November 2001 --

Breakage may have occured on the rigs, but it didn't detour participants from looking forward to next year.

The New Mexico 4 Wheelers, Rock Garden 4 Wheelers, and Cliffhangers Four Wheel Drive Club hosted the United Four Wheel Drive Associations (UFWDA) 25th Anniversary Convention in conjunction with the Southwest Four Wheel Drive Associations (SWFWDA) Summer Quarterly.

Several hundred four-wheel drive enthusiasts converged on Farmington, NM to attend a variety of functions, including world class four wheeling found only in Chokecherry Canyon, the Rock Garden and the nearby San Juan Mountains in southwest Colorado.

This jacket shows the miles of trails and many memories of the person who wore it.

Thursday morning's offerings included trail rides, tackling some of the most hard-core trails in the southwest. Chokecherry Canyon's Waterfall, Intimidator, Cobra and Reptile trails, the Rock Garden and adjacent Secret Trail, and some milder wheeling in southwest Colorado's La Plata Mountains were among the list of notorious trails.

A hundred or so four-wheel drive vehicles (mostly highly-modified Jeeps, which included a few buggies and a small list of other rigs) gathered in the parking lot of the San Juan County Fairgrounds McGee Park, staging for what was to become a great weekend of four wheeling. Rigs from all over the country amassed from places as far away as Illinois, Ohio, Kansas and Washington.

The Hummer may be the ultimate 4x4, but it rolls over just as the best of them do.

Over the course of the three-day event, breakage became a factor but never so much a factor that those from stuck to the idea that they'd return to Farmington for more of the world's best 'wheeling next year.

The three-day conference also included much more than just playing in the hills around Farmington. There were UFWDA and SWFWDA meetings and dinners, displays of four wheeling memorabilia in the exhibition area, raffles, and two seminars on land use issues, hosted by the UFWDA's attorney Carla Boucher, who talked about a 100-year plan for motorized recreation that she has been working on for the last two years.