wing night!!!!!! Wings and beer the day before we leave :p :moon: and a late night to boot. Friday I get up well kinda rollout of bed and start the hell packing. Got the cooler and gear, now to only get the bike. By the time I was done getting everything and the bike loaded, there was no time to do the last minute oil change and filter cleaning before work. So the bike came to work, the maint done and a few wheelies in the parking lot at lunch time for the co-workers. Work was finally over and off the Huckers to drop off the bike and home for a few ZZZZZZZZZZZZZ's 2 to be exact. Got up at 3:10 somehow because the alarm didn't go off and packed the last few things in the Quest. I then hauled :moon: to Hucker's making the 20 min drive in 12 min flat. We loaded up stuck in the famous Paragon Spodefest CD and hit the HIWAY. We get to the border hoping to get through customs without any problems. A few questions followed by a few answers and off we went with a high five. The I-90 went by fairly quick while a few fellow Canadian's burned by us to get pulled over by the state police so we could get to Paragon as fast as possible. If everyone could just pause for a moment and show respect to those few brave Canadians braving the rath of the GREAT AMERICAN 1.64% exchange rate.
Syracuse!!! What the hell is this 6 bucks US to drive on that piece of **** you call a hiway!!!!! WHATEVER!!!!!!!. Just a little humor.hehe
Any we turn onto the I-80 south. I swear the road crew that built that hiway must have been listening to AC/DC's I'm on a hiway to hell, because that is what it was. UP the mountain, down the mountain, up the mountain and back down the mountain, well you know the rest.
Paragon, we finally arrived!!!! Pulling in and taking the off-road course they called a driveway, got to the staging area and like Huck said no buddy from DRN. We started thinking the yanks pulled a practical joke on us to see if we would actually drive out here. Well thankfully I thought wrong. They actually ended up being a way cool bunch of silly yanks instead. :) Just kidding some of the nicest people I to now can call my friends. So weirder than others but still a good bunch.
Well you've heard the ride stories so I won't go into detail. I just want to say one thing though. NO MORE TIGHT WOODS or what I like to say, clutch burning, engine overheating, knuckle bruising, and a whole lot of swearing woods. Not to mention the boulder gardens that Dave liked to call rock gardens. I actually made it through all that shhhhtuffff without wrecking the bike. An accomplishment all on its own. That goes for Hucker to, if his countershaft didn't leak. Both days of riding was the best time on a bike I've had yet. I tried, I conquored, I learned, and best of all I made it with out any war wounds.
The CAMPSITE or I'd like to call it DELIVERANCE village.
This is where I equally enjoyed the weekend with the riding.
This is were the bench racing occurs. It is also where I chemically mixed hot wings and beer, and Hucker's beans and weiners delight all in my stomach which I call the pit. You can pretty much figure out the rest.
The CREW who i will break down now.
OFF-ROAD WORRIOR: AKA "where the hell are you taking us" DAVE. - This guy is a what motor heads like to call a sleeper. At first glance I did not know what powers this man had. He can go through walls I swear. He was the tour guide for our adventures through hell. I personally would like to thank Dave for the learning experience he has brought to me. What he put us through was I would have never imagined going through before, now I will look for it around here if that is even possible. Thanks bud.

LORI KTM - The other side of the evil coin and right hand man "woman" of DAVE.
I was truely impressed with Lori's riding ability. I rode alot behind Lori so I can attest to her abilily. Here is a super sweet woman who can kick butt on the trails. I watched her take a couple of pretty good spills, quickly get up and back on the bike and off again. That to me gives women riders my full respect. A great big thumbs up to LORI.

KNOBBYTHROWER, or the GAS GAS passing man. The bike I mean. :moon: I had the opertunity to follow his line up the turtle. If he went to the right and hit some rocks kicking him sideways I'd go left. The only problem with that is I got a little close a few times and ate some rock. The big prob with a MX bike is you are on or off. That is how I eventually learned to climb up the turtle, ON ONE WHEEL. Ya know it really works.
Anyway this guy is quite humorus, and also another one of them good riders.

ROHNMAN - A great guy with a great snore :) A good knowlege of bikes, and about the sport. Great guy to hang out with at the campfire and great to ride with.

