Couple Canadians head to Moab for Off-Rodeo, end up staying for 24 days/5000 miles

[bodean]

Great trip. I wish I could take my 10 year old Dane on a trip like that. Unfortunately with his hips acting up, he can't even get in my Bronco.
I enjoyed the read.

Cheers

We were devastated when we got the news, she went from happy and healthy to total loss of feeling in her rear leg over the course of a few weeks, our vet was the one who suggested we do a road trip and just make some memories and enjoy the time. We had to go so far as get her a wheel chair, it wasn’t easy, but so glad we did it.



This was taken at the Racetrack Playa in Death Valley

Now this is the best picture (other than the dog pic of course). It’s what these vehicles/ trips/ camping/ over landing is all about. jealous. Been a while since We’ve done anything remotely like your trip. I hope to change that with the bronco.

Best advice I ever got was not to overthink it, and just go. We’re pretty fortunate our work allows us to take months off at a time and explore. Whether is road tripping around the US or backpacking South America.

Nice road trip, well done! I'm jealous of your Wave success. I've lived in AZ for 4 years and haven't successfully gotten a permit yet

I think getting there when they were drawing for 5 days really played to our advantage. Wife was giddy when they called her number.

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[604Bronco]

It’s and access cab, so the bed is a little over 6’ long, we are both 5’10” and can stretch pretty much full length, here’s a shot of our feet to prove it

The sunrise at 8600’ makes up for the feet though

Awesome view, but “Worst. Patch. Ever.”

 

[JoJoBronco]

Your dog is stunning! What a lucky little girl to go on a bucket list type of trip before her passing! Great doggie paw-rents!
We are from Canada too, very interested in the off rodeo. Build date is January, so maybe next spring/summer.

 

[talbot]

fantastic trip, thanks for sharing!

hoping to do the same next year

nice shirt

 

[bodean]

fantastic trip, thanks for sharing!

hoping to do the same next year

nice shirt

Zappa fan? My Wife absolutely hates him

I can't wait till we start to see some large organized events similar to easter Jeep safaris for Broncos and we can get a nice convoy rolling south.

 

[AlpineDescent]

Wanted to share our experience with the Moab Off-Rodeo, but more about our road trip and love of the southwest. We had been through the area in 2019 with our 3rd Gen 4Runner for a last road trip with our 10 year old Great Dane before sending her across the rainbow bridge. Our plan was to make it an annual thing until Covid closed the boarders in 2020 right before we were going to set out.

We have a 2 Door Base Mansquatch ordered and once they opened the boarders we immediately signed up for the Moab Off-Rodeo. Here in Canada Broncos are even rarer and we had never even had a chance to sit in one let alone test drive.

I had spend the down time building our 2016 Tacoma into a bit of a camping rig, we've spend 25-30 nights in it camping around our area, but were eager to give it a real test. We started out from Crowsnest Pass, Alberta (right on the Montana boarder) 3 days before the event. We don't usually plan a route or put much thought into where we are staying, we had the Boondocking app and The Dyrt and a positive attitude and off we went.

First stop of note was the Bonneville salt flats, we had been to Salar De Uyuni, Bolivia in 2017 during the wet season and it was just amazing, the worlds biggest mirror for as far as the eye could see and the wife has been wanting to see dry flats ever since. But alas, it wasn't meant to be at this time of year and we were foiled by water once again (and not nearly as impressive as SDU)

We got to Moab a day early and found some BLM land to set up camp and hit the Off-Rodeo bright and early. Not much I can say about the event that hasn't already been said. It was professional, well organized and all around great time. They ran 4 groups with 8 trucks each, 2 groups start at 730 and 2 groups at 830. Nice thing about Moab is it's all done on public land and the groups don't run the same trail at the same time, so we never saw the other groups at all throughout the day and they run a lot of the same obstacles, but the guides had the freedom to choose were they wanted to go that day. and they seem to have it down so they manage to avoid each other . It's also 15 miles of highway to get to the trail area so we got to get some highway driving in as well. Guides were awesome, they gave a basic breakdown of the features and some basic off roading technics throughout the ride, demonstrated some basic recovery and wen't over spotting, line choices, etc, but for the most part just encouraged everyone to push the Bronco as much as possible. I should add all of the Broncos were 4 door and either Badlands, or had sasquatch packages. They provided lunch on the trails, and dinner at the end of the day, and encouraged folks to stick around for some s'mores and a campfire afterwards, which we did, and it was nice to sit around and bullshit with the guides.

