Holy Crap Man! Jesus those dunes are big!! Little Sahara Utah was absolutely amazing, well surpassed my expectations. Sand Mountain was everything I hoped it’d be, and more. There are so many dunes to ride there, I didn’t imagine it being so full of nice big dunes, but that area behind the mountain has a lot to offer that goes unseen on all the videos and pics I’ve seen so far. But the Mountain itself – its amazing. There’s so much riding to be had on the mountain, not just the main drag run you all have seen, but all the way around it. Its so long, and there are so many trails going up and circling it, to me it was the highlight of my trip.

St. Anthony’s, well lets just say it’ll put the fear of God into any nonbeliever in a heartbeat. If you like the floating gut sensation of rollercoasters, then St. Anthony’s is your place. So many massive huge dunes, all razored, witch eyes everywhere, massive bowls – and lots of them. This place is one dune after another, for miles and miles, and you gotta be hammer down in 3rd everywhere you go because this is some really loose sand, and you spend most of your time side-hilling so you gotta be putting out the power to keep you *** end from sliding out from under you, all the while looking down 2 hundred yards to the people at the bottom who appear small as ants, thinking how’s it possible to overcome gravity like this?!?!?
Oh, and Choke Cherry? Well Thunder Mountain and Devil’s Dune make it look like an ant hill. Devils Dune is the hugest pile of sand in the world man – never seen anything like it.

Took me the first day to get jetted right – no accel pump because my nozzle is too rich for the altitude, but amazingly no bog off idle as a result like I have at seas level. Dropped to 30 pilot, 145 main, #96 needle on 4th groove and it was perfect everywhere. My last day there I finally decided to drop to a 14T front sprocket and then I could take the Face of Sand Mountian in 3rd with plenty to spare. Wish I’da had all this done when I ran with Majorecho’s 733!
Oh, and BTW – one main jet size actually makes the difference between clearing that Face in 3rd, or having to shift down to 2nd!! Special thanks to the guy who gave me the 145, ‘cause 147.5 was the smallest I brought!

It was a wonderful trip, dream come true. 4 days of riding at Little Sahara, 3 days of riding at St. Anthony. Wonderful hospitality at Little Sahara by Air and Trxoutlawz, special thanks to Rusty’s wife for the Raptor parts delivery, John for the mobile workshop, and everybody else for the cooking, tours, and good times. Got to meat DSAholic, Majorecho, Quadloco, Derbyking, Sandgod, and I know some others I can’t think of right now. Man those 733’s sure do run!

Well, I could write all day, just too much to say about it all! One thing is for sure, I’ll go back!

 

Glad to hear your had a good time Chris. Maybe next time I will get to go with you guys. Maybe for long we can make a trip to Badlands again. This time I will not wreck in the first 15 minutes lol. How did Scotts Predator do? And how did Ernie like his set-up. Did Randy go also?

 

Anytime Rob, look forward to it! How about Silver Lake dunes in Sept.?
Predator wouldn't climb choke cherry, but I think its because it wasn't jetted correctly - he never changed it from home at sea level, where the rest of us dropped about 3 main jet sizes, and believe me it makes a huge difference in power. Randy went, his 400ex wouldn't climb it either, and I think he was fat on the main too. Ernie had a hard time jetting because raptors are put together stupid (no offense, but no raptor owner can disagree!) but once he finally got it all dialed in it ran great. He had some oil leak issues that we were able to repair thanks to parts aquired with the help of Air, but they were the fault of the prior mechanic that rebuilt his tranny and not Yamaha.

 

OMG:: thats it im going!! i dont care if its further drive than GLAMIS.. im sure its way cooler.. ill start making my plans now.. Hightower. what were the temps? whats the camping situation? restrooms? showers? how about the rules and regs? anyone inforcing them??
thanks for the answers

 

Little Sahara (in June) 95-100 by day, 65-70 at night, perfect for sleeping but bring plenty of shade with you because the tallest tree at the most wooded campground (Oasis) is a 12' tall juniper. running water bathrooms w/ flush toilets, very clean, hose spickets for garden hose showers w/ 55 degree well water - very refreshing! Oasis is 4 miles from Sand Mt. according to GPS - prolly 5 mile quad ride. You can see it the whole time, its fabulous.

St. Anthony dunes are supposed to be much cooler than Little Sahara, but they had a warm spell and it was nearly as hot as Utah with temps over 90 each day, and nights around 60. We camped at Desert Oasis - barren sand lot with no trees at all, but right at the dunes with Thunder Mt. is sight, about 4 miles from Choke Cherry. I recommend Sand Hills resort instead, much nicer with grass, trees, and showers. That Desert Oasis was the contrary - no showers, no shade, no nothing. But Sand Hills Resort is 8 miles from choke cherry.

never got checked for sound or sparky at either place, never saw a ranger.

 

SO what I'm hearing is that its a "tad" bit better than LS (okla). LOL![img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]



Glad you had a good time(you deserve it).

Oh wait,,,I'm thinking of big wayne! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img] you dont deserve ****....LOL(j/k)








BIgger.

 

oh they're big alright - both are at least 20 times bigger than Oklahoma's dunes, but I still like Oklahoma, and I'll be heading over for snakehunt next year for sure! Gotta love the tree-shootin' that Oklahoma offers!

AND hey, yes I do deserve it!

 

Nice.....I wish I was not dialing in a carb and replaceing a head gasket, so I could have come down and met you. Glad you had a blast. Come back soon...

 

Good to meet you Hightower. You're an funny bastard. We took Raptoid on a nice bowling tour late Sat evening. You guys were hillshooting. Sounds like he got his quad running good. Sucks living out west!!![img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img] Glamis has nothing on either of these two dune areas other then acreage.

 

yeah I heard about the bowls - some of that stuff gest a little spooky for me man, you should've seen me at St. Anthony's - talk about a floating stomache!
Hey thanks for that tour around the top of the mountain - we hit that same trail again two more times before I left, and I took some of it with helmet cam.
hey I should also mention that there are chicks out west that ride with the best of us too, and Sandgod's girl is one of them! DSBomb's wife (They're from Kentucky) does some hard riding too, and she even likes to air it! Wish my wife rode.

I must also mention that it sure was a relief to have all my trees back when I got home - once you get past Iowa it gets pretty barren man - there's only so much mountains and sagebrush a guy from west/central Indiana can take before he gets homesick for his backwoods hillbilly lifestyle in the lush deciduous bottom lands. That great wide open aint for me to live in, but I sure do love visiting it! Next year, we're thinking Walden Colorado - any input??