April 20, 2025 • 48 mins
In October of 2024 Art & Tom went to Moab UT for the Jeep Jamboree Signature event called Moab Odyssey. This is the conversation about that trip.
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Art Aldrich (00:00):
Hello and welcome to Talk is Jeep.
I am Art Aldridge.
I'm joined with Tom Chartrand.
Hey, Art.
How you doing?
It's been a long while.
Tom Chartrand (00:09):
It's been a while, yeah, but glad we're
getting back to jeeping season.
You know, for me especially,getting ready to hit some
beaches and, you know, maybe digsome stuff up here or there.
We'll see.
Art Aldrich (00:21):
It's been a little while since we had our last Jeep
trip.
Tom Chartrand (00:26):
Yeah.
Art Aldrich (00:27):
Our last Jeep trip was in Moab, Utah in October of
24.
We had actually recorded apodcast, not a video podcast
just because of the timing.
But we had recorded a podcastright after the event just to
keep it kind of fresh andaccurate.
(00:49):
And then we had some technicalissues.
And so we couldn't use it.
And I wanted to get back to itbecause we actually met some
good people there.
And I actually recorded someinterviews with people over Zoom
who were at the event.
So it wasn't just my voice andyour voice.
(01:11):
Awesome.
Tom Chartrand (01:12):
I think that's great because we had a really
diverse cross-section of Jeepenthusiasts on that trip because
it was such a microorganism ofa Jeep Jamboree.
It was really cool meeting somepeople that were just so
enthused by such a specialevent.
Art Aldrich (01:31):
I mean, I will say this.
At all of the events that I'vebeen to, and I've probably been
to, I don't know, 15 or 20 JeepJamborees over the last five,
six years, you do meet reallygreat people.
I mean, I've met people therethat I would be like, you know,
I would definitely...
sit and have a meal with thisperson if the circumstances
(01:54):
permit it.
Tom Chartrand (01:55):
Absolutely.
Art Aldrich (01:56):
The Moab Odyssey trip, if you're not familiar
with it, it's one of the JeepJamboree signature events, and
that means it's got some specialfeatures.
I mean, it also has a higherprice point than the regular
Jeep Jamborees by a good factor.
(02:16):
And we'll talk about that laterin the podcast.
Tom Chartrand (02:20):
Right.
And these experiences were allnew, right?
Weren't they new for 2024?
Yes.
Art Aldrich (02:25):
The one that we went to was the first event.
I don't know if that was thefirst year they did signature
events or not.
I don't recall.
Tom Chartrand (02:34):
Okay.
Speaker 05 (02:35):
But this was the first Moab Odyssey, they're
calling it.
Right.
And so when I saw theposting...
And the fact that it was beinghosted by the YouTuber Fred
Williams, I was just like, wow,this is going to be a great
trip.
(02:55):
I mean, to me, he's aninteresting personality if you
don't know him, which I wasactually surprised that most
people on the trip didn't knowwho he was.
Let's hear from Jamboreeparticipants Peter and Julia
from Canada.
Peter & Julia (03:12):
We told our kids that we were going to Moab on
this Jeep Odyssey, and they weregreen with envy to start with.
And we said, well, it's goingto be hosted by Fred Williams.
And my son-in-law's face justdropped.
And he's a big fan.
He's in his 20s.
He used to tell the stories ofcoming home from school, rushing
(03:35):
home to watch his movies.
His episodes on.
And so we really didn't knowmuch about Fred Williams.
We do know a lot more aboutFred now.
And since we both had been sickrecently, we've been watching,
catching up on a lot ofYouTubes.
Watching all the old episodes.
Fred was amazing.
We should know about Fred.
(03:58):
In a heartbeat, we'd sign on toanother Fred Williams trip.
Speaker 02 (04:03):
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 05 (04:03):
I mean, the whole reason of my interest level was
because he was hosting the trip.
Speaker 04 (04:10):
And I think he was riding along more for the fun
and a little bit of jovialitythan truly hosting, which let
people still get away and dotheir own things and just kind
of commiserate with him, whichwas different than we expected,
I think.
But it was cool.
Speaker 05 (04:27):
Yeah, it was different.
And if you don't know who FredWilliams is, he used to be part
of the Motor Trend Network, andhe had a show called Dirt Every
Day or Dirt Daily.
I think Dirt Daily is his newshow.
Dirt Every Day was a show thatwas on Motor Trend, and he just
did a lot of crazy off-roadstuff.
(04:47):
Not everything with Jeeps, buta lot of Jeep stuff.
And he's a Jeep guy.
Yeah.
So we went to this trip, andone of the things that made it
unique, aside from Fred, was thefact that they gave you a Jeep.
Right.
Speaker 04 (05:05):
Not gave, but
Speaker 05 (05:07):
yeah.
Yeah, they provided you a Jeepto use.
And that was the first JamboreeI've ever went to where that
was even an option.
You could bring your own.
They would give you a discountoff the price of the Jamboree if
you brought your own.
Right.
For us, if you remember, wewere right between two jobs.
(05:28):
Yes.
And we flew in and we flew outand we went to work on both
sides.
Yeah.
So it wasn't really an option.
Speaker 04 (05:39):
No, it was a jam.
We couldn't take our timegetting there or getting back.
Speaker 05 (05:42):
Right, right.
And I actually talked about iton the last podcast that last
year I had made a commitment tosort of take the next step of
being able to bring my Jeep tothese types of events.
And I bought a trailer and Ihave a F-150 that I'm leasing.
(06:03):
And, you know, I had that lastyear and I could have, in
theory, brought my Jeep.
It just, it wasn't time.
Right.
You know, there wasn't time todo it.
So I wasn't sure how...
That part of the trip would be,I mean, we didn't really have a
(06:24):
choice, wanted to do the trip,so we did the trip as it was.
But I was a little hesitantabout, you know, using like a
rental Jeep, so to speak.
Here's another Jamboreeattendee from Wisconsin, Amy.
Speaker 01 (06:37):
I wanted to use my own Jeep, but I didn't want to
deal with the headache andhassle of it, something breaking
that often happens with thesecars.
Speaker 04 (06:48):
Of course, you don't know it.
You're not sure what you'regoing to be given.
Thankfully, they were allpretty great vehicles, but
you're not comfortable with it.
They were
Speaker 05 (06:57):
built and they were four-door JLURs, Rubicon
four-doors, and they were built35s and automatics.
I think all of them were softtops, but I don't recall if they
were all identical cars.
Speaker 04 (07:15):
Only one soft top actually came off, though,
during the whole trip.
Speaker 05 (07:18):
Yes, our soft top was the only one that was not
up, which I just don'tunderstand Jeep people who treat
the Jeep like it's a car.
It is a convertible.
Take that
Speaker 04 (07:33):
top off.
Exactly.
Even though it's 42 in themorning, it's going to warm up.
Speaker 05 (07:38):
Yeah, exactly.
And it did.
Oh, it did.
Absolutely, absolutely.
So we flew into Grand Junction,Colorado, which I guess is the
closest airport to Moab.
Speaker 04 (07:50):
Right, right on the border, pretty close.