The next day we decided to run Fins & Things in the Tacoma, when we had been to Moab previously we did Gemini Bridges and Chicken Corner, not the toughest of trails and after the beating around in the Bronco our confidence was high. As we got to the trail head there was a group consisting of 2 JLUs on 35s and a mid 70's FJ40, they were kind enough to let us join them, and even provided us with a radio. It was awesome just meeting total strangers and wheeling with them all day we had a lot of laughs and a few oh shit moments but it was a great day. Tacoma had no issues, but the skids got a workout.

When we went through the area previously we did the slot canyons and horseshoe bend in Page, and we had done some research on the North Coyote Buttes(aka The Wave) and the daily draw that takes place to receive a permit to visit the area(10 people a day get permits from the daily draw). We were unsuccessful at that time but decided to give it another go. As luck would have it we rolled into Kanab on the 22nd to try for the draw on the 23rd, the day before Thanksgiving. Little did we know they draw for the next 5 days on the 23rd and it's their busiest draw of the year with over 600 people trying for 50 spots. Lady luck was on our side and we managed to get permits for the Sunday. We had a few days to burn in the meantime so we spent some time in Zion and over to Las Vegas for a couple nights.

Through most of this we are sleeping in the Tacoma and moving daily. It's right around freezing or below most nights and the wife was itching for some sun, so we decided we weren't ready to turn north just yet and decided to head down to Sedona and Phoenix and work on our much needed tans. We ran the Broken Arrow trail in Sedona (the skids took a real beating on the devils staircase!) and once we got to Phoenix we found a nice camping spot and just stayed in the area for about 5 nights I think.

After that we headed west to explore Joshua Tree Nation Park before finally turning north and making the trek home. Weather turned cold pretty quick so we just drove most of the last days. Checkout out the International Car Forest, found a big cat sanctuary in Nevada that I was hesitant to visit thinking it would be Tiger King like, but it was a legit sanctuary doing real work for big cats, randomly ended up in Riggins Idaho and we immediately fell in love with the area and can't wait to go back once it's warmer.

All said and done we spent 24 nights on the road, we slept in the truck 21 of those nights. Showered at truck stops, used coin laundry facilities, the only camping we paid for was a permit outside Phoenix. We traveled over 5000 miles and averaged around 17mpg. Avoided interstates as much as possible and kept the speeds around 60-65.

Any questions about the gear we use or our setup, fire away!

TL;DR - We went on a long road trip living out of our Tacoma, attended Moab Off-Rodeo, went to the Wave, Zion, Joshua Tree and got our tan on in Phoenix.

Now I'll share way to many photos and a few videos for those interested!

Our Dane when we first visited the area, she was a beauty.

Salt Flats

Some clips of the wife from The Rodeo, she didn’t manage to get any of me behind the wheel

The moguls looked impressive but weren’t that technical, we also went up them and one of the guides went up in REVERSE using the 1 Pedal and looked effortless.



Fins & Things, this is the perfect mix of scenery and challenges.

The Tacoma is a manual and the fellas we were wheeling with were surprised to see the wife running some lines, as seen in this second video,



Valley of the Gods

Gooseneck Park

Zion

Outside Vegas

The Wave! Yes, we did a fake wedding shoot, but no one wants to see those.

Lunch on Broken Arrow.

Horseshoe Lake, outside Phoenix.

Joshua Tree for lunch

International Car Forrest

Riggins, Idaho

If you took the time to read all this I appreciate it!

Sounds like a great trip, glad you had a great time.

 

[Vantcrst]

Awesome thanks for taking the time to share. I love the shot of the dessert princess standing on top of the rig.

 

[Bullitt]

Awesome trip and awesome photos. That's living life, right there. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Dom]

WOW! Posts like this make me happy. Great job!

 

[4door4family]

If you ever get back to Riggins in the warmer months, there's amazing whitewater and miles upon miles of FS roads to drive and explore. But don't tell anyone about our little gem... I'll be there next summer in my Badlands with raft in tow.

 

[bodean]

If you ever get back to Riggins in the warmer months, there's amazing whitewater and miles upon miles of FS roads to drive and explore. But don't tell anyone about our little gem... I'll be there next summer in my Badlands with raft in tow.

It’s definitely on our list of places to go back too!

I’ll edit my original post

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