PAPA KEITH - What can I say. A big man with a big bike. He was my lifesaver at Paragon. Without him I would have dehydrated out in the EAST B.F. Every once and a while I would drop to my knees and beg for water, and as that cold water trickled down my throat I would somewhat have the energy to continue. He also had the tools to change my plug when it fouled out in death valley, with some help from Trigger and his spare sparkplug distribution store. He actually asked me what brand I wanted.
Papa Keith is always there to lend a hand. He gets a little wierd at night and starts seeing things as something else. "Contrails" What he didn't mention is he called them JET STREAMS at first, when I corrected him and laughed saying that they were neither. They or course ended up being powerlines. Lastly, the big guy is quite the brewmaster, he brought some sweet home brew with him to the campsite for some after riding beverages.

TRIGGER - AKA "STROKER" I'll explain in a bit.
This dude is rockin. He rides in a suit of armour, on a green bike :aj: He loved Hucker's CD of hard rockin dirtbike prepsyc tunes. It was funny to see how intrigued he was with us Canadians. Hucker and I especially liked his "What do you guys call ***** in CANADA. We both replied, *****. I guess you'd have to be there. We discussed our different wildlife ie. flying rats, swamp donkeys, sod poodles etc. This interest I guess will continue for years. He most importantly was the man to bring us all together. Thanks for the great time. Again another good friend to be made.

THE SHAW CREW - They came, they rode, they drank, they slept, they slept did I mention they slept? they left. I didn't get a chance to ride with these guys but we did some serious drinking together. :aj: Hope to get up near there neck of the woods for some trail riding. I promised no rocks

RM-GUY thanks for the fast jeep trail riding, boy did I need it. It was a pleasure to meet you even though it was only for a bit in the afternoon. OH ya i seriously would like to organize a Turkey Point ride here in CANADA. I'll talk with MRMRX and PEER LOVEL to see what they'd suggest on where to ride. Since I've only been there once myself.

PATHUMPER - Nice bike, Man dude I thought you would have made it up that hill. After seeing you not make it I decided on not killing myself on the already torn up hillside. Thank GOD my bike fouled out on my turn to try.

I know there were others but I didn't have a chance to see everyone so I apologize for not mentioning you. But everyone that showed can agree what a time.

Lastly THE MY PARTNER IN CRIME HUCKER!!
He is the main reason I made it out to Paragon and to meet up with you all. This guy is great to ride with, because he always pushes me to go bigger and faster. I love the competition we bring to ourselves on the bike. He is an all round guy, who I will continue to ride with unless one of us moves to another city or country far from here. You the man BUCKSHOT!!

Just to wrap things up. I truly enjoyed this whole experience. I made new friends and learned a new way of riding.
Thank you to all who put up with KRAZY KANUCKS, that goes for both Hucker and I.
We will definitely do this again.
see ya in the forums for now
later
James

 

[Trigger1911]

Its good to hear averyone made it home OK!!

I will keep this short and sweet. The best people are bike people. PERIOD!!
I want to thank those who contributed to the "Ride for Ryan" fund. He is an 8 year old kid from my hometown who has a last wish to ride on a HArley before he passes on in a few months. I have enough in the kitty to get him a leather jacket for the ride we are taking him on this coming Saturday! Thanks are not enough!!

To our friends from the 53rd state, thats Canada, it was great to meet you and you really held up well under the torture I gave you guys! :p
It was great to hear about all the Canadians driving around with American flags on their cars after 9-11-01. (thats 11-09-01 in Canada). I never realized that in Canada they write out the day and month different than we do. I learned some Canadian English like sod poodles(groundhogs), swamp donkeys(mooses) and SH*T hawks(seagulls)! Now they know what flying rats(pigeons) are.

I wasnt feeling to great by the mid-afternoon and I felt even worse this morning. A bad case of severe dehydration but that comes with the health problems. Anyway, it was great! I would not trade it for anything.

I saw some old friends and met some new ones. Thanks for being there.
UNITED WE STAND, INTERNATIONALLY!!! The Canadian flag can fly next to Old Glory anytime!

 

[Shaw520]

Thank you Trigger for a great event, please send my prayers to Ryan, I truely hope he lives his dream.

Great to see some old freinds, and to meet some new ones, very cool stuff!

RM-Guy,...good ride!,......we gotta talk about Thunder Ridge.

KnobbieThrower,.. you and Rohman come down and ride with us one Sunday soon. PM me.

Wayneo,(did you get that bike dirty yet),.. Week-end-toy, and friends,(too many shinny 520"s)..........thanks for the fast lap,... ...I needed that!