Speaker 05 (07:52):
It was a drive that I think was like two, what, two
hours?
Two,
Speaker 04 (07:56):
two and a half, yeah.
Got to go through a ghost town.
That was kind of fun.
Speaker 05 (08:01):
Yeah, it was a small little airport.
Yeah.
You're going to have to waitbecause we waited a good
probably 45 minutes for therent-a-car line.
Speaker 04 (08:12):
Yeah, no automated, no walk out and grab your car.
Speaker 05 (08:14):
Right.
There's no express lane.
And there's like very, youknow, I guess all the flights
get in around the same time fromall the airlines.
Speaker 04 (08:22):
Right.
Speaker 05 (08:23):
And so they get overloaded pretty quick.
Speaker 04 (08:25):
Yeah, I think there were just two gates there or two
baggage claims.
So it was, yeah, a little bittight.
But that's, you know, all good.
Good to get away from all thebig stuff sometimes.
Yeah,
Speaker 05 (08:35):
yeah.
So we drove to the Moablocation.
We stayed at the Hoodoo Hotel.
Right.
Which is a Hilton, though Idon't think it says Hilton on
it.
It just says Hoodoo.
Speaker 04 (08:51):
Right.
It was a part of the Hiltonfamily.
Speaker 05 (08:53):
Yes, yes.
Yes, and it was a very
Speaker 04 (08:56):
nice
Speaker 05 (08:56):
hotel.
It
Speaker 04 (08:57):
was great.
And they were townhouse type ofunits.
So it was like a home of suitesor something like that.
Speaker 05 (09:04):
Well, the hotel had like two components.
It had the regular hotel roomsinside of the main building.
Right.
And they had these casitas, Ithink they called it.
Yes.
Which were like little, noteven a studio apartment.
It was a townhouse.
It was a two- two bedroomtownhouse.
Speaker 04 (09:24):
Exactly.
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (09:25):
Now we stayed in the two bedroom townhouse, but we
were told that it was going tobe double occupancy rooming for
the whole trip.
Speaker 04 (09:34):
Right.
Speaker 05 (09:34):
Now that didn't turn out the way it, you know, it
didn't turn out that way inreality.
Right.
And I heard that there was asnafu.
I don't know whose fault thesnafu was on, but I heard there
was a mix up.
either on the number of roomsor the dates at the hoodoo.
And the casitas were like an11th hour Hail
Speaker 04 (09:59):
Mary.
Ah, okay.
Because with only one king bed,that could have been awkward.
Speaker 05 (10:06):
Yes.
Yes.
So if you're hearing this andyou're doing the Moab Odyssey,
your mileage may vary.
They may have figured out.
the logistics by the time, uh,Moab number two comes around.
But, uh, at least for numberone, we had a pleasant surprise
(10:27):
of a very nice, you know, like Isaid, a townhouse with a
fireplace, I think, and a livingroom kitchen and the bedrooms
were upstairs, two bedrooms,washer dryer.
Speaker 04 (10:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (10:38):
I mean, it was,
Speaker 04 (10:39):
it was nice.
It was, it was very comfortableto come back to.
And, um, and it was eclipsedlater on by even cooler, uh,
accommodations.
We'll get to that.
Speaker 05 (10:49):
Right.
We will get to that.
So we had sort of the kickoffmeal.
We met Fred.
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 02 (10:58):
I was nervous, very nervous at the beginning.
I had butterflies.
I was terrified.
When we were all walking up tothe Jeeps and they said, okay,
just pick whichever one youwant.
And I had so much anxiety andconcern about
Speaker 05 (11:14):
So the first day's trail was, I think, maybe going
to be the day two trail, butthey decided to do an audible,
and we did Top of the World.
And all of these trails are theJeep Badge of Honor trails.
So if you've had experiencewith the Jeep Badge of Honor
(11:35):
trails, these were three ofthose trails.
If you're not familiar withthem, there's a Jeep Badge of
Honor app.
You download the app, youcreate an account, and then you
have to check in while you're inthe vicinity of the trail
somewhere.
Speaker 04 (11:53):
Which can be dicey on some of those outlying areas.
Speaker 05 (11:56):
It can be because there wasn't a lot of cell
service in there.
But basically you check in andthen you get in the mail for
free a little plastic badge thatyou can.
I mean, I know a lot of peopleput them on their Jeeps.
I don't particularly like that.
Right.
GAC, I think is the term on myJeep.
Speaker 04 (12:17):
That GAC.
All right, all you kids.
Speaker 05 (12:20):
Yeah, I think, I don't know what I'm going to do
with my, I have a few badgesbecause we got one out in
Drummond Island.
We got a badge of honor badge,but I'm not going to put mine on
my Jeep.
I may put them in a pictureframe or some kind of a thing.
(12:40):
I don't know.
Speaker 04 (12:41):
Sure.
Speaker 05 (12:42):
How do you guys out there feel?
Do you put the Badge of HonorTrail badges on your Jeep?
Do you like to show that off?
Is that your flex?
Speaker 04 (12:52):
What do you think?
To me, it's a cool questionbecause is it a conversation
starter?
Does it guide you into aconversation about, whoa, what's
that about?
What is Badge of Honor withyour Jeep to get other people
maybe more interested?
And I know my Jeep didn't makethat climb, but we did together,
so...
I don't know.
(13:12):
I see it more of a conversationstarter and it's not, you know,
I wonder, so yeah.
What do you guys think?
Speaker 05 (13:18):
Talk is Jeep show at gmail.com.
Drop a note and, uh, and let usknow what you think of the
badge of honor badge.
It's the only thing that I haveunder my Jeep.
I have the stickers from eachJeep Jamboree year.
Right.
And so I just have a littlestrip of, you know, I've, I
missed one year, uh, where Ijust, I, All the jamborees I
(13:40):
signed up for, I had to cancelbecause of work.
Because of work, exactly.
So I have one year that I'mmissing, but I've lined them up
on my front quarter panel.
Speaker 04 (13:49):
There you go.
Speaker 05 (13:50):
But I don't think I want to do more than that.
Speaker 04 (13:53):
Gotcha.
And in defense of anybody's...
you know, opinion that yourJeep is such a personal thing,
you know, and that's why I lovelooking at Jeeps that do so many
different crazy things.
You might see a hundred duckson a dash and be like, Oh my
God, what?
And different stickers.
And, you know, it's anopportunity for somebody to
really make their Jeep theirown.
(14:14):
And I think that's part of thebeauty of, of owning a Jeep.
Speaker 05 (14:17):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Again, and it's not everyone'scup of tea.
So, you know, But anyway,getting back to the trails.
So Top of the World, the trailitself wasn't very technical.
I mean, the visuals out thereare stunning.
We were commenting just on thedrive in from Grand Junction.
(14:38):
It's just this epic, epiccanyon walls and rivers and just
scenery that goes on forever.
And that was awesome.
And you get that on all ofthese trails, but the technical
part of the Top of the WorldTrail wasn't really much.
Speaker 04 (14:58):
Well, there were some.
Looking back at some of thosepictures, there were some neat
little inverted climbs.
