We published our dates for 2011 and updated some policies so take a look around our web site (www.northwoodsoverland.com). Some highlights include:

• Simplified our group discounts
• Updated prices for camping
• Specific office hours for the weekends we are open

Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas!!

It's hard to believe, but mid June is already here! We ended up opening for a weekend in mid May for several clubs, which was earlier than planned. That Friday evening 5" of snow fell across the Northwoods... making for an entertaining day of wheeling.

So far this year we have seen a dramatic increase of visitors which unfortunately conincided with the closure of McCaslin Mountain. While it is discourgaing to have another wheeling location closed, the hidden blessing for us is that many have visited who prior had always kept with past routines (which didn't include NOL). We have gotten very good feedback from people so far this year.

As to trails, we are working on extending the yellow trails and are continuing the concept of having a continuous loop of yellow. Right now the newest addition of the trail ends to the northwest of the covered bridge. I hope to get it to the north edge of the park yet this summer.

So far in June it looks like the two weekends will be at less than 50% of capacity and we have almost no reservations for the July 4th holiday. This trend confirms our decision to limit the open weekends and on the personal side has been a big improvement for our family. Please don't assume we're full on holiday weekends! Call to find out.

The March of Dimes Director, Luana Schneider contacted us this week to discuss the 4 Wheelin' With Feelin' ralley in October. We are pleased to announce that NOL will once again be honored to host the event.

Hope to see you in the park (tires down of course... Cowboy).

Sincerely,
Jeremy

2010 Season is Nearly Here

Spring is in the air! With temperatures in the low 50's the snow is melting and another summer of wheeling is on the way.

This season will bring some significant changes to the off-road park. For our personal sanity we will be offically open to the public for six weekends that are posted on the web site. Larger groups can reserve other weekends. Business was very slow in mid summer and we spent many weekends hanging out with an empty facility.

More importatly... as was the case in the past two seasons we are adding trails! This summer we plan to work on completing the yellow loop on the east and north side of the park. Currently it runs along the southern edge from east to west. If the yellow trail is completed, the orange tight & technical trail will be extended to connect with the yellow. We also have plans to improve to obstacle area as not much was done with that portion of the park last summer.

As always, our old workhorse family Jeep recieved a little TLC over the winter. Frequent winching from last summer damaged the winch cable badly enough to merit a replacement. I opted for the safety and strength of a sythetic cable. A damaged rocker guard was replaced with a seriously beefy upgrade and some improvements made to the power steering setup.

Hope to see you in the park this summer!

Sincerely,
Jeremy

The End of the Season is Around the Corner

Hey All! We have had a CRAZY couple of months that involved having no internet connection or access to our computer files, so that's why we've been very remiss in updating the site and blog. So here's the latest and I'm so sorry we can't update the site too. We should be back up within a month or so.

Our last open weekend will be this coming one. Then we will be hosting the 4 Wheel'n with Feel'n rally on October 3. Then we close our doors for the season. We have a had a good run this year. Mid-summer was very slow, but business has picked back up nicely towards the end of summer and into fall.

On the personal front, we've moved off site so it has been a bigger challenge to be available when we are needed, but overall it has gone well. We are in temporary living right now, but soon will be moving to a new home in Rhinelander, closer to Jeremy's day job. The hour long commute is wearing us down and it is time for a change for our family.

But don't fear...we are not shutting down! (As the rumor mill may have suggested.) We will be open next year, most likely on Memorial Day. We will only open the trails certain weekends though. Since we are limiting the open days, please check the web site and blog for information. We should have those dates ironed out by the end of this calendar year. The campground is open anytime using self-registration.

If you want us to shoot you an e-mail when we have the dates, just send us an e-mail to info@northwoodsoverland.com. Let us know you'd appreciate an e-mail when we set our open dates for next year and we'll get them to you.

Wishing you all a great Fall!!!

Trail Building Update!!

