A few years ago, REI started promoting an alternative to the hustle and bustle of Black Friday shopping with their #OptOutside campaign. It’s a fun way to have an alternative healthy activity on the busiest shopping day of the year! Well, you don’t have to convince us that the outdoors are a perfect way to spend a fall day!
So, we went wheelin’! On Friday November 28th, we went up to Flagpole Knob in the George Washington National Forest.
Attendees:
- Jendra, Aimee, Kiran & Arya – Jeep Wrangler
- Andrew, Cherie, Ethan & Norah – 4Runner
- Jeff – Land Rover Defender
- Thomas – Colorado ZR2
- Garrett – Bronco
We met at Skidmore Fork Lake, and had our drivers meeting. As we were chatting, snow flurries began to fall, which just looked incredible! It was a good sign that we were in for a fun day. We aired our tires down, and made our way up Dunkle Hollow Rd, towards Flagpole Knob.
It was a pleasant ride up the mountain. We came across a fallen tree across the road, which would have required getting precariously close to the edge of the shelf road to get around. It was really big and heavy, too heavy for the tools we had on hand with the time we had. So we took a reciprocating saw and a pruning blade, and cut down the end to make it easier to get around. We could have spent some more time sawing it, and winching it off the road, but we had a few toddlers with us, and didn’t really have the time for a full on tree removal at the moment. But we did cut it back enough for a full size 4×4 to easily get around it.
We continued to make our way up, with the snow falling gently around us. Temps were right below the freezing point, but as we got higher, temps dropped a fair bit, down to the teens. We got to the top at Flagpole Knob, and went over to the big tree to the right of the loop, to get out of the wind for a lunch break. After hanging for a bit, we wrapped up and finished lunch. At that point we had planned to split into 2 groups to exit. One group led by Andrew headed out the easy route, via Briery Branch Rd. I led the other group down Union, the more challenging route.
The Briery Branch group wrapped up quickly, and made it out safely. The Union side is much longer, with a more challenging descent. There are some bigger drops, which require careful line placement, to avoid hitting the undercarriage. My JK with a mild lift and 34 inch tires made it down comfortably. The interesting different challenge was the water/mud puddles were quite iced over! They had about a 1 inch thick layer of ice across them. Luckily, the JK broke through the ice easily and we made our way down.
We got to the end, aired up our tires, and wrapped up the trip. It was a great day, and one we would choose over Black Friday shopping every time!
Trail Report written by Jendra Rambharos. Pictures contributed by Jendra Rambharos, Cherie Taylor, and Thomas Loeber.