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April 2023 Black Sheep Week - Sand Hollow UT

Silverton34

Well-Known Member
Messages
360
Location
Phoenix, AZ
I finally pulled the trigger and sold my business and retired. We are definitely in for Sand Hollow next spring. Is there a restaurant district with hotels in the area? Where Is everybody staying?
 

HirschH3

Probationary Member
Messages
3
Location
St. George, Utah
I finally pulled the trigger and sold my business and retired. We are definitely in for Sand Hollow next spring. Is there a restaurant district with hotels in the area? Where Is everybody staying?
Hurricane Utah is the closest town and has all the amenities because it is also close to Zion National Park. The next closest city with all of the amenities would be St. George.
 

HirschH3

Probationary Member
Messages
3
Location
St. George, Utah
I will help in any way possible, hoping to join the fun however it is too far out for me to plan on it for sure, with 11 adopted kids and working 1 full and 1 part time job it gets a little crazy juggling everything.
 

3Hummers

Super Moderator
Staff member
Messages
10,400
Location
Central Texas
Damn, I don't know how anyone does 11 kids these days. It was all we could do to handle getting the eldest to all of her activities.
 

HirschH3

Probationary Member
Messages
3
Location
St. George, Utah
Their are actually 30 adopted kids and 5 bio kids over he years along with helping 2 other family's taking care of thier kids while serving overseas in the military. Check out a YouTube video taken several years ago by our neighbor, search joe kenemore what makes a family to see some of the kids, they keep me young at 61 and still running like crazy.
 

alrock

El Diablo
Staff member
Messages
10,447
Location
Scottsdale
Months to go, but how are we looking? Booked a place yet? I'm hoping someone with experience (Chris, are you there?) can help me with trail recommendations for the group.

I may stick to milder stuff. I'm really tired of breaking stuff and the wallet's pretty thin right now. Or maybe I just use the rental SxS that's in our AirBnB garage 🤣
 

06 H3

a.k.a. "The Jackal"
Messages
9,352
Location
Meridian, ID
I can chime in on trails. It’s been a couple years but I’m hoping the mapping system and trail markers have improved.

The trails are great and I think a step above Moab but holy crap they could be tough to find and tough to stick to as there can be a ton of turnoffs to other trails.

The trail rating system is different. It’s not like Moab or other places. 10-15 rated trails avoid. They are rear steer buggy trails that we have zero business on.

I’ve done a couple 9 rated trails and I’m working my rig hard.

I’d stick to 4-8 rated trails. I will say Milts mile is a 6 but has a lot of optional stuff to keep everyone entertained. Normal lines for a rig on 35s, tougher lines on one side, bypasses on another so it caters to many. 8 is probably your SAS guys. 4 is your bone stock H3, 5-6 and some 7s for your traditional H3 on 35s, sliders, one locker, UCP.

1-3 is dirt road stuff.

If you want to do a weekend trip to scout it out and get an idea on what to run we can try and make that work. I’m gonna have a crazy January but maybe end of Feb or March?

For guys camping, you can camp near the beach in a designated spot and I must say (as of a few years ago) they are the cleanest showers and bathrooms I’ve ever seen at a campsite. They are cleaner then some hotel bathrooms! Temperature controlled as well. Figured I’d put that out there for anyone camping.
 

06 H3

a.k.a. "The Jackal"
Messages
9,352
Location
Meridian, ID
I’ll also chime in that there has been major trail changes from monsoon season. It’s been said that the changes have never been this great. Some have gotten harder, some easier. I’m not sure where that puts trail ratings.

Triple 7s was rated a 7 and I just saw that it’s now an 8. So I’m assuming they are working on re-rating trails? They do rerate trails between 10-15…as more people complete it they drop a rating. I haven’t seen them do that with lower rated trails but they might be due to the monsoons.
 

06 H3

a.k.a. "The Jackal"
Messages
9,352
Location
Meridian, ID
Luck would have it that someone started talking in a thread about sand hollow maps on another forum. I didn’t realize cartotracks now has a sand hollow map (under sand mountain) but cartotracks is not a free map though.

It’s $20 a year with updates each time it gets updated. You can probably buy it for $20 and cancel the subscription.

I download cartotracks maps and use it off of the Avenza app to host the carto track map, if that makes sense.

Anyways, I have used onx, cartotracks, Magellan TRX, the list goes on and cartotracks is my favorite and they have been extremely accurate. I use their Hammers map and have only found 1 lesser known trail to be slightly off. Everything else is dead on balls accurate including when we download the race course for when my buddy races.

