Corral Canyon was a new run for all of us that went.  I was really looking forward to trying some fresh trails - especially ones with names like Bronco Peak and Sidewinder.  We all ended up having a great time.  Corral Canyon OHV area is located 130 miles south of my Corona home but was easy to find.  Just take the 15 freeway south to the I-8 east.  Go east past Alpine and Pine Valley to Buckman Springs Rd and take a right (south).  Turn right on Corral Canyon Rd and take continue until you hit the Four Corners staging area.  From there we took a left to Bobcat Campground where we stayed Friday and Saturday night (for free!).  Make sure you display your Adventure Pass or you'll get fined.  The area is hilly and the road in an campgrounds are lined with impressive old oak trees.  This makes for a shady camp.  Even in mid July it wasn’t baked dry like some area are.  While there are dry grassy areas, the tress and bush help keep the temps manageable.  In the sun it was hot, under the trees it was comfortable.

            John Strege was the first to arrive Friday and made friends with a Tony, a Navy See Bee,  camped nearby with his family.  They brought a nice sand rail to the park.  We shared the campfire and stories with them.  I asked him if there are sandy areas like Glamis without the crazy crowds that Glamis is infamous for.  He said he avoids Glamis for that reason and goes a little further east.  They suggested the club try the sand runs near Yuma because they are popular for Jeepers and more family oriented.  Roger and I made it to camp Friday after 11:00 p.m.; mostly due to my slow, thirsty Jeep.  Ron Webber and his friend Jay planned to meet us Saturday morning. 

Unfortunately, Ron got held up in traffic and missed meeting before our first trail run.  So, we decided to start Saturday with the Sidewinder trail since it was short and close to camp.  This would give us a better chance to find Ron.  It turns out he was only 15 minutes behind us.  He tried to catch up on Sidewinder, and we tried finding him by backtracking, splitting up, and even going back toward the freeway.  We ended up doing Sidewinder twice and part of ATV trail #9.  Once we got together, we the group was made up of my old CJ-7 with a spring over and 35s, two TJs with 35s (John Strege and Ron Webber), and one near-stock height YJ with 31s (Roger Mauer).  Roger continues to prove that good skip plates can take 31s darn near everywhere 35s will.  However, he’s got a bunch of new parts in the garage for a springover and 35s.  But for this trip he relied on the skip plates he made.

            Sidewinder is appropriately named.  It's a narrow, brush-lined trail full of tight hairpin turns.  The trail meanders down into an arroyo that is line with trees.  It's not full-size friendly so my Jeep with full-width axles struggled to make some of the turns.  So, here's what I did to “cut the corners”: I disconnected the rear axle using my Currie twin stick, hit the breaks and gas letting the front tires spin me around the tight corners.  It worked great - so great that I went sideways into a tree branch and took out my top (ouch!).  We found out later that we had taken a wrong turn onto an ATV trail where it crossed Sidewinder.    The real Sidewinder has big granite rock slabs that remind  me of the Rubicon area.  Some are flat and up to 50 feet wide.  There is one slab that is concave, about 10 feet high and STEEP!  This one reminded me of the inclines at Moab.  Of course, Corral Canyon is much smaller than the Rubicon or Moab, but the slabs were pretty, and a nice change from Big Bear's boulders.

            We met four young Navy soldiers at the beginning of this trail scratching there heads over the first big slab.  They couldn't imagine a vehicle could negotiate the obstacle.  We urged them to leave the full sized Chevy behind because the fan was hitting the shroud (the truck was too big anyway), and air down the stock Toyota truck, and the nice, red YJ w/ 33's.  They let us spot them through and had a blast.  The slabs are more to the northern end but there is a nice obstacle at the southern entrance.  It consists of a round, 6-foot high rock on the left, and diff-eating rocks in the center.  Roger tested his Jeep’s new belly armor on the rocks in the center and I climbed high on the left rock.  Roger’s home-built skid plate worked great (he used it a lot).  Overall, Sidewinder is fun - especially up hill (South to North).  Going straight through only takes an hour or less and both ends meet the main access road within a mile of themselves.  I think doing it twice is fun and not boring.

            After lunch we hit the Bronco Peak trail, starting at the east end.  It’s also rated as Most Difficult but doesn’t have the large slabs that Sidewinder has.  While it is still narrow and brush-lined, the featured attractions are its grades and rocks ledges.  As it’s name implies, the Bronco Peak trail leads up to and over Bronco Peak.  On the north side just below the peak I saw a rock formation that looked a little like several horses running.  This might be the peak’s namesake, or just my imagination.   Either way the trail offers nice views of the valley and surrounding mountains as well as a good challenge to 4x4s. 

