The day was nearly spent as Lorena and I made our way toward Flat Nasty offroad park to attend a benefit event for St. Judes hospital. Since I didn't fuel up earlier, we traveled US51 south to US60 west, then on to US19. It was nearly dark by the time we turned onto US19 and I must say it is NOT a relaxing country drive at night. After making good time to Eminence we somehow wondered unto a Missouri torture track that lasted 20 miles till we turned onto HwyKK and Akers Ferry where we made our final connection to HwyK, which led all the way to Jadwin. Feeling somewhat like a frog caught in a blender, we were pleasantly surprised to be met on the road by David Payne who escorted us the rest of the way to Barton's Motel.
Barton's is a scattered collection of mobile and modular homes, which although dated, were clean and roomy. Every site had a outdoor fire pit and grill, with plenty of parking for friends and trailers. Right in front of where Darren and the gang were staying was a nice concrete floor pavilion, which we put to use every night! The owners were friendly and accommodating, even allowing use to stretch our checkout time so we could explore some more on Sunday. Outstanding place for rugged individualists to stay while exploring the area and Flat Nasty!
We arrived at Flat Nasty around 9am Saturday, stopped at the general store/office to pay our entry and pick out some souvenirs. They also sell led light bars, camping necessities and a few parts. Once we have all our plunder stowed we head into the park. As expected this time of year, the main trail was pretty dusty, but we stayed on the main road until we got our bearings. Darren, being a natural daredevil, volunteered to lead us around and onto our first trail. The Trail Map such as it is is fairly accurate and the trails ratings are differentiated by color and numbered or named. Light blue being reserved for motorcycles and atvs, with green being the easiest, yellow being the intermediate and black being extreme. As we all understand there are no set standards on determining trail difficulty and it is used as a general guideline to plan your adventure, the leveling was in places deceptive. Darren warmed us up on a green trail that meandered the perimeter of the park toward the gate, it was a pleasant trail with lots of twists and turns and ups and downs, with a few mild obstacles. We arrived back at the gate unscathed and ready for more action, but with the rock bouncers scheduled for noon we take the main dust river to the back campground to park and eat our lunch of Jeeper delicacies (lunch meat and soda)
After a meeting some new friends and packing up we walk over to the bouncer arena to set up our stadium chairs and listen to the sweet music of untamed horses and feel the ground shake from unbridled torque. The challenge hill was a nearly vertical loose rock mountain with a couple of ledges and a denier tree or two forcing competitors to take a hard line. Since that didn't seem tough enough they had to time it. The first competitor, maybe a repainted ultra buggy, with a HOT LSX shot up the hill, ripping out bowling ball size boulders and throwing them down the hill, in 31 seconds! The next several had to make multiple attempts to make the hill, until a orange single seater bettered the time to 27 seconds showering down the hill some huge stones. Shelby Tanner wasn't able to display her normal antics because the rear drive wouldn't stay engaged. After the timed run, several tried the hard stuff without success, but the Orange buggy really put on a show going where no one has gone before (he was bulldozing trees and zig zagging with rear steer over a area hundred feet wide). Next was the monster truck race, motocross racing and rockbouncer drag racing! We decided to pass on all of these and explore the park, we hooked up with a group of locals in Toyota crawlers and they took us on some of their favorites (mostly yellow and blacks). Later we left them to make our way back to the bounty hill for we heard they were scheduled to make the attempts at 6pm, unfortunately this never materialized and we decided to explore the park until dark. As we were making our way to our selected trail head we stopped to watch a group of buggies tangle with a nasty creek run with boulders the size of appliances that made them work to get through. We used up all our daylight and stamina, so we returned to camp to grill burgers and dogs and fellowship, before turning in for the night about midnight. As I was getting ready for bed I heard in the distance a high horsepower rig kicking off the midnight race! Ahh.....sweet dreams!
Early Sunday I fellowship with my neighbors from Illinois with massive jeeps and built razors, good peeps! I then roll over to Casa del Hyde to find them fellowshipping with some Hannibal Mo peeps with a built Tj and a Cadillac buggy. Darren and I headed back to Flat Nasty to do some more exploring, David bowed out this trip to wash and wax his Jeep for the trip home. As soon as we drove through the gate Darren led us onto the back half of a one-way trail that we started Saturday, but didn't finish. Although it was rated a green trail it held a nice challenge or two, as we worked our way to the back of the park we inadvertently wandered onto a black trail which was fairly easy because it was the downhill part, but burned up a lot of time. When we finally bounced our way to the bottom it didn't connect to the green loop like we thought and the only way was to climb a loose rocky hill with a couple moderate ledges. Darren was able to will his way up the first ledge, but was unable to bounce over the second ledge and found himself between the ledge and a bank, so he couldn't go forward or back. At that point Chris braved the treacherous footing to hook up the winch and with a little tug Darren was on top! I was fairly certain that I could make the ledge, so Lorena ground her way up in order to preserve my accomplishment for posterity. As soon as I made the turn to approach the first hill I started going down instead of up as the loose football sized boulders kicked out from under my tires, with a little throttle feathering I was back on top, but had lost my momentum. As I caught the first ledge I killed the engine and after a restart I was able to claw my way up to the second ledge, where to my surprise I spun. Thinking that a little bump would pop me over I rolled back and attempted to implement my plan. As I bump the ledge I hear a distinct pop and the driver side tire no longer pulls, Darren looks at the axle joints and determines they are intact and the lockout is engaged. I try it again and it is apparent that something is broken; if it isn't a axle joint that leaves the inner axle, the locker, or the hub. Being in a position that negated further investigation, Darren hooks up my virgin winch and up I come. At the top I unlock that hub and continue on, but unless I engage my locker I am rear drive only. I was able to limp out to the main trail and back to camp. We all enjoyed the park and people and the word is that they are soon to have a modern shower house and bathrooms. Overall this park is a keeper and other than the roads getting there; there is no reason I would not be a regular!
