Moab Jeeping Adventures '09

"Whatever it is that you like to do, try doing it in Moab, it's always funner there." - Ralph Waldo Emerson



The Moab BLM Field Office marks and maintains over 250 miles of dirt roads. The Jeep Safari Route System includes over 750 miles of off-road 4x4 trails; all are well-marked and documented in various guidebooks. In addition, there are another 5,000 miles of unpaved routes in the Moab area. In other words, there should be something for everybody!

We will only be bringing Jeep seating for 5, but we will be filling up 4 of those seats with us and the kids on many trips. However, Lori and Ron will be taking turns on a couple of jeep rides, so we will have a couple of empty seats now and again. Lori may be hosting a "girls only" trail run up Pritchett Canyon for a few hours one of the days - a liability waiver will be required for those interested - no pregnant women or persons with heart conditions allowed (...that's a big JK, unfortunately, perhaps another year, after some more upgrades to the Jeep!)!

If you don't have the patience to take turns on the jeep trails, bring your own 4x4 or consider renting one. Please be aware, that you should probably not take your own 4x4 unless you are willing to accept some amount of scraping, scratching, and denting on the undercarriage and lower body panels of your vehicle. The best Jeep rentals in town are at Cliffhanger Jeep Rental; they run as much as $195 per day (ouch!!). See Discover Moab's auto rental guide for additional Jeep rental businesses: but be forewarned, you may be able to save $20 per day by renting from one of "the other guys," but you might end up with a stock Jeep with bald street tires. Maybe if enough of you who always CLAIM you want to go to Moab with us actually show up, you can go in together on the cost of a Jeep for a day (no additional rental fee for additional drivers).

Past trips have included the following routes: Tower Arch, Fins N Things, Hells Revenge, Long Canyon, Gemini Bridges, Shafer Trail, Sevenmile Rim, Wipeout Hill, Tusher Tunnel, Hidden Canyon, Klondike Bluffs, Poison Spider Mesa, Dolores River Crossing, Elephant Hill, Eye of the Whale Arch, and CliffHanger.

Some top priorities for new trails to add to our repertoire include: Hidden Canyon Overlook, Bartlett Overlook, Flat Iron Mesa, Gold Bar Rim, Little Canyon, Metal Masher, Chicken Corners, Steel Bender, and the new Mashed Potato.

Read details about the 32 most popular jeep trails in the area at the Red Rock 4 Wheelers' website. They are the hosts of the annual Easter Jeep Safari, a 10 day jeeping event held in Moab every spring, widely considered to be the largest 4x4 event in the nation. Note- I am comfortable driving a group on any trail rated 5 or less and a couple of the 6 rated trails from this site.

Read even more details about the same trails, plus another 45 or so more trails at TrailDamage.com. Note- all of the "Utah" trails on this site are in the Moab area. I am comfortable driving a group on any trail rated 6 or less and a couple of the 7 rated trails from this site.

See also the Moab BLM Motorized Routes guide for more information on 4x4 routes.

Please feel free to make requests and suggestions.

IMPORTANT NOTE - This info is in the "Costs" section (see "Costs" for more details), but it bears repeating here. To be fair, there will be NO FREE JEEP RIDES! Unless you have your own four-wheel-drive vehicle (that you don't mind putting through some significant abuse), please plan on either renting your own Jeep (as much as $195 per day) or plan on pitching in YOUR FAIR SHARE toward somebody else's vehicle costs. Something like $1.50ish per seat, per half-day ride for owner-operated vehicles or around $35.00ish per seat, per half-day ride for rented vehicles: is probably reasonable. DO NOT ASSUME that someone will magically have an empty seat available whenever you want to go on a ride. We will personally do our best to try and make sure everyone who is interested gets as many rides as is possible, but ultimately, it is up to you to communicate with us and to make all of your own arrangements in advance. Just showing up the day of and expecting somebody to fit you in without notice is simply unreasonable.

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