So it’s not free but I can say with confidence that if it’s anything like the hammers map you will not be disappointed and probably won’t get lost either.

Edit: it was also stated that crowd sourced maps such as onx are difficult at sand hollow because it’s truly open OHV. You can run a trail and find some offshoot and go run it. Most places like the rubicon or Moab are stick to the trail policies so when random people upload it’s pretty accurate. Sand hollows open OHV policy makes that more difficult. The cartotracks owner and founder rode around all week with the guys who started sand hollow so it’s accurate.

I can also copy and paste some info over here on trail data that was provided.
 
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06 H3

a.k.a. "The Jackal"
Messages
9,352
Location
Meridian, ID
Double Sammy is a 7. Two lockers and 35's and it's fun-challenging, 42's are a bit silly on it. Similar for Triple 7s. I don't have a lot of experience with 38s specifically. A k5 is a lot of sheetmetal, is it a "pretty" truck? If so, I'd stay to 7's and under. If it's a bit wrinkly, 8's are probably OK too. If it's a raisin, 9's. If you're calling it a k5 to keep plates but it's really a buggy, 10's are probably doable but I would be leery of running 9+ anything alone.

Dixie4wd has a free overview map, as noted earlier. Updated 6 years ago. Great overview, missing many many trails.

OnX is crowdsourced. so a "trailhead" might start at the campground, might start at McDonalds or might actually start at the trailhead....and who knows if the person mapping actually knows the route. I use OnX for mapping, and an overview only. I have some stuff that's only on OnX too ;)

CartoTracks is accurate. Lots of locals, including me, had the owner Jake ride with us as we mapped the trails. The gps track is down the center of the trail, and follows the correct/recognized route. Nearly all of the current routes are on it (including some I've yet to run) No clutter from someone's track across the sand too....

Sand Mountain ratings are from 1-15. 9's "might" have been done with a full body earlier this year, but the rains in August about guarantee that's not happening presently. 15, never completed but mapped. 14-13, arguably rear steer only. 12-11, drag axle buggy. 10-9, lighter buggy. 8-7, full body, 37's for most. 6-5, 35's for most. I opened/named 777 with my FZJ80 on 35's :)

Then look at the options, and there are thousands....we run TNT as a 12-13 versus the 9 it's mapped at. Nasty Half goes from a 9 to a 13 quick too. We have climbs on a few trails that only a handful have ever run.

Obviously there are a few badass web wheelers who will claim they ran a 13 rated trail in their JK, not even knowing they bypassed all the real stuff. And someone else will angle the camera to make The Chute look ridiculous (which I have done with my 1986 RHD BJ74 Land Cruiser on 33's and no spotter)

BEST option, run with a few locals....the South West Adventure Group on FB has someone out there damn near daily.

As far as difficulty, I think you'll enjoy 6-7 rated trails and 8 rated trails will be a challenge. I doubt you will want to run 9+-rated trails. The thing to keep in mind is that many of the easier trails have optional lines that are fun even in a buggy. West Rim is an excellent first trail to hit out there since it is basically "choose your adventure" and can get as stupid as you want to make it.
All the comparisons in these posts are based off of a K5 with 38in tires. Like mentioned. Many “easy” trails have crazy lines too so choose your path.

Woody is a local and runs ih8mud (land cruiser forum) and has a portal rear steer buggy and cut some of these trails. He mentions a full body rig historically could run a 9, which we did on UA, but the monsoons have made it probably not possible so take that for face value and you may want to drop a number because most trails are more difficult now.
 

alrock

El Diablo
Staff member
Messages
10,447
Location
Scottsdale
BTW, if anyone gets stuck, uses Matt's Off Road Recovery and ends up on YouTube, you'll owe $100 to the local charity of your choice for shaming the Hummer brand.
 

alrock

El Diablo
Staff member
Messages
10,447
Location
Scottsdale
Chris, thanks for your input. I wrote down trails when I first planned this based on their rating but I'll revisit with your input. A winter or spring trip sounds good but not something I can plan on yet.
 

alrock

El Diablo
Staff member
Messages
10,447
Location
Scottsdale
As I read through the trail descriptions again at https://winter4x4jamboree.com/Trails-Home.cfm I'm leaning towards choosing 5s and 6s as our group typically isn't looking to take the Pucker Factor to 11, but when we feel the need for challenges those optional obstacles typically exist on the moderately hard trails. But I'll keep some 7-rated trails on hand in case our (my) understanding of the trail ratings is off a bit and we need more difficult stuff.
 
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