Coal Wash Loop on a Rainy Day

[Udink]

I had a hell of an adventure with my youngest son this Saturday in the San Rafael Swell. We rode the Coal Wash loop, which is about 60 miles and took 11 hours to complete. I'm still not sure whether the heavy rainstorm late in the day improved my time or made me slower.

Here's a link to my GPS tracklog in Google Earth .KML format, and for those following along in their San Rafael Motorized Route Designations map, here's the route I took starting at the staging area at the north end of Coal Wash:

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[accadacca]

Epic trip dood. Wicked.

[BruteForce]

Nice! Great photos and excellent tale.

Cute kid you've got there, quite photogenic!

[Jaxx]

I concur. Very cool TR. How do you plan your trips? Do you just know the area and remember roads that you wanted to check out when planning or do you just look at a map and connect roads and go?

[Udink]

How do you plan your trips? Do you just know the area and remember roads that you wanted to check out when planning or do you just look at a map and connect roads and go?

I normally use the BLM's OHV travel map, USGS topo maps, and Google Earth to plan out my routes. I create waypoints in Google Earth, then transfer them to my GPS and just follow them when I'm out on the ground. Although, recently I got a new GPS with very nice topo/trail maps, and I could probably dispense with much of the route planning, but I'd think I'd still prefer to do it all in advance just in case the GPS fails me on the trail, so I'll still have a good idea of where to go.

[Jaxx]

Cool. Thanks for the info. I'm surprised you don't just have all the trails memorized. you post a ton of TRs