Hope these pics load :)

 

[Shaw520]

"slept late"?...... heck,...we were just trying to give you guys a head start on the trails! ;)

 

[Hucker]

Shaw520 was the only one left by the fire when me and FLYIN_KAW went to bed. Glad we hooked up, we'll have to get down to your part of the woods for a day or 2. The flag in question IS in the pic, how it ended up on the Canadian bike is unknown to me :p :p :p

Hopefully OffroadWarrior posts some pics and movies, I'm sure he has some great ones.

 

[knobbiethrower]

Northeast Spodefest

:aj: I am so glad I had the opportunity to be at Paragon this past weekend. It was a truly an enjoyable two days of riding and hanging out with DRN members. I will be sure to attend any other events that get organized or offered! I mainly considered this ride to be an "exploritory" ride. Myself and Rohnman took the opportunity to explore as much terrain as possible without killing ourselves. We only covered about 70 miles of trails between saturday and sunday. (Next time we will double this total!) Paragon has alot to offer : Fireroad type trails, Speed tests ( Truly enjoyable rock gardens ) New Jersey type single track trails, sand pit valleys and lots of coal dust. The "turtle trail" was neat, (going uphill was more fun) trail 76 (I beleive) was also a neat trail. Some of the other trails that I forgotten by name were good technical, challenging routes. Again I would like to thank all for the fun I had this weekend. Trigger, Good job organizing the event. I will not blackmail you for the photo I intend to post later! PapaKeith, your homebrew was much appreciated and tasty for your first batch! LoriKtm and OffRoadWarrior, thank you for being the ambassitors of paragon, Warrior thanks again for the sample of single trail, it was neat! I would like to hook up with you again Warrior! Well now, this brings me to the two DRN members that I enjoyed the most, FlyingKaw and Huckster. You two are so awesome! They came from afar, with their MX bikes (naked mind you) and were exposed to elements that they previously have never rode through or over. They never flintched or really wined too loud(although every time we stopped to wait to see if they would emerge from the "brush", I could have sworn I heard Huckster cussing!) They were troopers. Pathumperman, we hooked up with you late on sunday and I enjoyed riding with you at the pace we were maintaining ( You handle that stroker impressively!) RM guy, glad to see you got a little dirty, you can't stay shiny all the time! Shaw520 and crew, you can count on a visit or three from The Knobbiethrower and Rohnman, we will be riding in Hyde Park with you this year! The weekend went by soooooooo quick, I wanted to ride with all alot more, but my impatience had gotten the best of me. Next time I want to stay closer to the group and enjoy your company for longer. To sum it up....... Great Place, Great Riding and Great people! Please let's all do this as often as we can, Hello to all and see you soon. S**thawks and jet trails forever!!!! PS Huckster, I have a used M78 & M77 that I'll give you for free, but shipping will cost you shelter for a weekend! :moon:

 

[Hucker]

ha ha, Knobbie I'll do anything as long as those early morning photo's don't make it to the forums!!! (even though, I know they will) :)

I agree that the weekend just went by to fast. Hopefully we all can get together again real soon for another ride. Bench racing Sat night was just a blast, teaching you yanks a whole new vocabulary was priceless. I am never buying new tires again!!!

 

[RM_guy]

I’m glad everybody had a great time. Of course it was hard not to :) I’m really glad to finally meet a lot of you. Now some of you know why I avoid following Off Road into the woods. :eek:

It looks like everyone hit on most everything already and I don’t have a lot of time to post much anyway. My buddy Alex on the CR250 (remember he was the first to crash on the small hill climb?) broke his toe in the crash and rode the rest of the day. I found out later at work that after he and his friend got separated from our group, they got separated themselves. Not sure how they managed that :think: Here I was thinking they be OK since they were together and it turns out they weren’t. That place is so huge we may have never found them :eek:

Well I gotta go. I’ll check in later.

 

[FLYIN_KAW]

Ya it was truely a good weekend. sorry i babbled on sooooo long but oh well tough made you read it anyway. I am definitely go for another weekender somewhere with the clan. Maybe we can find some other DRN members to join in on the festivities.
Peace ya'll

 

[Trigger1911]

i forgot to put in a plug for the campground. The place is beautiful and clean! www.redridgelake.com. They did cut the rate in half for us too! Way cool!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[LoriKTM]

Photos are up!

I didn't get as many as I would have liked, but I posted what I have in the Gallery under Damn Yankee DirtRiders.

Next time we'll have to pin everyone down for a few minutes so we can get everyone in the picture! Sheesh. It's like herding cats... ;)

 

[Papakeith]

Sheesh. It's like herding cats. . .

Or swamp donkeys!:confused: Sorry I just like typing that:)