And in defense of the guideswith the rental Jeeps from
TwistedJeeps.com, they providedus some great, great vehicles.
They didn't want to take achance of doing damage, too.
So that was one thing thatwas...
(15:19):
It would have been great totake some tries and do some more
challenging things, but theydidn't want to take a chance to
damage the rental vehicles.
So I get that too.
Speaker 05 (15:28):
I remember one of the guides telling us that
there's some restrictions onwhich trails you can run in Moab
with a rented Jeep.
And so the trails we did wereapproved, but again, they didn't
want to...
them up too much.
Speaker 04 (15:43):
Sounds like an insurance company had something
to do with that.
Speaker 05 (15:46):
Yeah, absolutely.
But it was like the feature, Iguess, of that trail is this
rock ledge that you get to,which is hanging out over this
canyon.
And I mean, Jeep has used it intheir commercials.
It's just an iconic spot whereyou literally can see around you
for thousands of miles
Speaker 04 (16:08):
oh my god and thousands of feet down just the
the panorama is amazing and i'msure you're looking at a video
of it right now from our dronewhich we were lucky enough to
have out there just beautiful
Speaker 05 (16:19):
well this is a little plug here for the youtube
channel because most of thepeople who are with us are
listening on the podcast waymore podcast views than are our
youtube channel views so if youdon't know we do have a youtube
channel it's called at talk isjeep show at on youtube and
(16:40):
there's a video component toalmost all the podcasts or at
least there will be goingforward i don't think every
episode has a video componentgoing back you know all 20
episodes but This one has avideo component.
We have some great video.
Tom, you shot most of it.
You did an excellent job withthe drone.
Thank you.
(17:00):
And the iPhone.
And we had some GoPros running.
Oh,
Speaker 04 (17:03):
yeah.
All of that.
It was fun switching it all.
And we had a mishap with one ofthe drones.
Speaker 05 (17:10):
If you're listening and you're curious, go head over
to YouTube and check out theYouTube channel.
The scenery out there wasbeautiful.
And at Top of the World Ledge,we spent a fair amount of time
there.
They...
You know, obviously, if youbrought your own Jeep, they
would let you put your Jeep outon the ledge and then take
pictures.
Right.
Because most of us had rentals.
(17:30):
There was only one or twopeople, I think, that had their
own Jeeps.
Speaker 04 (17:34):
Yes.
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (17:35):
And they got to put their Jeep up there.
Everyone else, we just used oneof the rentals.
Right.
We did a group photo.
We, you know, you could do afew different takes up there.
But it was, I think we hadlunch there, too.
And it was, you know.
We did.
It was epic.
I mean, the views were epic,but
Speaker 04 (17:53):
I think overall drive up there.
Speaker 05 (17:55):
It was.
And the overall trail by therewere, I do remember as you're
saying it, we'll show some ofthe stuff.
There were a couple oftechnical, I mean, you know, my,
my driving, it didn't reallyseem too hard.
I know a few people had sometrouble on, on some of the
obstacles, but if you, if youfollow the line and you, you
(18:16):
know, Yeah, I mean, I guessthere was no way to know really
everyone's level of experiencein driving.
Speaker 04 (18:26):
But being a passenger with you over the
years, I know you're willing totake some chances that other
people may not, and you come outon top 98% of the time.
So I know it was frustratingbecause you'd see something, and
I remember looking at your eyelike, oh, I want to go there.
Yeah.
But, you know, overall, andyou'll see looking back at it,
(18:48):
that it was a really, reallycool trail and definitely worth
the journey.
I'm looking at some of thepictures now, and it was even
nice seeing a few really nicelifted TJs, because that's my
soft spot, you know, with somenice lifts and 37-inch tires.
And there were a lot of happyJeepers out there.
Speaker 05 (19:07):
Once again, Amy.
Speaker 01 (19:09):
It seemed like, if you noticed, over the course of
the three days, the threetrails, Day one, everybody was
stopping.
They were getting us over allthe obstacles.
Day two, they pedaled it back alittle bit.
And by day three, what did hesay?
He's like, hey, if anybodyneeds us, just call.
We're on the radio.
And we were just jamming.
I'm not saying I can run outand do this by myself.
(19:31):
That'd be stupid.
But I felt confident in a groupsetting.
to be able to look at theobstacle that was ahead and read
it right or watch the person infront of me.
I'm like, yeah, I don't want totry that.
I'm going to go a little aroundthis way or that way.
(19:52):
Instead, I felt good about thetrails.
Speaker 05 (19:58):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 02 (20:00):
Something I did like was that every trail we did was
very different from the onebefore.
We didn't seem to be going oversame stuff you know like they
were all very very differentlike top of the world and steel
bender and metal masher like ididn't feel like we were
repeating things
Speaker 05 (20:21):
day two we did steel bender right i and from what i
remember definitely a littlemore technical
Speaker 04 (20:33):
yes yeah Steelbender, I want to say
that's the one we came in low.
There was a lot of waterways werode along and just high
arching walls on top.
And we rode over some arches.
And it culminated, I think, inthis crazy drop that I...
(20:56):
had no desire to be a passengeror a driver on
Speaker 05 (21:00):
it.
Well, that was the one where westopped for lunch at the top of
the obstacle, and everyone hada good hour to kind of stew over
it.
The problem with this one
Speaker 02 (21:16):
is
Speaker 05 (21:19):
you're being forced to go on the right edge as you
come down.
And if you can't stop for somereason, you're going over.
Speaker 00 (21:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (21:33):
That's the problem with that.
Because you can't come on theright.
You can't be driver, right?
You have to be passenger onthat rock.
Jesus Christ.
Right?
And if you miss the...
Speaker 02 (21:46):
If you miss the landing, if you don't stick the
landing...
Speaker 05 (21:50):
Yeah, you don't stick the landing...
Oh,
Speaker 02 (21:54):
my God.
Speaker 05 (21:55):
That was like, I definitely, there was a Parker
factor.
The way the guys were talkingabout it, they wanted to put a
tow line from the top.
From the top, yeah.
Especially if you had atwo-door, they wanted to put a
tow line or a safety line on theJeep just in case it wanted to
(22:16):
go over.
Speaker 04 (22:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (22:18):
Because you were definitely off camber.
Speaker 04 (22:20):
Oh, it was freaky.
And there was no forgiving areathat if you did go over,
because you were just topplingover the end.
Speaker 00 (22:28):
There was no bypass.
Speaker 04 (22:29):
No, and just shout out to the guides who really had
good eyes on the ground andknew everybody's vehicle and
kept an eye on everyone.
Speaker 03 (22:40):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
I'll say that if we had been onour own, and we had not been
with guides, we wouldn't havehad the nerve to go the places
we went.
So that was one of the, Ithink, great benefits is that it
safely allowed you to extendbeyond your comfort zone.
(23:01):
And...
Speaker 05 (23:03):
I mean, everyone was talking about that, you know,
all through lunch and even atdinner.
That was sort of, you know, thebig point of the day.
Speaker 04 (23:13):
It really was.
And to give it a littleperspective, too, for people
that are going to jump over toYouTube, you and I, you know, we
both work on the Iditarod up inAlaska, too.
