**OHIO WHEELIN' & MEET-UP THREAD**

MeefZah,

I'd be interested in learning how one goes about determining where trails are and if those trails are open for driving, and legal to access. Your post #494 had a whole lot of "seemingly" well researched facts that made my head spin, and it would appear you knew exactly what you were doing. I too don't want to ever be one of those guys that does something irresponsible on land that doesn't belong to me.

If think it would be sweet for this thread to also include somewhat of a how-to or checklist for someone to put together a Meet and Drive.

 

It's a multi part deal. You gather a bunch of info, some conflicting, and you make a best decision based on available information and impressions.

I use local knowledge from riding in the area, meeting people, talking to them, determining which ones are mentally retarded and discounting what they say, determining which ones are lucid and considering what they say; consulting county maps (the ones issued by the engineer's office), consulting the DeLorme Gazetteer for certain areas, reviewing what appear to be roads shown on GPS, talking to landowners, talking to law enforcement, noting signs and gates, noting a lack of signs and gates, and noting other seemingly insignificant clues that indicate an area is public access.

I am really pretty new to "overlanding" (there, I used that fucking word) by truck; but I have (sorry if this is bragging?) ridden hundreds of thousands of miles on motorcycles and have ridden in and camped in every one of the lower 48 states, all the Atlantic provinces of Canada, and have done a massive amount of exploring both far away and very close to home and I've found all manner of cool shit by banging around and seeing what's out there, and then inquiring about places I have been. Some turn out to be illegal and those ones I generally don't go back to. Some places, my impressions are validated after researching them and since they are now know to be legal, I go back. Wills Creek, as an example, was one of the first local places I really started exploring on my enduro and my knowledge of that place was gleaned from many, many rides through there and a lot of talking to local people about the legality of it. In fact, I've been through there so much by bike that I literally know every mud puddle - ask Micah, as I was riding in the back of his truck I was telling him about holes coming up in the trail and which side of upcoming ruts to be on and depth of mud holes coming up and so forth ...LOL. I'm not going to lie and say I haven't ridden my bike on single track in Wills Creek that I know is illegal, but that's a chance I personally am taking in the interests of exploring my world, and I'm not going to drag other people into that shit with me. I will say that I do no damage and in fact, I would argue this till I was blue in the face, a competent biker does way less damage to a trail than a goddamn horse and rider does, but you can ride fucking Trigger any goddamn where you want. Bullshit, sez me... but I digress and probably shouldn't have even said that since now TG knows I am a violator.

So Wills Creek, as the example: one day I'm riding down SR 83 and I look over and see the back side of a rusty old stop sign poking through some bushes, and there is an ancient overgrown gravel road that pokes out onto 83 right by that stop sign. They don't put stop signs in places they don't anticipate people to be and in places that are "illegal", so I thought, WTF, let's go up this road and see (that road was the rutted trail that we ran in 3 vehicles coming downhill, where we had to move a few trees and Greg was damn near sideways in a rut, if you guys recall. The stop sign is long gone but the fact that there was once a sign there means that there was once a road there, and where there was a road there is always a road until such time as it is legally closed and reverts back to the landowner - which in this case is a government entity (MWCD) and so if they wanted the road closed they'd put a gate and / or sign up). Anyway, that chance viewing of the stop sign and me riding up to the top of the hill led to my personal awareness of the rest of Wills Creek, which I then rode all through. I also rode the east side, which was posted on one end, but is not posted coming off of SR93; but again, I digress. I rode the areas to see what was there and to see if there were houses, street signs, no trespassing signs, signs of activity, locals on site that I could talk to, etc. In the course of doing this once or twice I ran into a few locals who explained to me what the area was, gave me the name of it (Wills Creek), which enabled me to do some research into it, call appropriate law enforcement to ask about it, etc. I met some more locals at lunch one day and picked their brains and gradually I began amassing independent data from numerous conversations with people, maps, internet research, local LE, and so on. This led me to the ultimate conclusions that I have posted several times about the legality of that area.

I've done this for most every place I've taken my enduro more than once, because I want to know if I should expect a bullet between the shoulder blades from some pissed off land owner or if I'm righteous by virtue of being on a public road or at the very least what Ohio refers to as an "abandoned right of way" which still grants public access as the land has not reverted to private ownership.

Maybe for another outing we can do my Danville enduro loop which has some neat abandoned right of ways on it, all of which are perfectly legal and all of which I know are legal because I used the same vetting process on them as I did for Wills Creek.

Goddamn that was a lot of words. That answer the question for ya?

 

Motivation enough to spend time figuring out what the hell you're planning to tromp through.

 

I feel that the terminology we are using may be getting convoluted. I know that we throw the term "off roading" around as a slang all-inclusive, but it's sort of an oxymoron. We are off of paved roads, not off of roads altogether. Cruising along township and county roads, old public access routes from years past, that's the sort of thing we are referring to. As far as trails go, by legal definition in this state, a trail is something that an on-highway vehicle can not legally drive on. Technically speaking, any place that an on-highway vehicle can legally drive is a "road" we just happen to be looking for the ones that are not maintained when we go "off roading."

I'm afraid that in some situations there is no right answer legally speaking. A lot of it comes down to interpretation and enforcement. I have had a few conversations/encounters with LEOs in a couple of different states and found that many of them are enduro/off road enthusiasts. A lot of the time they ride in places where the legality of what they are doing is somewhat iffy. Recognizing discrepancies in the law, zoning, maps, and property boundaries of an area is important when approaching the conundrum: "can/should I ride here?" A lot of places in this country still aren't very well mapped or parceled. One good example of this is that there are state boundaries where the legal boundary and the LE/map boundary are miles apart! There are also plenty of places where LEOs don't know what is/was a legal road and what isn't. A lot of the time, even with proper research and planning, one just has to make the best call they can make at that point in time with the clues they have in front of them. When in doubt should we all just turn around and go back home?!?...

I say no. In the spirit of Teddy Roosevelt creating BLM and DOI and National Parks, I say no. In the spirit of not turning tail and running when you see a farmer with a shotgun and instead going up to him and asking politely where you are and if you are allowed to be there, I say no. In the spirit of is this my 4th or 5th beer aww fuck it I don't have to drive anymore today it's whatever number beer I want it to be, I say.. ... I say.. uhhh..





I say...







..uhh..

Wouldn't mind checking this out with you after I put new sprockets and chain on my XR!

 

"off-roading" and "overland expedition" will henceforth be referred to as "on-highway vehicle legal, off-pavement, dirt and/or gravel trailing" -- OHVLOPDAOGT'ing

 

Has a nice ring to it

 

The fuzz is here! Everybody scatter!

 

Who's not behaving? There isn't even an argument here...? Everyone is totally civil or is making reference to inside jokes. I'm legitimately confused by the concern...?

 

I have seen a Jeep with that Sticker too.

 

Welcome to the thread bud, nice to have ya! Thought you could sneak a post in here without us realizing that you're new?..







Time to initiate the new member ceremony...

 

Greg...how 'bout you hit the "pause" button on your meme'ing and vote on a Wrench Fest date! What's a guy gotta do to get noticed around here?

 

I'll have everything ready to go if we're doing this the 23. Do you think we can get everything done in a day?

 

Depends if it all goes smooth or we run in to any snags. What all did you want to get done then?

 

You guys suck. I'm in Punta Cana right now

 

Let us know when you're back.

 

August 27th. My truck still is apart too