            The trip up the northeast side was fun, but uneventful.  There are some rock obstacles, but the real show began on the west/downhill side.  You can’t see very far in front of you because the high brush blocks the view.  It’s like driving in a steep, 6-foot high groove.  We were surprised by a couple of large, rocky steps that really got our vehicles tippy.  For the first one I lined up far to the left because of my axle width.  This put my left front tire over a large rock.  Believe me when I say I took this one slowly! I was standing on the break pedal more than

sitting on the seat.  John and Ron were able to sneak their TJ’s to the right of the rock to avoid getting so tippy.  Roger, on the other hand took the same line I did.  Keep in mind that this drop off is in the middle of a steep hill - doubling its tip-factor.  As Roger’s Jeep descended the rock step on the left, his right rear tire rose and rose.  I was standing below him at the edge of the trail watching his front end go down the rock (stupid move).  The Jeep’s rear rose so fast and so high it almost rolled end over end down the hill toward me!  I dove for the bushes but luckily Roger kept the rig upright.  Ron, Ron’s friend Jay and I moved to the back of the Jeep to pull down on his bump as ballast.  His bumper was higher than my shoulder while the front tires was down the hill lower than my feet!  Roger nudged it down slowly and got everything back in line.

            John’s trail guidebook warned us of a second steep rock ledge coming up and it was correct!  We came up to a section of the trail that had a 3-foot high rock on the left and about 4 or 5 feet ahead of that was a 3-foot high rock straight ahead blocking the trail.  So instead of continuing straight, the trail took a very sharp corner to the left between the rocks, then an equally sharp right turn all within about ten feet.  To make things really challenging, once you were to the left of the 3-foot rock straight ahead, you were faced with a couple of other large rocks in the center of the trail which cause a nice drop off.  This means that just as a vehicle was coming into the right turn, the tires would drop off the step to an even steeper downhill - another tippy section.

            As I said before, my Jeep’s axles are full width and my 15 ½ inch wide tires really stick out there making sharp turns tough.  There was no way for me to turn left between the first two rocks, and then turn right within a Jeep-length.  So, I just put my right tires over the 3-foot rock in front of me, and the left tires over the first big rock on the left.  I was able to straddle the big rocks in the center that created the drop off.  I think my rear Dana 60 dragged on them, though (no surprise there, huh John?).  With that axle my Jeep is a real tail dragger.  Fortunately my new rock ring kept the cover from peeling back and leaking fluid – NO MORE DRIPS!  I inched my way down the drop off and made it down through the rocky hill to the T-intersection of Bronco Peak (which turns right) and trail #5 (rated More Difficult).  There was a nice white CJ-7 at the bottom of the hill whose owners were amazed I made it down.  I told them to just wait for Roger’s Jeep…

            Of course, John was able to squirm through that section pretty well, but did slightly lift a tire or two in the process.  Very elegant driving as usual. John often gets stuck leading our runs because he usually doesn’t get his vehicle stuck.  The real show came when Roger tried to make it through.  His 31” tires are mounted on 8-inch rims, which doesn’t allow for much sidewall bulge.  Because of this, he avoided going over the rocks and a potential blown bead.  He made it through the left turn, through the right turn and that’s where everything stopped.  His right front tire slipped off the rock in the center leaving him high centered.  Ron tried to pull him backwards for another shot at it but when Roger tried to back up his left front u-joint exploded.  Who says you need big tires to break stuff?  He proved once again that backing up puts more strain on the u-joints than going forward.  He probably would not have broken if he had stayed out of Reverse.  Luckily, none the tire blocked the hurled bearing caps.  Because his Jeep was in the middle of this steep section, Ron had to secure the Jeep to his own with a strap before we could even jack it up.  It was spooky to see that the front end of his Jeep was still much lower that the back end even after the front end was jacked up using a 48" Hi-Lift®.  We wouldn’t have tried this without first getting it hookup up to Ron’s.

            While Roger patiently fixed the u-joint, I scouted the trail ahead on foot. The Bronco Peak trail (#3?) takes a right (north) and goes down tree-lined Corral Canyon.  It gave me a chance to cool down in the shade.  There are more rocks and drop offs but they're under the cool shade of trees.  Because it was close to dinner time, we went left on trail #5 to get back to camp.  This trail is rated as More Difficult.  We saw a stock Geo Tracker make it through.  The passenger was standing up on the back seat, and leaning against the roll bar (safari style).  While this did look like fun, it was dangerous.

            Sunday morning John left for home while the rest of us drove up to Los Pinos Lookout.  Norm, the official eyes of the tower, invited us up to see his “command post”.  He was an interesting person and  told lots of stories.  We saw a huge fire burning in San Felipe, Mexico and watched another big one start in Live Oak.  Norm instantly called that one in and pretty soon a tank plane was dispatched from Ramona and two bucket helicopters buzzed the tower on their way.  We could hear other people on lower ground reporting the fire in a different location.  As Norm said, “this high lookout is effective” because he was dead on with the location (near Live Oak).  We got to see hummingbirds near the window and bees attack carpenter ants and fly off with them. The view from Los Pinos was great.  We could see south to the buttes in Rosarito, Mexico all the way to Mount Wilson in L.A.

            I think the club would enjoy going back to Corral Canyon.  The trails are short but are worth doing both ways.  The short length means you won’t be on one trail all day but can try several.  Sidewinder and Bronco Peak were definitely challenging but not to the point of causing damage - Roger just got lucky.  Instead they were fun and gave a good thrill. There are mild trails as well, and the camping is free.  There is a motel  in nearby Pine Valley.  I'd love to go finish Bronco Peak from the other end and have lunch on the peak.  There are also a couple of trails outside the park.  I’ll just have to plan the next trip...