And when you're in a plane oryou're out in an area like this,
the vast, open, unknown, youreye...
your cameras just don't captureand the drone didn't capture
(23:33):
it.
And the phones don't capturethe expanse, the drop of what
was going on on that particularone.
It's like, it's, we can talkall we want about it, but until
you're looking at it, oh my God,you know, it just, in fact,
just, just multiply times ahundred percent the, the fear
factor you get when you seethose visuals.
Speaker 05 (23:53):
That's true.
I mean, out of, out of all thestuff that we filmed, you know,
all the time, sometimes videocan't capture the, the reality
of it.
It always looks more tame.
Speaker 04 (24:06):
Right.
Speaker 05 (24:07):
Right.
Speaker 04 (24:08):
Yeah.
It doesn't, the, the puckerfactor filter doesn't a pucker
factor filter doesn't alwayscome through.
I
Speaker 05 (24:15):
do.
I do think though, the, the daythree trail, which was called
metal masher.
I think that was my favoritetrail of the, of the week of
Moab.
I mean, there's probablyhundreds of trails.
Speaker 04 (24:29):
Right.
Speaker 05 (24:30):
And actually, one of our participants that we became
friendly with, Amy, she had aguidebook.
There's a Moab off-road trailguidebook that I was never aware
of.
She had she's very detailoriented and her and her mom
were out there on a road tripand she had really done some
(24:50):
research into it and she let uslook through the book and it
looks like you know you couldbasically go out and do some
self-guided uh right trips ifyou wanted to though it's
probably not recommended to doit alone
Speaker 04 (25:04):
right and she was with her mom so it was they were
you know, families there.
There were, you know, Jeep guyslike us that were just having
fun being together because theylove Jeeps.
It was a really, again, a cool,diverse cross-section of Jeep
lovers, which was a neatexperience.
Speaker 05 (25:22):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 03 (25:23):
We had so much fun with everybody on the, the other
people who did the trip plusthe guides and Fred was a great,
It
Speaker 02 (25:34):
was a great crowd and we had a lot of fun.
Speaker 05 (25:36):
The trails overall, I guess, not as technical as I
would have liked, I guess,overall.
But again, maybe we werelimited by skill of
participation overall, plus therental Jeeps.
Speaker 04 (25:51):
I'm sure there's...
I think that's a big part of itbecause, again, you're so used
to doing the cat skills andreally getting dirty in there.
And this was...
as much about your surroundingsas it was about climbing some
rocks and getting and seeingsome amazing vistas and taking
some funky climbs to get there.
Speaker 05 (26:12):
Well, let's talk about it from this aspect
because I think this gets intosome of the other areas of the
jamboree that make this oneunique.
And that is, like, who is thisjamboree for?
Because it's not your typical,like, go-out, hardcore wheel...
And you're camping or whatever.
(26:34):
This is more...
I would say this is more likethe Disney World variation of a
Jeep Jamboree.
In the sense that you can bringyour wife.
You can bring your girlfriend.
It's comfortable.
It's expensive.
But you're getting niceaccommodations.
You're getting certain thingsthat make the trip more of a
(26:58):
luxury experience.
trip.
When you go to Disney andyou're going to stay at Disney
property, when you're on site atDisney, you know you're paying
upper level.
But you have a certainexpectation that they usually
live up to with that Disney...
Speaker 04 (27:17):
They deliver the goods.
They deliver the
Speaker 05 (27:19):
goods.
And Jeep Jamboree is pricedthis one, I would say, in that
stratosphere.
It's the higher echelon ofpricing.
It's $11,000 for two people
Speaker 04 (27:29):
right
Speaker 05 (27:30):
but i think what they gave you what they gave us
was a very good trip and that'swhy i say like i would never
bring my wife to like thecatskill mountains jamboree just
because she wouldn't enjoy youknow the accommodations but i
could bring her to to moab onthat signature trip I think she
(27:52):
would enjoy it.
She would have the option ofnot even going to the trail but
still having something to do.
The hotel had spa services andthere were other things to do in
town.
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 03 (28:07):
I think we were the perfect audience.
I think it's good for peoplewho haven't done a lot of
jeeping that want to push theboundaries a bit and do a few
things they might not do ontheir own before they get into
(28:28):
trouble.
And I think it's highly suitedto people who have to come from
the East Coast or elsewhere thatwon't have their own vehicle,
that as well.
Yeah,
Speaker 02 (28:41):
and I think we learned a lot.
Like, I feel like we wereprobably the least experienced
people that were part of thejamboree.
But gosh, I learned so much.
And I learned a lot from Fred.
Fred was very good at sharingand teaching certain things.
(29:05):
I mean, I know he wasn't thereas a teacher, but he definitely
was guiding us and helping usalong the way.
If we had questions, he wouldanswer them.
Speaker 03 (29:17):
And...
We broke a Jeep, but it wasn'tours.
Speaker 04 (29:22):
And also I'd look at it as well about, you know,
it's also an opportunity to seea part of the country that
you've maybe never seen from aplace that not a lot of people
get to see.
And there's a lot of peoplethat can't get their Jeeps out
to places where their bucketlist is.
So it's an opportunity to say,you know what?
I don't have to throw cautionto the wind with my Jeep and get
(29:43):
it across country.
I don't have to take chanceswith something that, might break
down.
We had one participant whosepersonal Jeep did break down and
again, twisted Jeep stepped upand got them a rental.
So it is, it's a bucket listkind of an event that you don't
have to worry that everything'sgoing to fall apart if something
(30:03):
does fall apart, right?
Once again, Amy.
Well,
Speaker 01 (30:07):
Jesus, what if I go somewhere and I break it and
it's not an easy get it home andyou've got to get it repaired
out of state.
So, It was difficult.
I felt silly bringing my ownJeep, and it's sitting in the
parking lot, but I also feltcomforted that at least I have a
ride away to get home.
Speaker 05 (30:28):
The thing that I like in general about the Jeep
Jamborees is that if you breakdown on the trail, the guides
will go above and beyond to getyour Jeep running again, get it
at least off the trail, orbetter yet, back on the trail
for the next day.
They go through tremendousamount of effort to to make sure
(30:51):
that, you know, you're notstranded.
Speaker 04 (30:54):
Right.
Speaker 05 (30:55):
Right.
So I think you could say thatabout all the jamborees.
But again, like this one, thisone had some more creature
comforts that the others don't.
But but again, you know, youyou're paying a higher price for
it.
For sure.
Yeah.
Now, let's talk about the FredWilliams part because, again,
the Fred Williams part, as Ialluded to earlier, was the real
(31:17):
hook
Speaker 04 (31:19):
for me.
Right.
I didn't know as much as youdid coming into it, but you had
been a subscriber to those showsand shared a lot of it with me,
and I'm like, this guy's crazy.
crazy
Speaker 05 (31:32):
yeah he's he's he's a genuine character and a
genuine person yeah but here'shere's the thing so you know the
way it was sort of built up wasthat he was going to be the
host of the jamboree and as yousort of pointed out he wasn't
really the host he was more oflike a guest he was a guest
Speaker 04 (31:52):
of the jamboree he was ed sullivan to johnny carson
Speaker 05 (31:56):
He was– in a sense, he was there at the meals and he
was there on the trail rides.
