Page updated: 04/23/2005 04:54 PM

These comments are mine and mine alone! They have no affiliation with www.jeepaholics.com www.broncoholics.com or Daimler Chrysler. I will try to post my "Thoughts" every couple of months.

I hope you enjoy the first installment!!

Jack


The “Thoughts” of an Off Roader

primergray

There was a time that I “thought” that Offroading would be something that I could do all of my life and never worry about where I could drive. Then came along “Pa”, my Father, I was in for an “Education”!! After getting my ass chewed out for leaving the Road and having my fun, the keys were taken from me and I had to “think about what I did wrong”. WOW!! What did I do wrong I “thought” to myself, it’s an Off Road vehicle? I was Off Road and having fun! Spinning donuts and tearing things up was the thrill of Off Road driving, I “thought”
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To back this up a little bit, I was 16 at the time, had just got my Drivers License and “thought” I was indestructible!! Hell, I am in a vehicle that out weighs almost everything on the road!! I can run over a small forest and not be slowed down! I am the man in complete control of my destiny!! No cops to hassle me and I have a free rein!! What a life!! This is great!! I “thought”.

It took me a couple of weeks to get up the courage to ask Pa what I did to make him so mad. Finally I screwed up all of my courage and asked him at the dinner table, Ma was there so I “thought” I was safe, WRONG!! He laid into me with a verbal tirade that would rival Castro “tongue lashing the President of the United States”! In no uncertain terms I was told that I was the 1% of people that got HIS areas of hunting and fishing closed because I “thought” I was beyond the Law since I was Off Road. I was the reason that people look down on Hunters, Campers, and Off roaders. Needless to say, I tried to finish dinner as quickly as possible and get the hell away from that dinner table! Didn’t quite work out that way. What I got was a lesson that I will never forget! Pa told Ma that he “thought” it was time for me to see what the “WOODS” was all about. Oh boy, Thoughts of the movies with the dog getting left along side the road after being taken “for a ride” crossed my mind and I was scared stiff!! Ma shook her head and asked if he “thought” I was ready for that. Now, you have heard the phrase” so scared that you need to change your underwear”! Well, that’s me sitting there with “Thoughts” running through my head!!

Back when I was growing up, Ma and Pa owned a 21-foot Nomad travel Trailer. They never went camping without it! Ma had had enough of trying to figure out where to “visit the forest”!

After a sleepless night wondering how I was going to get home after being “dropped off” in the forest, Pa comes to my room at 5 am and says it’s time to pack up and go “camping”. Oh Boy!! I am DEAD!! Pa never goes camping with out the trailer! We didn’t take fishing poles, guns, the motorcycle or THE truck so I figured I am really going to have a long walk home. So I “thought”.

A three to four silent drive into the forest and Pa finally stops at this little meadow that we used to camp at years ago. I could never figure out why we never camped there again until I saw it. What used to be a beautiful green grass meadow was nothing but “donut” marks and mud! Three years ago this was one of my favorite places to camp!! Pa stopped the car and told me to unload it; this is where we are going to camp for the weekend. I was appalled!! Camping in the mud!! He looks me straight in the eye and says, “I thought that this was how you wanted to camp. You want to spin donuts and tear up the Land that is here for everyone. We are going to stay here this weekend so you can see what the 1% of Off Roaders do to give us a bad name.”

That was the most important weekend of my life! I “thought” I knew everything, hell, I was 16, I knew everything!! I “thought”. Boy was I wrong! After spending two days in the mud with Pa, we are now on the same page when it comes to respect for Public Land. I took Pa wheeling here in Southern California when him and Ma were down here for 6 months. My most memorable time of the whole trip is when Pa looked at me and said, “That lesson I taught you when you were young finally sank in! I “thought” you would never learn what this Land means to every one, not just you Off Roaders. When you can actually say that you are a steward of the Land, then, and only then will you fully understand what the Public Land means to every one? Some day, you will understand that.”

Some of you may think that my Pa is a “Tree Hugging Environmentalist”; I “thought” the same thing. When I sent him his BlueRibbon Coalition Membership and told him that the renewal was “on me” for as long as him and Ma were alive, I heard the words that I would never here. “You finally understand”.

You see all, our sport not only affects US, and it affects all of the people that use Public Land. The Mountain Bikers, Horse Riders, ATV’s, Dirt Bikers and the Hikers. I love to use my Off Roader to get to the places that I want to see. I understand that there comes a point in time that we NEED some areas designated as Wilderness. Unlike my 16 year old self, I now understand that I can’t drive “where ever, whenever I want”. I have to leave something for my daughter to enjoy when she has children. Am I talking about designating more Wildernesses? Nope, I am talking about making sure my daughter and her children have a place to “Drive” in!! I want to make sure that when I “get old and cranky like SDCJ” I have a place to wheel! Will I have to have the “talk”(no, not that one!!) with her some day? Probably, will she understand the way I did? I can only hope she will.

Some of you will look at this and say, “We have another Environmentalist in our midst”!! Yep, you sure do!! I feel that I am more of and Environmentalist than most that claim to be! I take care of the Public Land that I use. Have you ever seen the Environmentalists out there on the Hiking Trails cleaning them up?

I “thought” they cared!!


This piece is my own opinion and has nothing to do with the views of Jeepaholics.

Primergray
Moderator of the Land (ab)Use Forum
www.jeepaholics.com