January 1, 2006    The Official Newsletter of the New Mexico 4-Wheelers    www.nm4w.org

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Meeting was held at the lovely home of Phil & Ilene Rodacy.  Their hospitality was fabulous and we want to give them a big THANK YOU!!!

Mark Werkmeister called the meeting to order at 6:43 pm, after tracking down the secretary and waiting for her to get set up.

Guests:  Deborah Marchi - 2001 Toyota Tacoma, Ron Hyman - 87 Samari, Chris & Andrea Michel -04 Grand Cherokee.

Members Present:  Bontly, Brady, Capener, Collins, Duggar, Eklund, Kausche, Marx, Lavy, Ohnesorg/Coe, Rector, Rodacy, Sierra, Simenson, Tanner, Thompson, Turpin, Werkmeister, Whiston Sr, Whiston Jr, Wolf.

Secretary’s Report – Lauri Rector:  This is to be a very short meeting.  There wasn’t any discussion about reading of last month’s minutes.  Everybody wanted to get through it and on to the gift exchange.

Treasurer’s Report – Paul Thompson: We have $2,679.50 in the bank.

Vice President’s Report – Jeff Rector:  Nothing.

Trip Chairman’s Report – Jason Lavy:  Upcoming Events: Gordy’s Hill on New Year’s weekend.  Stock-to-extreme trails are available.

Chile Challenge in February.  Wednesday, February 22^nd through Saturday, February 25^th.  There are usually about 350 vehicles.

Director Environmental Affairs Report – Bob Norton:  Not present.

Program Chairman’s Report – Leon Duggar:  Leon is stepping down from this position and Jerry Marx wants to fill in.  Leon finally has some raffle tickets for the Chile Challenge, which is known for having very good prizes.  Normally these tickets are sent out a lot earlier.  Last year, there was $17,000 worth of prizes raffled off.  Tickets are only $1 apiece and you do not have to be present to win.  He doesn’t even need for you to pay him for them tonight.  You can also sell tickets to other people – friends, relatives, neighbors.  If you know a business that would want to donate something, please have them contact Leon.  Leon then read off the list of most of the items that have been donated to the raffle so far.   

Historian’s Report – Laurye Tanner:  If you plan to e-mail her pictures, call her first and she can turn on her computer and go do something else while the pictures download.  Send her stuff even if it’s stuff from earlier in the year.

Webmaster & Editor’s Report – Glenn Bontly: Nothing 

Old Business:  Summer Quarterly.  Need a volunteer to head up the organization of committees for food, catered dinner, port-a-Broncos (I mean, “potties”—sorry), and a place to camp and have dinner.  Need to think of a place that would have room for camping and a selection of trails.  New Mexico really doesn’t have anything to offer.  Colorado has the most to offer.  Salida and Fairplay have been done the last 2 time (2002 and 2004).  The last time we had it in Silverton was in 1995.  There were several offers from club members to help out on the committee, but no one was volunteering to head up any committee.  Wolfie volunteered to oversee all of the committees, but he will not be able to serve on a committee.  He will have presidential duties of SWFWDA to attend to during the event.  Anyone wanting to help has been asked to go see Wolfie after the meeting.

New Business:  Laurye suggested doing a photo directory on the club web site.  People could either send pictures to Laurye or Glenn.  Glenn recommended posting the pictures on the Member’s Only Page, not the public page.  Pat Brady wanted to know why we didn’t get to vote on the photos that were being shown on the DVD slide show tonight?  Laurye will take off weight and wrinkles, but the person must make a donation to the club.

Wolfie asked that the club make a $300 donation to the Road Runner Food Bank.  This will be the only Christmas community project that the club does this year.  Motion passed.

Meeting was adjourned at 7:04 pm.

Joan Wolf thanked our hosts. 

Afterwards, we had our annual gift exchange.  We sorted the gifts on two tables, one for the guys and one for the ladies.  Things got to be very interesting when Jason Lavy took the lady’s present that Lauri Rector had, a deck of Jeep cards.  And became even more funny when Barbara Marx took the ratchet straps – was it Pat Brady that had those?  Jeff Rector had tried and tried to give away a brush (tooth?, vegetable?, wheel?) for most of the evening.  He all the sudden was in luck as Justin Simenson had the last number and the last present was on the lady’s table.  Justin decided that the brush was a much better present than the unwrapped unknown upon the Lady’s gift table.  Jeff happily walked away with last present, which was a very nice set of dish towels.

On November 19^th, 12 vehicles showed up at the Conoco on 528/550 for a day of scenic four wheeling and trash pickup on the Sage Brush Flats Loop Trail.  Members present were, Glenn Bontly (TJ), Paul & Mary Thompson (Rubicon), Erwin Grevin (TJ), Cliff Meier (TJ), Mark Berglund (TJ), Ed & Lynn Kausche (TJ), Mary Turpin with daughter Hannah and Hannah’s friend Amanda Newell (Rubicon),  Phil Rodacy (Rubicon), and of course my wife Joan and I (Jeepster).  Visitors were Doug Pannell (TJ), Chris & Andrea Michel (WJ), Jerry & Mary Moran (Unlimited Rubicon), and Glenn’s friends Pat & Jan Montano.  We pulled out at about 9:05 am and headed for Santa Fe.  The weather was beautiful and sunny.  All we had to deal with was dust (which is a lot better than mud according to Glenn!).