I thought that he could havebeen more leadership, so to
speak, like more– like I wouldhave loved to hear him talk
about– and he did a little bitif you got him one-on-one and
asked him a question.
(32:16):
But as a group, I would haveloved like after dinner to have
a little Q&A or just talk aboutsome of his– experiences, his TV
stuff, some of the crazy thingsthat he's built or done with
Jeeps.
It
Speaker 04 (32:31):
wasn't organized.
It wasn't organized like that.
And it could have been becausefor you, like you said, that was
a main draw.
So it could have been Q&A chatwith Fred after dinner or
something like that.
Or show and
Speaker 05 (32:46):
tell, like he could show clips.
Now, what was surprising to meis that when we got there and I
was talking to people as we weregathering and meeting, a lot of
them, I would say maybe 75%didn't have a clue who Fred
Williams was.
Speaker 04 (33:03):
Right, right.
I knew his name, but didn'tknow as much.
Speaker 05 (33:08):
But I guess that wasn't really the appeal for
them, which is interesting.
That was the main reason Iwould pay extra to go on that.
And I think that's how JeepJamboree thought it was going
down.
Right.
But in retrospect, I think manypeople didn't know who he was.
Speaker 04 (33:31):
Which is interesting because his name has been in
the game for so long.
And like you say, it didn'tcome out with all the variety of
people that we had out there.
Speaker 05 (33:42):
But now I think if you took...
Like if you brought FredWilliams to like the Casco
Mountains, I think like 80% ofthe people would know who he was
as opposed to 25%.
I think it just depends.
It depends.
Because I think, again, thistrip, I think the people who
wind up going on this tripweren't necessarily the hardcore
(34:05):
four wheelers.
Speaker 04 (34:08):
As
Speaker 05 (34:09):
much as people who were...
There was a father and son.
There were a couple of marriedcouples, mother-daughter, couple
of buddies.
But it was much more of a...
We're here for the experienceas opposed to the Fred Williams
(34:29):
hardcore rock crawling.
Speaker 04 (34:31):
Because Fred was...
if you could, if you were ableto engage him and get him aside,
he just kind of let loose andit was great.
Speaker 05 (34:39):
Yeah.
It wasn't hard to get himengaged.
It's just, it wasn't, it wasn'tstructured.
You had to go up to him andengage him.
He wasn't necessarily going.
And he did try to ask somequestions a little bit of like
who you were or whatever.
But like what I thought wouldhave been cool was have him ride
with everyone in their Jeep fora little bit.
That would have been easy todo.
Speaker 04 (35:02):
100%.
Speaker 05 (35:03):
They were all four-seaters.
He rode with the guides, and Ithought that was a little bit of
a missed step, a missedopportunity.
Speaker 04 (35:11):
I didn't even think of that until you brought it up,
but absolutely.
Maybe they just didn't use himto the extent that he could have
been used because I think ifpeople got to know him, it could
have been like a two-way thing.
It could have gotten more forhim as well as the participants.
Speaker 05 (35:28):
Absolutely.
So that part of it was like amixed bag.
Now let's talk about the otherparts of the trip that were not
the jeeping or the Fred Williamspart, the hotels and the meals.
Because all of the meals andthe hotels were included.
That part of it was, again,based on double occupancy.
(35:51):
We sort of alluded to the factthat we had these townhouses in
Moab at the Hoodoo.
But I think that was in error.
I'm not sure whose error, butthat was in error.
I think we were supposed to bebasically in a shared room.
And so we had a much differentexperience because we had this
nice townhouse.
(36:14):
I
Speaker 04 (36:15):
just want to say, coming back after day one...
the guides who, you know, theyput in serious hours and, you
know, they had our Jeeps readythe next day.
They had them gassed up.
So that part of the experience,there was nothing we had to
worry about.
You know, the next day we wereready to go and they were on top
(36:35):
of all that, which I think is anod to them as well to, you
know, be on top of the rentalsand, you know, make that part of
the experience all that it was.
Speaker 05 (36:46):
Yeah, there were three guides plus Fred.
They all were workingtremendous hours to make it
smooth.
I mean, lunches, beverages,like you said, fueling it.
Yep.
You know, mine didn't getwashed every night.
I'm not sure if that was anoversight.
I had requested that.
Speaker 04 (37:06):
Well, you were the jerk that put your top down when
no one else did.
Speaker 05 (37:09):
Oh, it was so dusty.
It was so, so dusty.
And then when we had to, so wehad to check out on day three.
Oh, day two.
Right.
We had to check out on day twobecause we were moving hotels.
Right.
And when I say hotels, so wehad the beginning and the end of
(37:32):
the trip was at the Hoodoo.
But the middle night of thetrip was at Ulam Resort.
Speaker 04 (37:41):
Yes, in Monticello, Utah.
Speaker 05 (37:44):
Which was not a hotel per se.
Resort might mean differentthings to different people.
It was basically a glampingresort.
It was a tent resort.
That was like a platform tentwith a fireplace and a bed and
(38:05):
running water, you know, toilet,a sink.
Speaker 04 (38:09):
Almost no Wi-Fi, which somebody will say, oh, you
don't need it out there, right?
Speaker 05 (38:14):
Yeah.
Well, when you're trying to getstuff done, either cameras or
firmware.
That's true.
Whatever.
But yes.
But anyway, it was a greatexperience.
Speaker 04 (38:26):
Oh, yeah.
It was beautiful.
It really was.
I didn't expect it to be thatneat because it was– I don't
camp.
It's not my world.
But being able to have a greatdinner there, get good coffee in
the morning, and start your ownfire, it just– it really was a
(38:48):
Disney type of experience.
Speaker 05 (38:49):
Again, we were supposed to have double
occupancy.
We were supposed to be sharinga tent.
Unknown (38:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (38:56):
Again, that would have been interesting because I
don't think they had tents withdoubles in them.
Speaker 04 (39:02):
Right.
Speaker 05 (39:03):
And they wound up basically you got your own tent,
I got my own tent.
Other people who had thatsituation, I think the father
and son wound up getting theirown tents.
So I'm not sure if that was anoversight or a fortunate
accident or just the fact thatit was maybe the time of year
where they weren't busy gettingAnd they were able to do it for
(39:26):
us.
Speaker 04 (39:27):
I mean, in my mind, it really might just be that
that was one element they didn'tthink of going into it, you
know, so I don't fault themhugely for it.
But, you know, so somebody hasto sleep on a couch for a night.
big deal no
Speaker 05 (39:40):
it's not it wasn't a fault or criticism oh yeah yeah
just it worked out that we hadour own tents yes but again it
might have been it might havebeen a different experience if
someone you know slept on acouch or a chair or whatever
Speaker 04 (39:55):
especially if i'm snoring in the tent you know
Speaker 05 (39:58):
so but but again beautiful beautiful
accommodations the only the onlyyou know It was chilly at
night.
Overnight, it got really cold.
Speaker 04 (40:07):
It did.
