Day 7, Friday: Ranch Hoppin' From Cline To Trees
Tom Boyd missed out on all the falling-over attention from the day before, but he made up for it in the first 100 yards of trail at Trees Ranch.
We ended our time at Cline Ranch early and hit the road for a few hours drive over to Trees Ranch way past civilization. Trees Ranch is a massive 5,500-acre facility that is part exotic game ranch and part off-roader's paradise. We stayed overnight and had an excellent meal with all the trail teams and local wheelers before camping out under the stars. The next morning we rounded up our team and headed for the rocks. Our course took us down a dry riverbed and then up through some gullies and canyons which were getting progressively tougher as the day went on. Every obstacle had multiple lines to try depending on how each vehicle was built, such that some rigs made things look easy while others spent multiple attempts floundering around.
Roland Trees and Kenneth Wright were our primary contacts at Trees Ranch, but we also must thank Bob Kostner, Richard Hartgrove, Tony Palmer, Steve Pylant, Bunny and Artie Fluffert, Steven Smith, Mark Harlow, and Greg Fritz for helping lead, feed, and fix our crew of four-wheelers. We can't say enough about how helpful all our new friends from Texas were for our trip, and that goes for every park we visited. Even when our group was dirty and stinky from hours on the road or trails, the Texans greeted us as old friends and bent over backwards to ensure we had a good time. If we missed mentioning anyone, we're sorry because you all made our trip great. If you want to visit Trees Ranch, check out the Web site for a calendar of events or contact them to reserve a group weekend for your club. And if you want to try all the trails we hit look for the Rock Garden, the Bowls, the Lathe, Deception, Greg's Hill, Hangover Hill, South Park, and Lucifer.
We started our day creeping down a dry riverbed known as the Rock Garden and worked our way over some really large boulders. The Watson family truckster driven by father James and son Stephen from Off Road Designs made short work of these trails even with massive girth and a mile-long wheelbase. Check out how the rocker panels were cut and plated, giving their crew-cab truck a boat-side finish. This added clearance helps a ton in the gnarly tight stuff. | 
Tim Hardy came along again this year, but to mix it up a bit we got him to bring a different 4x4 than his battered red Samurai. So he did some wrenching to the grocery-getter and showed up in this '00 Suzuki Grand Vitara. We don't usually recommend IFS for serious trail use, but Tim can fix just about anything with a few rocks and screwdriver so we weren't worried. Unfortunately we were right on both counts: The IFS broke and Tim fixed it...a few times. This still didn't deter him from trying the obstacles, and after this week of rough wheeling we're sure this GV is on its way to a wrinkled life like the Samurai. | 
Clay Parish and Eric Jones spent a lot of time fixing their old 'Yota 4Runner, but when it was up and running they tried to drive the wheels off of it. These two fun-loving southern boys from Alabama had various axle problems, but the super flexy suspension had them clambering up the boulder climbs. This last obstacle of the day was known as South Park and was a finicky climb demanding the perfect line and strong nerves. |
Day 8, Saturday: Granite, It's Just Katemcy Rocks
After we finished up at Trees Ranch, we headed over to Katemcy Rocks between Mason and Brady for our final day of four-wheeling. Though every place we visited in Texas was awesome, Katemcy is definitely the premier rockcrawling spot in the Lone Star State. In fact it reminded many folks of a mini Moab...only on granite instead of sandstone, and if you're down that way and you like rockcrawling you'll regret not stopping by. The 800 acres of wheeling is on property formerly considered useless since it wasn't much good for grazing livestock. Luckily Shain Chapman and Randy Kruse saw the value of rock-covered acreage and joined forces to develop it into Katemcy.
We spent one day there, but many felt a week wouldn't have been enough. The park has campsites, cabins, and showers should you want to stay overnight (by this time in the week our crew was toxic-smelling so we ended up at a local hotel in Brady). Randy and Shain, along with Casey Kruse, Russ and Christie Bear, Matt Hodges, Jamie Katerez, and Gary and Sherri Banks, were excellent hosts to lead us through the park. This park is also open on certain scheduled events during the year or you can reserve it for a group of wheelers if you have a public or private event you would like to plan.
Fred Perry was half way up South Park when one of the link mounts on his frame tore off. Luckily we had a fine crew of bush mechanics ready to jump in and help get Fred's ride back in running order. Hobart had a top-secret prototype rechargeable MIG welder along that we got to use. We'll show you more of it as soon as Hobart gives us the green light. | 
After Clifton's conquering of Impossible Hill the day before, we all egged him on to try Lucifer at Trees Ranch. Lucifer hasn't yet been climbed, and with its massive undercut ledges, vertical rock faces, a tight V-canyon, and a soft soil floor, we understand why. But the Poison Spyder Buggy seemed the perfect vehicle to defeat it. Clifton had a team of spotters helping him and tried every possible line that his big buggy would fit on, but to no avail, and Lucifer still stands. Let us know if you're the first to climb it and we'll send you a 4-Wheel & Off-Road license plate. | 
Feature Editor Ali Mansour had his Danger Ranger project along with us this year and though it was only running 35-inch tires with 1/4-ton axles, he still ran the tough obstacles. His technique was simple; push the truck to that point just before it might break and then pull the winch cable. Our friends from Warn didn't seem to mind, and Ali's little truck lived to tell about it at least until the end of the trail. Unfortunately after this day of wheeling his front track-bar mount gave up the ghost on the way back to camp! Funny how the truck broke when he stopped wheeling, almost like it was happier on the rocks. |