McIver's Cabin Day Run

January 26, 2019 McIver Cabin Snow Run What can I say, this was a fantastic day run and the participation was beyond my expectations. For all the years that I have been a member of OTR, I have to say, a run with 4 to 8 rigs was a well attended run. Now that number is ever inching up and up. 8, 10, 12, 14. It’s now becoming the norm that we get 10+ rigs. It’s a mix of OG members, new members and guests and their families and friends. For this run we had 14 rigs and an astounding 25 awesome friends. OMG!!!! 1-Bob Boltner 1- Skip Perkins 2- Mike & Laura Whittington 2- Rich & Corky Wholers 2- Jerome Blunck & Bob Marshall 3- Fred Peterson, Molly Rodi and Randi Rodi 1- Gary Martin 1- Tim Ragan 2- John & Wendy Cary 2- Dean Fraley & Edmund Griswold 1- Mike Sidlinger 2- Kristy & Mike Demers 2- Hanna & Kaitlin Demers 3- Chad Joanna and Nash Oellien 25 Total Now for the Meat & Potatoes: Most of the group met at the Porter Ranch Park N Ride before 7:00am and after the usual chit chat and welcomes, I had a quick safety brief and we hit the road. The plan consisted of a run to Mojave with a stop for gas and a nature break, then the final 35 miles to the trailhead on the Horse Canyon Road in the Dove Springs OHV area. Along the way we joined up on the 14 freeway with Fred Peterson, his daughter and son in law. At the trailhead we met John & Wendy Cary as well as Rich & Corky Wholers, who had come out I believe on Friday to spend two nights camping in their RV’s. The weather on the drive in was a bit gusty and a slight chill was in the air, but by the time we reached the trailhead I knew it was going to be a great day. The winds were calm, the sun was shining, and it was warming nicely. We quickly aired down our tires and by 9:45 our caravan of 14 vehicles was moving across the valley floor to the base of the mountain for the climb towards the cabin and hopefully snow. The chance of snow didn’t look promising, as we were nearing the base of the climb, the peaks that we could see only had a few patches of snow on the north slopes. Time would tell. We dropped our transfer cases into low range and began our ascent up the mountain. It was less than ¼ of a mile as we rounded a bend in the trail that our route was blocked. The trail had a serious washout during the last rain and the rain had eroded a large portion of the trail to a depth of about 5 feet deep and leaving us only about 5-foot-wide section to pass the washout. The remaining portion of the road was a bit precarious as the soil was composed of a sand material that was very unstable and could collapse at any moment. (According to my geological Expert Jerome Blunck) This wasn’t even our real problem as there was just enough room for all of our vehicles to slip by on the uphill side safely. It was the beautiful Ford F250 crew cab, long bed diesel truck that had fallen into the washout that was our real problem. Its front tires were still on the road, but the rear wheels had ventured too close to the soft washout and it collapsed, and the back of the truck fell into the washout, blocking our path. They were alone and had no recovery gear. Well, OTR jumped into action and all of the regular recovery pros were all over this rig like flies on an old mule. A few minutes of assessment, a few minutes of back and forth on the recovery plan and we had formulated our plan. I was in the lead of our group, so that put me right behind the pickup. I moved up as close to the left rear of the truck as I could get. We attached my winch to the trailer hitch of the pickup. We pulled the rear of the truck as far out of the ditch as the winch would allow. We re-positioned my jeep to get another good pull, and we got it up further out of the ditch. We had a gang pushing the back of the truck out of the ditch as well. After some careful explanation to the Driver/owner of the truck as how to properly use his 4WD, limited slip Diff and how to not use too much skinny pedal. We were able to free the truck from the ditch and get our wagon train rolling. I must say this was a great OTR team effort. I hope that all our new members and guests saw that with a bit of teamwork, planning, experience and the right equipment there is almost no recovery that cannot be accomplished Safely. It just takes a Total team effort. So next time just ask how you can help, it’s the only way to learn and become the next generation of OTR recovery crews. It’s also the only way we all get off the trail together when things don’t go as planned. The rest of the ascent up the mountain was uneventful. As we crested the top, we began to see patches of snow. As we passed the radio tower and made the right bend towards the cabin trial and the tree cover created shady areas the snow patches got larger. The top of the Scodie mountains are about 6500’. We traversed the ridge and meandered through the trees. We drove on a section of the Pacific Crest Hiking Trail that starts on the Mexico border and ends in Canada for a total length of 2650 miles of continuous hiking. (Trivia) After 19 miles of driving and about 3 hours 15 minutes, we arrived at the Mciver Cabin at about 1:00pm. This is an old cabin that was used during the construction of the California Aqueduct in the early 1900’s. It was moved by my Mr. McIver from the Sand Canyon area to the top of this mountain for prospecting gold. Those old dudes were amazing. (More Trivia) We took about an hour and a half to eat lunch, relax and just imagine what it must have been like to actually live in this old cabin on the top of this mountain in the remote area. It was a bit cooler at 6700’ but by no means was it cold. At 2:30 we mounted up and made our way back towards the trailhead. The ride down was mostly uneventful, but a few of us found some stashes of snow to drive through and slip around a bit. I will call this, just barely a snow run. Someone made a suggestion that next year we make the snow run a floating day and call it just after a significant snowfall and just make it happen, rather then schedule it months in advance. We all wanted more snow. We rolled into camp at about 3:45pm, aired up out tires, bid our farewells and headed down the road. Some of the group elected to stop for burgers at the world-famous Primo Burgers where were served by the lovely Miss Mojave. No kidding, you have to go there, She’s Hot!. In summation, this was another fantastic OTR run. Not for the destination or the super gnarly wheeling. It’s all of you great people that made it so much fun. Thank you for joining us and see you again soon on another trial. Your Humble Trail Leader Bob Boltner