Speaker 05 (40:07):
And the fire goes out.
I mean, I don't care how muchraging fire you have when you go
to sleep.
It's only going to burn aboutfour hours.
Speaker 04 (40:16):
No, and that canvas is only as thick as canvas gets.
Speaker 05 (40:20):
And so I remember having to get up at about 3 a.m.
and get the fire started again,which was, you know.
whatever it was you know anexperience i mean it was
beautiful and i wish it was wishwe had some more time like to
just you know even take videolike we just didn't have a lot
of time we were tired as it was
Speaker 01 (40:43):
once again amy i kind of felt like when the the
morning came that we had to dothe pack all your stuff up
because we're going to adifferent place i was kind of
like Not excited about it.
But when we got to Ulam and sawthe accommodations and just the
resort itself with all thetents, is that a yurt?
(41:08):
I don't know if I would ever dothis on my own, like
intentionally, purposely booksomething at a place like this.
So once we got there and I sawit, I was okay and it wasn't
that bad.
much of irritation because wegot the experience of doing
that.
But then also we were kind of,I felt like kind of cut short on
(41:30):
that experience because we wereout on the trail so long.
Speaker 04 (41:33):
And I was so excited to get up that next morning
because the day before onSteelbender, We had ditched the
drone.
I was taking a shot.
You were going up rocks next toa river.
I hit a tree.
It fell in the water.
And for some odd reason, itworked throughout the day.
And we were able to get allthat great video of that crazy
(41:53):
drop that we were going on.
But that next morning,everything went to hell.
And there was this great,feature of the desert where
there was a great big hole inthe middle of this natural
statue out there and I wanted tofly through it and I couldn't
get it to work so we have noaerials from that area but it
was just such a beautiful area
Speaker 05 (42:14):
it was the stars that night were very epic and I
would say that the fact thatthat was in the middle of the
trip and it was very far out ofthe way It was.
It wasn't really close.
Right.
And so granted, I enjoyed it,but I probably could have done
(42:37):
without that experience justfrom a convenience standpoint.
Speaker 04 (42:42):
Right.
I mean, if you bring some ofthe factor in, you know, with
people that want a differenttype of experience, it was cool.
You know, the food was great.
The surroundings were amazing.
You know, time of year, youdefinitely had those cold, cold
evenings and cold earlymornings.
And so I get that.
(43:04):
But that's kind of nitpicking.
I mean, it was a cool.
It is nitpicking.
We got to see a lot.
Speaker 05 (43:15):
And this kind of brings me to the last point,
which is obviously the cost,because the cost will deter a
lot of people.
Look, there's a market forluxury in everything, right?
There's a luxury market inevery aspect of our lives.
Some people can afford theluxury and some people can't.
(43:35):
And at the end of the day, ifyou have it and you want to do
it, you'll do it.
And they have people, I mean,they sold out the trip this
year.
They sold out the trip lastyear.
People will pay it if they, youknow, think it's worth the
experience.
And at the end of the day,let's just say five years from
(43:58):
now, 10 years from now, I'm notgoing to remember the money
part.
I'm going to remember thepictures and the videos and the
memories of From that trip, thepeople that we met, I'm not
going to remember the moneypart.
So here
Speaker 03 (44:12):
again, Peter and Julia.
It really felt like, in spiteof the fact that it cost what it
did, was that you were gettingyour money's worth.
We didn't feel like we weregetting gouged or hosed at all.
Speaker 01 (44:25):
Once again, Amy.
To me, the Moab price wasbecause we were celebrating my
birthday, my milestone birthday.
It hadn't happened yet, butnow...
Now I am 50.
I guess it kind of, to me, thatwas the, not excuse, but, you
(44:46):
know, you earned it.
It's your birthday.
This is your birthdaycelebration.
But so that way, when we werelooking at the Iceland trip, I'm
like, yeah.
That's too much for just aregular vacation.
And I said, why don't we putthat on the back burner maybe
for when I retire?
And we can see what kind ofsignature trip they're offering
then and do something like thatthen.
(45:07):
So, yeah, the price was notthat expensive for Moab.
But, yeah, it was because wewere doing it for a celebration.
So
Speaker 05 (45:19):
anything else that you remember or you want to
share about the trip?
Speaker 04 (45:23):
You know, the one thing I would say is there
wasn't a lot of away time and wemade our own away time.
So people, I think, would loveto go somewhere.
They want to experiencesomething.
And it was very segmented.
And it might not be a bad thingto consider that, you know,
that last night we saw, oh, myGod, there's a barbecue place.
(45:44):
Let's check it out.
One a little bit of time away.
And we went out, had somedrinks.
Very good.
I wouldn't say it was the best.
Barbecue and a beer and just alittle alone time to sort of
explore where you are.
And I think that's somethingthat they could consider that
might be a little bit of savingson people.
Like you don't have to provideevery night for meals and things
(46:07):
like that because it gives youa chance to explore and see
things.
Speaker 05 (46:12):
Right, well, maybe they could option out the
package a little bit, like youdo it with the meals or without
the meals.
I don't know if it makes itharder for them or not.
I think they're about trying tomake it simple on many fronts,
so it's probably simpler to justhave everybody in on the one
plan.
But like I said, I do thinkthere could be ways to make the
(46:35):
trip cost less.
I'm not sure they'renecessarily interested in that.
I would have liked to have seensome more difficult trails.
Maybe I didn't need the tentcamping part of it.
I would have been okay juststaying at the Hoodoo.
But overall, great trip.
I would definitely love to goback to Moab with my Jeep.
(46:57):
And that will be something thatI will be planning for maybe
next year.
We'll see how my cross-country
Speaker 04 (47:07):
trip
Speaker 05 (47:07):
goes
Speaker 04 (47:08):
this year.
I'd like to hear that for you.
Speaker 05 (47:12):
We'll have to see how that goes.
But I think overall, the peoplethat we met, the things that we
saw, the experience as a wholewas A+.
Speaker 04 (47:21):
Absolutely.
Stories shared, people that wemet.
It was just a cool experienceto get outside of your own area
and what you're comfortable withand to experience that.
So, yeah.
Speaker 05 (47:35):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 02 (47:36):
It was really nice and very personable.
You know, it was...
It didn't seem like it was themand us.
It felt like we were all oneunit, like a team, just all of
us together, which was great.
All
Speaker 05 (47:53):
right.
Well, until next time, I'm Art.
I'm Tom.
Talk to you soon.
Thanks for listening.
Hello and welcome to Talk is Jeep.
I am Art Aldridge.
I'm joined with Tom Chartrand.
Hey, Art.
How you doing?
It's been a long while.
Tom Chartrand (00:09):
It's been a while, yeah, but glad we're
getting back to jeeping season.
You know, for me especially,getting ready to hit some
beaches and, you know, maybe digsome stuff up here or there.
We'll see.
Art Aldrich (00:21):
It's been a little while since we had our last Jeep
trip.
Tom Chartrand (00:26):
Yeah.
Art Aldrich (00:27):
Our last Jeep trip was in Moab, Utah in October of
24.
We had actually recorded apodcast, not a video podcast
just because of the timing.
