I have ridden and camped on Military zoned land before without any problem. The area you speak of is zoned for Twentynine palms Marine base however they may not be concerned with the area because it is nestled against a rural neighborhood as you said. However if people start to encroach too deeply into their area they may put a stop to it. Several years ago I was playing behind Edwards Air-force base on land that had no signs but the Military Police swarmed us and said we were trust passing. I explained there were no signs posted! Nevertheless we were escorted off the land....A simple check of any good map will show you the areas zoned for military purposes whether they use it or not is another story.

 

I'll have to make sure that if we go out there again, that we don't go way back on some of those trails that seem to lead out to the middle of nowhere, although we did see some riders on them. Most of the riders hung out on the lake bed and on the trails in the hills nearby. I'll have to ask my husband about it . . . it seems he would have known since he's done a couple of jobs out at the 29 Palms Marine base before. Like you said, I'm sure one of these days, they'll start kicking everyone out of there.

I wish Gorman would open up and get back to normal - oh well.

 

[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-cool.gif[/img]Tell everyone Gorman is open, just had a partner go over Easter and said it was Packed to the gills. Some areas are roped off because they have not got to fixin it yet. There was some places that had some deep ruts from the storm run-off, but other than that it was all good . Just thought I'd let everyone know.



silverado
21 ft AmericanFreedom Hauler
Blown 450 ex
LT 250
Quadzilla 500
TTR 90
400 ex




Just shut up and ride it
[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-shocked.gif[/img]

 

WOW - good to know!

I was just telling our friends that we needed to plan a trip there. It would be a first time for all of us, however, it has been on our "Places to Go" list for camping & quading.

I just checked out the website this morning. Now we just have to pull out the calendar.

Thanks for the update.

Richard & Lori

 

Great! I'll have to check out their website again.

 

Well, finally made it out to Ocotillo Wells for a long weekend. All my other ridin buddies bailed, but I said what the hey, I'm going anyways. So it was the three of us (and the dog). We found a great camping spot out of the crowds, but still close enough if we wanted to be. Had a great view of blow sand at night.

Now, this may sound like heresy, and may raise a few hackles, but I'm not sure that I really like the place. It seems like if there were more of us it would have definitiely been more fun. I liked the fact that there were dumpsters, dump station, good ranger presence and if you needed more ice it was just across the street. I didn't like all the whoop de dos on the smaller trails. Now on the other hand my daughter loved them - couldn't get enough. I think a heard a few hoots, whoops and hollers from her on a few trails. I also did not like that there were lots, and I mean lots, of pick ups, jeeps and other "street" vehicles that were being driven off road. These "road warriors" were a bit too crazy on the main roads for my taste (but I am approaching that of the geez, so I may not be that open minded anymore.) However, when two young men in an F-150 come barreling down the road near Holmes camp at about 50 mph, skidding around a corner, fish tailing and not even slowing down near camp fulls of kids, you get a bit cranky. We were lucky that I noticed them driving like idiiots so we could get out of their way. Although it was quite fun watching the same type of idiots try to make it up blow sand hill and getting stuck half way up.

Now what I did like was that it was very easy to navigate with all of the main roads marked. We barely had time to see all of the hot spots, only making it to blow sand, devils slide and shell reef. Next time we'll try to find pumpkin patch and go over to gas domes. We couldn't have foudn a better spot to camp (for the first time) The particular area was not overcrowded and up until Monday morning we didn't get any dust. Sunday aftermoon was great. The place cleared out and the riding was wonderful. Unfortunealy the winds kicked up something real bad Sunday night and blew all day today. We will go again, first impressions can be wrong, or maybe from reading multiple posts on the area I expected too much. But it will be with the entire caravan in tow and on a long (3-4 night) weekend. Otherwise for just a weekend, I'll stick with Johnson Valley or Stoddard Wells.

 

We didn't ride at Carnegie over the weekend[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-sad.gif[/img] Waited for the wife to go with us today[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] Had a great day of riding[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] Not a lot of people there, maybe a dozen or so, other riders[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] Did find 2 atv riders that found a mud hole off Oso trail, they were buried up to mid engine in mud[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-shocked.gif[/img] Got to use my winch for the first time[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] and pulled both of them out[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] Winch ran for about 15 mins between getting both quads out and it ran flawlessly[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

This weekend, looks like it's Miami trails with a group of riders from here and Club Atv West[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

Hi all, I haven't posted in awhile. Mostly because I haven't got to ride for a couple of weeks. Well we're going to take care of that this coming weekend, YEAH!! I know (because my wife tells me)[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img] I'm just a big kid.

We will be at least 4 adults and 3 kids, and possibly some more of our neighbors as well. If any of you other SoCal riders out there are going to be in Johnson Valley this coming weekend I'd love to meet you and be able to put some faces with the names.[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-cool.gif[/img]

 

Isn't Johnson Valley where they have the rock crawling contests..[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-confused.gif[/img]
Is there any sand out there or just hard desert dirt? In other words do you use paddles or knobbies?

Inquiring minds what to know.... [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

 

Johnson Valley is a mixed bag, a little bit of everything. There are hills to climb, trails to follow and large open areas to play in, including the dry lake bed. Our group has sport quads, utility quads and motorcycles and everyone found a place to play. I was told by someone else here on the site that there is also a sand hill east of the dry lake bed a couple of miles, I didn't know about it before but I intend to find it this weekend. So the short answer is, .....***** not paddles.

Last time we went out there I did stop and chat with this older couple that had a jeep with them and they were telling me that there was some big off roading group out there doing a run. I guess they were rock crawling, I have no idea.

Are you headed out Scoundrel? If so I guess I had better get my rental trailer reserved now. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] Boy it's going to be nice when I have my own rig.