John L wrote:happy to see you had fun. ...Another vote for all of the details please as I love riding out west...
Where did you fly in to?
Where did you stay?
Rental with a hitch?
How many miles did you trailer to the trail heads?
Did you keep the bikes overnight or return them each night?
What was the weather like for you this time of year?
What condition were your rentals?
What were your costs like? Flight, hotel, rental truck and rental bikes?
If you get a chance... Thanks!
Sure here some details:
My wife is a horse Veterinarian, and she had a conference in Salt Lake City. One of my ridding buddy’s wife is also a horse vet so while the girls are at the conference and taking continuing education classes we pal around doing fun stuff
We flew into Salt Lake City and stayed there. Moab is a 3.5 hr drive from Salt Lake. I had called around looking to rent bikes, and the only person I could get in touch with was Jim from dualsportutah.com. I spoke with him about 3 weeks prior to the trip and he told me he would be running a tour in Baja and that he wouldn’t be around to rent us bikes, but to check back closer to the time and he would see if he could pull something together.
Once we arrived in Salt Lake and got off the plane it was 55-60 degrees, we knew we had to find some bikes because the conditions on the ski slopes were not going to be great. I called Jim again and left him a message telling him we were desperate and would ride anything he had available.
He called back and said he had one CRF230 and one WR250 available, but they were not tagged so we would have to pull a trailer that he would provide. We were driving a Ford Explorer rental without a hitch so I had to find something with a hitch.
We drove back to the airport and started looking around for vehicle with a hitch. The large SUV's come from the factory with them so that is what we would have to use. I had been down this road before and I knew the rental companies do not let you attach anything to their vehicles so I didn’t even mention it.
We left SLT at 530am and arrived in Moab at 9am to pick up the bikes. Jim had someone meet us at his house to pick up the bikes. The bikes were in decent shape for rentals, had bent levers, and mine had a bald rear tire. Looking at his collection he had some Beta's and a few KTMs that all needed little things, like levers or a battery, or had a flat. Since it was his off season and he was not home we were lucky to just to get the bikes.
The Slick rock trail head was about 5 miles from were picked up the bikes, and the Sovereign trail head 10miles north of town. Slick rock was cool to go experience once, but I wouldn’t go back and ride it again. I like something that you can sink a knobby into, and it was like riding on concrete. It is like no other terrain on the earth though.
The Sovereign trail was cool mix of slick rock, sand washes, fast single track and technical climbs. If I went back I would ride that again for sure.
The weather could not have been better in my opinion. I think it was warmer than normal for the time of year, but it was 40 when we arrived and got up to about 60 during the day. I can’t imagine riding there in the summer, there is no shade. Another plus, is we didn’t see anyone else out on the trails, we had the place to ourselves.
It cost $225 each for 24hrs of bike rental. He gave provided gear (boots, helmet, goggles, gloves, pads etc.) that wasn’t in the best shape but was good enough. We returned the bikes that night so we could drive back to Salt Lake to meet the wives for a night on the town, it made for a long day but totally worth it.
I used this web site to pick the trails we wanted to ride.
http://www.dirtbikeutah.net/ There is a description of each, some maps and some video.
I personally liked riding in Colorado better, but it was cool to see the different terrain. I would not have picked Moab to fly and ride to, but since we were out there thats what we did.
Id be happy to answer any other questions, just let me know.