But we had recorded a podcastright after the event just to
keep it kind of fresh andaccurate.
(00:49):
And then we had some technicalissues.
And so we couldn't use it.
And I wanted to get back to itbecause we actually met some
good people there.
And I actually recorded someinterviews with people over Zoom
who were at the event.
So it wasn't just my voice andyour voice.
(01:11):
Awesome.
Tom Chartrand (01:12):
I think that's great because we had a really
diverse cross-section of Jeepenthusiasts on that trip because
it was such a microorganism ofa Jeep Jamboree.
It was really cool meeting somepeople that were just so
enthused by such a specialevent.
Art Aldrich (01:31):
I mean, I will say this.
At all of the events that I'vebeen to, and I've probably been
to, I don't know, 15 or 20 JeepJamborees over the last five,
six years, you do meet reallygreat people.
I mean, I've met people therethat I would be like, you know,
I would definitely...
sit and have a meal with thisperson if the circumstances
(01:54):
permit it.
Tom Chartrand (01:55):
Absolutely.
Art Aldrich (01:56):
The Moab Odyssey trip, if you're not familiar
with it, it's one of the JeepJamboree signature events, and
that means it's got some specialfeatures.
I mean, it also has a higherprice point than the regular
Jeep Jamborees by a good factor.
(02:16):
And we'll talk about that laterin the podcast.
Tom Chartrand (02:20):
Right.
And these experiences were allnew, right?
Weren't they new for 2024?
Yes.
Art Aldrich (02:25):
The one that we went to was the first event.
I don't know if that was thefirst year they did signature
events or not.
I don't recall.
Tom Chartrand (02:34):
Okay.
Speaker 05 (02:35):
But this was the first Moab Odyssey, they're
calling it.
Right.
And so when I saw theposting...
And the fact that it was beinghosted by the YouTuber Fred
Williams, I was just like, wow,this is going to be a great
trip.
(02:55):
I mean, to me, he's aninteresting personality if you
don't know him, which I wasactually surprised that most
people on the trip didn't knowwho he was.
Let's hear from Jamboreeparticipants Peter and Julia
from Canada.
Peter & Julia (03:12):
We told our kids that we were going to Moab on
this Jeep Odyssey, and they weregreen with envy to start with.
And we said, well, it's goingto be hosted by Fred Williams.
And my son-in-law's face justdropped.
And he's a big fan.
He's in his 20s.
He used to tell the stories ofcoming home from school, rushing
(03:35):
home to watch his movies.
His episodes on.
And so we really didn't knowmuch about Fred Williams.
We do know a lot more aboutFred now.
And since we both had been sickrecently, we've been watching,
catching up on a lot ofYouTubes.
Watching all the old episodes.
Fred was amazing.
We should know about Fred.
(03:58):
In a heartbeat, we'd sign on toanother Fred Williams trip.
Speaker 02 (04:03):
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 05 (04:03):
I mean, the whole reason of my interest level was
because he was hosting the trip.
Speaker 04 (04:10):
And I think he was riding along more for the fun
and a little bit of jovialitythan truly hosting, which let
people still get away and dotheir own things and just kind
of commiserate with him, whichwas different than we expected,
I think.
But it was cool.
Speaker 05 (04:27):
Yeah, it was different.
And if you don't know who FredWilliams is, he used to be part
of the Motor Trend Network, andhe had a show called Dirt Every
Day or Dirt Daily.
I think Dirt Daily is his newshow.
Dirt Every Day was a show thatwas on Motor Trend, and he just
did a lot of crazy off-roadstuff.
(04:47):
Not everything with Jeeps, buta lot of Jeep stuff.
And he's a Jeep guy.
Yeah.
So we went to this trip, andone of the things that made it
unique, aside from Fred, was thefact that they gave you a Jeep.
Right.
Speaker 04 (05:05):
Not gave, but
Speaker 05 (05:07):
yeah.
Yeah, they provided you a Jeepto use.
And that was the first JamboreeI've ever went to where that
was even an option.
You could bring your own.
They would give you a discountoff the price of the Jamboree if
you brought your own.
Right.
For us, if you remember, wewere right between two jobs.
(05:28):
Yes.
And we flew in and we flew outand we went to work on both
sides.
Yeah.
So it wasn't really an option.
Speaker 04 (05:39):
No, it was a jam.
We couldn't take our timegetting there or getting back.
Speaker 05 (05:42):
Right, right.
And I actually talked about iton the last podcast that last
year I had made a commitment tosort of take the next step of
being able to bring my Jeep tothese types of events.
And I bought a trailer and Ihave a F-150 that I'm leasing.
(06:03):
And, you know, I had that lastyear and I could have, in
theory, brought my Jeep.
It just, it wasn't time.
Right.
You know, there wasn't time todo it.
So I wasn't sure how...
That part of the trip would be,I mean, we didn't really have a
(06:24):
choice, wanted to do the trip,so we did the trip as it was.
But I was a little hesitantabout, you know, using like a
rental Jeep, so to speak.
Here's another Jamboreeattendee from Wisconsin, Amy.
Speaker 01 (06:37):
I wanted to use my own Jeep, but I didn't want to
deal with the headache andhassle of it, something breaking
that often happens with thesecars.
Speaker 04 (06:48):
Of course, you don't know it.
You're not sure what you'regoing to be given.
Thankfully, they were allpretty great vehicles, but
you're not comfortable with it.
They were
Speaker 05 (06:57):
built and they were four-door JLURs, Rubicon
four-doors, and they were built35s and automatics.
I think all of them were softtops, but I don't recall if they
were all identical cars.
Speaker 04 (07:15):
Only one soft top actually came off, though,
during the whole trip.
Speaker 05 (07:18):
Yes, our soft top was the only one that was not
up, which I just don'tunderstand Jeep people who treat
the Jeep like it's a car.
It is a convertible.
Take that
Speaker 04 (07:33):
top off.
Exactly.
Even though it's 42 in themorning, it's going to warm up.
Speaker 05 (07:38):
Yeah, exactly.
And it did.
Oh, it did.
Absolutely, absolutely.
So we flew into Grand Junction,Colorado, which I guess is the
closest airport to Moab.
Speaker 04 (07:50):
Right, right on the border, pretty close.
Speaker 05 (07:52):
It was a drive that I think was like two, what, two
hours?
Two,
Speaker 04 (07:56):
two and a half, yeah.
Got to go through a ghost town.
That was kind of fun.
Speaker 05 (08:01):
Yeah, it was a small little airport.
Yeah.
You're going to have to waitbecause we waited a good
probably 45 minutes for therent-a-car line.
Speaker 04 (08:12):
Yeah, no automated, no walk out and grab your car.
Speaker 05 (08:14):
Right.
There's no express lane.
And there's like very, youknow, I guess all the flights
get in around the same time fromall the airlines.
Speaker 04 (08:22):
Right.
Speaker 05 (08:23):
And so they get overloaded pretty quick.
Speaker 04 (08:25):
Yeah, I think there were just two gates there or two
baggage claims.
So it was, yeah, a little bittight.
But that's, you know, all good.
Good to get away from all thebig stuff sometimes.
