'Zuki 'xplorin'

‘Zuki Exploring

Several months ago Chris decided that he was ready to be done dirt biking, and ready to sell his AWD Rally Bug and move on to something else. I was surprised that he was ready to sell the Rally Bug because he loved that car so much.



We had fun racing it, but honestly, it had turned into a hanger queen. We haven’t raced in years and have no plans to race anytime in the near future. The car was great, but he had gotten his fun out of it and was ready to move on. He wanted something more suited to our lifestyle now and here in Southern Oregon. He decided on a Suzuki Samurai 4x4.

We have had fun heading out and running around in it. It has a very short wheel base, so it is kind of fun to drive around. He put some new gearing in it so that now that thing will climb darn near anything without too much effort. We have a little off road area not far from the house where we run out to every so often for a half hour of fun.

Today we decided to go on a longer trip and headed up into the hills to the west of Medford and Jacksonville. This is an area with a lot of dirt bike, ATV, cycling and hiking trails, along with miles and miles of forest service roads. We stuck to the roads and just went exploring.

First stop was this lookout point. The flat “hills” in the distance are the Table Rocks, which we have hiked and I have posted about in the past.






As you can see we were pretty overcast and cool today, but the clouds were really high. They broke up by late afternoon and we warmed up a bit and had some sun.

From the lookout point we headed off on another spur road, and then another, and then another. We came across an active logging operation, freshly cut trees everywhere. We came across an older clear-cut on a very steep hillside. We found an old road that was overgrown by grass and bushes. Chris found a spot to do a few doughnuts, too.

For it being a nice summer day we saw NO other dirt bikes, off road trucks, or even ATV’s. We saw two enduro bikes and riders, one little pickup and two parked cars. That was it. We were out there in the hills in a very popular area for over 2 hours! Crazy! This is one of the reasons we like living down here though. No crowds!

When we came down out of the hills we weren’t exactly sure where we were going to pop out at. We certainly wouldn’t be coming down the same was we came in, as we had traversed over several ridgelines. We popped out very far north of where we started. We started out in Jacksonville and ended up in Gold Hill, all through the foothills.

We had a great day, lovely picnic lunch and enjoyed ourselves. Chris found one road that would make a good rally road, and even though we weren’t in the rally car, Chris put the ‘zuki through its paces out there.

The only downside to the whole trip was at the lookout point there was a ton of garbage, beer cans and miscellaneous other junk. I really wanted to clean it up but we didn’t have anything to transport it all in. We decided the next time we head out we are going to bring a garbage bag with us so that we can help clean up after the lazy morons who ruin the beauty for the rest of us. In fact, I think I’ll go put a garbage bag in the lockbox right now.



Hope you all had a great Saturday, too! Feel free to comment with your own Saturday Adventure!