We aired down our tires and headed out for a day of fun and trash pickup.  We went through the cattle corral and there we found lots of trash.  That was just a start.  Up “Tom’s Hill” (all made it easily) and over to the trailhead.  We again ran it backwards as that is the best way (I like going up hills).  We traveled down the trail a short ways and decided to stop to pick up trash.  Mary’s daughter Hannah and her friend Amanda were quite the trash pickers!  They were making a game of it and wow!, they picked up a lot of stuff.  Everyone participated in this effort and we stopped two more times before heading down to the lunch stop (overlook to Los Alamos and Whiterock).  It was a great view.  Once again, I tried to talk to all of the visitors, but am sure I missed a few.  Sorry, I tried, but I like to talk a lot (ask anyone who knows me!).

After about an hour, we again headed up the trail.  I stopped just after the rock garden to make sure that all of the vehicles made it through fine, and they did.  Chris Michel was driving a stock WJ and is a good driver.  He had no problems with this rock garden at all!  We picked up some more trash and then headed down the trail again.  As I went down the hill to the long meadow, I ran into a tree blocking the trail.  We had run into one before, but simply pulled out of the way by hand.  Not this one!  I had to pull it out of the way with my Jeepster.  Seems like a lot of trees died over the year as they were lying every where.

We kept up a steady pace and stopped a couple more times to pickup some more trash.  I think those girls gave up on trash pickup for the last couple of stops, but they did a great job that day!  We all got back to the air up spot at about 3:40 pm.  Those who had air shared with those that didn’t and everyone got their tires up and ready for travel down the road.  We broke up at that point and headed our separate ways.  It was a fun day and the weather was gorgeous.  I hope to get back there this spring sometime and see how dirty things get.  It seems that most of trash we picked up was really old.  That’s a good thing. I would like to thank those that came along and enjoyed their day.  No one had any problems that I’m aware of and the guests had a good time.  I believe everyone was made to feel welcome, something the NM4Ws do well and makes me proud to be a part of.

This month’s quote is another one of my smart-alecky comments, from one of our trips down to Gordy’s Hill back in November.  Werkmeister was there with the “Itch” and its 42”(?) tires.  Jeff Rector was there with his new 40” MT/Rs.  And then there was Brady, with his “little” 37s. While Jeff and I were watching Pat unload his Jeep from his trailer, I whispered to Jeff (just loud enough for Pat to hear me):

 “Hey Jeff, look how small those tires are.”

Pat looked at me and said, . . .   On second thought, I better not print it here!

The NM4Wheelers are hosting this year’s Summer Quarterly, 27 – 29 Jul 2006 in the Silverton/Ouray, CO area.  This will make it easy for folks to attend both our event and Mile High Jeep Club’s “All-for-Fun”, and offers a variety of trails.  I need volunteers to fill the following positions:

Facilities Committee; Food Committee; Restroom Committee; Registration Committee; and Trails Committee.

Each of these committees will be responsible for organizing the logistics of these items.  I will oversee the organization to be sure we cover all bases.  You can get help from whomever and from as many people you want.  If you want to help, but are unsure of what capacity, please respond with an e-mail that you would like to help.  Each of these committees will require multiple volunteers to be sure we have enough to put on an organized event.

I had several people come up to me at the Christmas party, but I can’t remember all of them.  Please respond with an e-mail or phone call to let me know you are interested in helping.  Also, please understand that help at the event is also needed and it goes beyond what these committees provide.  For instance, we will need multiple trail leaders and tail gunners to be sure we have all bases covered.  Also, registration at the event is necessary as many are not sure they’re coming until the last minute.  We need to come up with a fee for this event ASAP to allow Bob Norton to post in the 4WDrive Lines for the members of SWFWDA, along with the registration form that Glenn Bontly has so graciously offered to recreate from past events.  

Thanks for each of your assistance in making this a well organized event.  I look forward to attending!

Mark Wolf

Aluminum Cans: Our club saves and recycles aluminum cans.  Money from the sale of cans goes into our club treasury.  Please bring your crushed aluminum cans to each meeting, and somebody will take them to the recycling center.

To Our Guests: If you attend a club meeting or event and provide us with your e-mail address, you will be added to our guest e-mail list, and will receive monthly notifications of when the Trail Tales newsletter is posted on our Club web site.  If you are interested in becoming a member of the New Mexico 4-Wheelers, please contact one of our officers for membership requirements, or visit our web site at www.nm4w.org/join-the-club.htm.

Trail Tales on the Web Site: In a continuing effort help save natural resources and to control costs, you are encouraged to read the Trail Tales newsletter on the Club Web Site in lieu of receiving a hard copy in the mail.  Around the first of each month, the current issue of Trail Tales is posted at www.nm4w.org/newsletters.htm and an e-mail notification is sent to all club members.  In addition, a minimum of 2 years of back issues of our newsletter is also available on the web site.  So if you want to help “save some trees”, please send an e-mail to TrailTales@nm4w.org stating that you do not need to receive the hard copy of the newsletter.  Thanks for your participation in this program.

Submission Due Date: The Trail Tales is published on the first of each month.  Submissions for each issue must be received by the Editor not later than the 25^th of the prior month.  Submissions can be sent to TrailTales@nm4w.org, or Trail Tales, 21 Rattlesnake Ridge, Tijeras, NM 87059.

Please see the Events Schedule Page

Trail Tales
21 Rattlesnake Ridge
Tijeras, NM 87059-7440

TrailTales@nm4w.org