Snow at the trailhead
Posted: January 4, 2017 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Placer, recovery, winter Leave a commentFor those of you following the saga, the past practice of Placer County piling snow at the Tahoma entrance to the Rubicon should have stopped.
Unfortunately, not everyone got the memo. This was today, 1/4/17.
Now we don’t know who piled the snow here but I’m working on it.
For the record, the Rubicon Trail doesn’t close during the winter.
If you are prepared enough and brave enough to try the Rubicon during the winter, realize there may still be issues at the trailhead this winter.
On your way in, feel free to break-down any piled snow or shovel the snow away all together. Do not throw that snow in to the street. If capable, drive over the berm.
Remember that there is no street parking from November through May. A sheriff in a bad mood may try and cite you if your rig is in the street as you work the berm. My advice is be polite and don’t fail the attitude test.
On your way out, make sure the berm has not been altered. Get out and check before driving off the edge.
On a side note, there are currently two rigs stuck on the Rubicon. A recovery team is going in on Friday to get the vehicles out. All the people are safely out.
The first rig is near Miller Lake, in a water hole, on the trail (35″ tires). Please do not go off trail to get around this vehicle.
The second vehicle is almost to Observation (40″ tires). It lost one tire off the rim. They plan on bringing out a spare, swapping it on to the rig and driving out. That rig is off to the side of the trail.
Rubicon Ronin
Merry Christmas!
Posted: December 25, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized Leave a comment
That’s the fire department way of fixing a broken ornament.
OHMVR Grant Funds at Risk
Posted: December 14, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: CORVA, education, grant Leave a commentAs a new CORVA (CA Off-Road Vehicle Assoc.) Field Representative, I felt the responsibility to phone in to and participate in the Board of Directors meeting Monday night. It is an open meeting, anyone call phone in and participate or just listen. For the most part, it was your typical meeting reviewing minutes, President’s report, old business, etc.
The one thing that jumped out at me was someone (sorry I didn’t note who brought it up) spoke about the new CA Senate Bill SBX1-1. Look it up. (I think there’s a similar one in the Assembly.) In a nut shell, it proposes the ability to change the allocation of the gas tax revenues that usually funds CA State Parks OHVMR grants to be used for all things vehicle related such as general highway repair, adding bicycle lanes to state roads, etc.
I’m not a legal scholar, so I’ve provided a link to the bill below for you to review the bill as well as copied the two paragraphs from the bill that I think sum it up:
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520161SB1
(8) Article XIX of the California Constitution requires gasoline excise tax revenues from motor vehicles traveling upon public streets and highways to be deposited in the Highway Users Tax Account, for allocation to city, county, and state transportation purposes. Existing law generally provides for statutory allocation of gasoline excise tax revenues attributable to other modes of transportation, including aviation, boats, agricultural vehicles, and off-highway vehicles, to particular accounts and funds for expenditure on purposes associated with those other modes, except that a specified portion of these gasoline excise tax revenues is deposited in the General Fund. Expenditure of the gasoline excise tax revenues attributable to those other modes is not restricted by Article XIX of the California Constitution.
This bill, commencing July 1, 2016, would instead transfer to the Highway Users Tax Account for allocation to state and local transportation purposes under a specified formula the portion of gasoline excise tax revenues currently being deposited in the General Fund that are attributable to boats, agricultural vehicles, and off-highway vehicles. Because that account is continuously appropriated, the bill would make an appropriation.
This could be a huge blow to funding OHV maintenance and repair. Along with this bill, the entire OHMVR program is coming up for review (it will go away unless it gets voted to continue) and the OHMVR division will be rolled into the CA State Park system and no longer be a different division.
These are a lot of changes facing our grant source all at one time.
CORVA is on it. They are already voicing support to renew the OHMVR program. They are keeping an eye on how this system will be managed under CA State Parks directly. And they are aware of and will work to correct any bill that would defund or reduce funds to our OHV grant program.
As a life member of CORVA, I would ask that you help support the efforts of CORVA in this issue and the many others that CORVA champions. www.CORVA.org
Rubicon Ronin
“Turn Around, don’t Go Around”
Posted: October 24, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized Leave a commentSo, “Turn Around, don’t Go Around” has been the unofficial motto of this website. This weekend it came in to play twice. The first time, we didn’t go around, we cleared the trail. The second time we turned around.
Traveling down to Rubicon Springs Saturday morning (10-22-16), we came up to a rather large tree across the trail.
In two different places, people who didn’t know any better or were to lazy or unequipped to deal with the situation, drove around the tree.
Unfortunately, I didn’t take the time to photo our method but a single winch line and a snatch block was all that was needed to clear the trail.
The tree will need a more permanent solution but I think it will wait until spring.
The rocks should hold the tree off the trail until we can cut it up and remove it completely from the trail.
At the bottom of Cadillac Hill, we turned on to the Long Lake Trail to check conditions. We didn’t get too far and found trees down. We cleared a few and kept going. Then we got to this:
At this point stopped driving and walked in to the campground along the river to check things out.
We had a chainsaw if we really had to go down this trail but we were planning on camping in the springs anyway.
The Hi-Lo’s will ad this to our schedule and try to get the trail cleared as soon as possible.
Did I mention the Springs…
After probably ten inches of rain in the previous week, there were puddles everywhere. Also evidence of the river rising out of the banks and moving toilets, wood and misc. debris down stream.
We camped along the slabs.
Rubicon Ronin
Fire Restrictions
Posted: July 9, 2016 Filed under: Uncategorized Leave a commentFYI,
Fire restriction are in place now on the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit. They started July 1st.
Fire restrictions start on the Tahoe National Forest July 11th.
Eldorado Forest fire restrictions started July 21st.
You can have a propane grill but you still need a permit.
No welding while fire restrictions are in place. Maybe on private property WITH PERMISSION. Have water and shovels ready at all times.
The 'Other' Rubicon 