Sorry, I've neglected my blogging duties... but here is an update. We have added a significant amount of trails this spring. Check out the full map on our web site at this link:
http://www.northwoodsoverland.com/trails_descript.htm

We had a great group come up in mid May from south eastern Wisconsin. While they were here we put in a good amount of the new Orange Trails. I owe a big "thanks" to Anders who worked diligently to organize the group. The orange trails are much more difficult than our other existing trails. They are very tight, off-camber and have lots of twisty moguls. Not for a stock rig... awesome for a well built short wheel base machine. Best of all, I like these trails! Vehicles as large as a Grand Cherokee can squeeze through with some work, but may incur some scratches. It's a good thing I put power steering on the CJ last winter because these would be NO FUN without it. The CJ's new cage is already quite scraped up and that should hint at how tight these are, and perhaps how lazy I am when it comes to backing up.

We also eliminated the yellow trail coming out of the campground and went north with it to come off of green (1) so that all trails come and go out of one point. On the east end of that yellow trail before it goes to the scramble area we added a leg to the north. This helps tie two yellow trails together. The goal is to build a large orange loop through the center of the park and a large yellow loop around the perimeter.

We have had a lot of excitement so far this year. Memorial weekend was fun. Cowboy from Going Broke Off-Road was here... and we had to recover his truck with the skidder, which was not pretty. Cowboy was a good sport about me rolling the truck on its side into some trees and then rolling back into the front end with the 12-ton skidder. Fortunately Jesse was able to winch the truck back onto it's wheels (mostly) which enabled us to get off of the tree and a sticky situation. They were videoing the "recovery" but I haven't yet been able to get my hands on any pics or videos.

It has been wet in the Northwoods. We have had tons of rain. Some of the trails have been getting very muddy and one of the yellows has become winch mandatory. So far nothing has been able to make that trail without a tug. Thankfully the holes are small (but deep) and are a short winch. I've had to pull two full clubs through so far. Some of the green trails have also become rutted and difficult.

We're excited to be open again for another summer. The coming July 4th weekend will mark the first full year the park has been open. I'm beginning to be more comfortable with where we are at with trails and can now more clearly see where we need to go with trail building. Come visit and let us know what you think!

Spring 2009 Trail Building Begins

The WI4WD Association Spring Fling was here this weekend. We did not have a large number of people, but made up for it by working hard and having lots of fun. The weather was beautiful, making for ideal trail building conditions. I had flagged off a new trail that will go from the trail head around the entire property to the north side. My flagging was more ambitions than our energy! We completed about 1/5 of what I had flagged.

We had decided that a new category "Orange" trail will be added. These are very tight and twisty with lots of opportunity for flex and off-camber sections. There was one very built up '08 'Yota Cruiser in the group and we had to use some creative winching and cable cranking to squeeze through. Extremely tight for that size... I would not recommend it. It is a good thing that Hannis is a good sport about pin stripes, etc. on a rig that new. :)

Orlin's clean early 70's CJ5 was impressive. I loved the healthy bass growl of the 401ci small block. You can hear it quite well on the YouTube video. With 35's and locked front/rear he kept up to the old Northwoods Overland CJ7 quite well. Of course the senior Hannis brought his TJ Rubicon which, with a short arm Rubicon Express lift, 35's and some other toys, walks through everything he points it at. Check out the air under his front left tire on the video (too bad the tree was obstructing a good camera shot). He took a hit to his hard top and left with some nice cracks.

Check out a video clip from this weekend: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGJj0WPikFc&feature=channel_page

After polling together feedback and reviewing what last year's visitors had to say, here are our plans (roughly): we will add a new trail color, orange, which will be very twisty and technical woods trails, extremely tight for anything larger than a short wheel base Jeep. The orange trails will wind around in a large loop, crossing other trails. The yellow trails will be coordinated better to make a large loop around the premiter of the property (outside the orange loop). Each loop should take a good part of the day to complete. The red trails are yet to be determined but must be made much harder. We have been scouting the areas near each and will work on lengthening and making them harder.

Hope to see you this summer!!!

Spring 2009 Opening Dates

As the weather warms and snow slowly fades from open fields we are beginning to plan for the 2009 summer. The campground will open in early may and the trails will open to the public for the Memorial Day weekend.

For this summer we are planning to add trails, trails and more trails. I can clearly see the need to add more miles of harder tails and expand the obstacle course. Much of the feedback we have gathered is that our facility has a surprisingly beautiful campground with some off-roading. That is definitely not what we have in mind...