Yeah,
Speaker 05 (08:35):
yeah.
So we drove to the Moablocation.
We stayed at the Hoodoo Hotel.
Right.
Which is a Hilton, though Idon't think it says Hilton on
it.
It just says Hoodoo.
Speaker 04 (08:51):
Right.
It was a part of the Hiltonfamily.
Speaker 05 (08:53):
Yes, yes.
Yes, and it was a very
Speaker 04 (08:56):
nice
Speaker 05 (08:56):
hotel.
It
Speaker 04 (08:57):
was great.
And they were townhouse type ofunits.
So it was like a home of suitesor something like that.
Speaker 05 (09:04):
Well, the hotel had like two components.
It had the regular hotel roomsinside of the main building.
Right.
And they had these casitas, Ithink they called it.
Yes.
Which were like little, noteven a studio apartment.
It was a townhouse.
It was a two- two bedroomtownhouse.
Speaker 04 (09:24):
Exactly.
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (09:25):
Now we stayed in the two bedroom townhouse, but we
were told that it was going tobe double occupancy rooming for
the whole trip.
Speaker 04 (09:34):
Right.
Speaker 05 (09:34):
Now that didn't turn out the way it, you know, it
didn't turn out that way inreality.
Right.
And I heard that there was asnafu.
I don't know whose fault thesnafu was on, but I heard there
was a mix up.
either on the number of roomsor the dates at the hoodoo.
And the casitas were like an11th hour Hail
Speaker 04 (09:59):
Mary.
Ah, okay.
Because with only one king bed,that could have been awkward.
Speaker 05 (10:06):
Yes.
Yes.
So if you're hearing this andyou're doing the Moab Odyssey,
your mileage may vary.
They may have figured out.
the logistics by the time, uh,Moab number two comes around.
But, uh, at least for numberone, we had a pleasant surprise
(10:27):
of a very nice, you know, like Isaid, a townhouse with a
fireplace, I think, and a livingroom kitchen and the bedrooms
were upstairs, two bedrooms,washer dryer.
Speaker 04 (10:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (10:38):
I mean, it was,
Speaker 04 (10:39):
it was nice.
It was, it was very comfortableto come back to.
And, um, and it was eclipsedlater on by even cooler, uh,
accommodations.
We'll get to that.
Speaker 05 (10:49):
Right.
We will get to that.
So we had sort of the kickoffmeal.
We met Fred.
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 02 (10:58):
I was nervous, very nervous at the beginning.
I had butterflies.
I was terrified.
When we were all walking up tothe Jeeps and they said, okay,
just pick whichever one youwant.
And I had so much anxiety andconcern about
Speaker 05 (11:14):
So the first day's trail was, I think, maybe going
to be the day two trail, butthey decided to do an audible,
and we did Top of the World.
And all of these trails are theJeep Badge of Honor trails.
So if you've had experiencewith the Jeep Badge of Honor
(11:35):
trails, these were three ofthose trails.
If you're not familiar withthem, there's a Jeep Badge of
Honor app.
You download the app, youcreate an account, and then you
have to check in while you're inthe vicinity of the trail
somewhere.
Speaker 04 (11:53):
Which can be dicey on some of those outlying areas.
Speaker 05 (11:56):
It can be because there wasn't a lot of cell
service in there.
But basically you check in andthen you get in the mail for
free a little plastic badge thatyou can.
I mean, I know a lot of peopleput them on their Jeeps.
I don't particularly like that.
Right.
GAC, I think is the term on myJeep.
Speaker 04 (12:17):
That GAC.
All right, all you kids.
Speaker 05 (12:20):
Yeah, I think, I don't know what I'm going to do
with my, I have a few badgesbecause we got one out in
Drummond Island.
We got a badge of honor badge,but I'm not going to put mine on
my Jeep.
I may put them in a pictureframe or some kind of a thing.
(12:40):
I don't know.
Speaker 04 (12:41):
Sure.
Speaker 05 (12:42):
How do you guys out there feel?
Do you put the Badge of HonorTrail badges on your Jeep?
Do you like to show that off?
Is that your flex?
Speaker 04 (12:52):
What do you think?
To me, it's a cool questionbecause is it a conversation
starter?
Does it guide you into aconversation about, whoa, what's
that about?
What is Badge of Honor withyour Jeep to get other people
maybe more interested?
And I know my Jeep didn't makethat climb, but we did together,
so...
I don't know.
(13:12):
I see it more of a conversationstarter and it's not, you know,
I wonder, so yeah.
What do you guys think?
Speaker 05 (13:18):
Talk is Jeep show at gmail.com.
Drop a note and, uh, and let usknow what you think of the
badge of honor badge.
It's the only thing that I haveunder my Jeep.
I have the stickers from eachJeep Jamboree year.
Right.
And so I just have a littlestrip of, you know, I've, I
missed one year, uh, where Ijust, I, All the jamborees I
(13:40):
signed up for, I had to cancelbecause of work.
Because of work, exactly.
So I have one year that I'mmissing, but I've lined them up
on my front quarter panel.
Speaker 04 (13:49):
There you go.
Speaker 05 (13:50):
But I don't think I want to do more than that.
Speaker 04 (13:53):
Gotcha.
And in defense of anybody's...
you know, opinion that yourJeep is such a personal thing,
you know, and that's why I lovelooking at Jeeps that do so many
different crazy things.
You might see a hundred duckson a dash and be like, Oh my
God, what?
And different stickers.
And, you know, it's anopportunity for somebody to
really make their Jeep theirown.
(14:14):
And I think that's part of thebeauty of, of owning a Jeep.
Speaker 05 (14:17):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Again, and it's not everyone'scup of tea.
So, you know, But anyway,getting back to the trails.
So Top of the World, the trailitself wasn't very technical.
I mean, the visuals out thereare stunning.
We were commenting just on thedrive in from Grand Junction.
(14:38):
It's just this epic, epiccanyon walls and rivers and just
scenery that goes on forever.
And that was awesome.
And you get that on all ofthese trails, but the technical
part of the Top of the WorldTrail wasn't really much.
Speaker 04 (14:58):
Well, there were some.
Looking back at some of thosepictures, there were some neat
little inverted climbs.
And in defense of the guideswith the rental Jeeps from
TwistedJeeps.com, they providedus some great, great vehicles.
They didn't want to take achance of doing damage, too.
So that was one thing thatwas...
(15:19):
It would have been great totake some tries and do some more
challenging things, but theydidn't want to take a chance to
damage the rental vehicles.
So I get that too.
Speaker 05 (15:28):
I remember one of the guides telling us that
there's some restrictions onwhich trails you can run in Moab
with a rented Jeep.
And so the trails we did wereapproved, but again, they didn't
want to...
them up too much.
Speaker 04 (15:43):
Sounds like an insurance company had something
to do with that.
Speaker 05 (15:46):
Yeah, absolutely.
But it was like the feature, Iguess, of that trail is this
rock ledge that you get to,which is hanging out over this
canyon.
And I mean, Jeep has used it intheir commercials.
It's just an iconic spot whereyou literally can see around you
for thousands of miles
Speaker 04 (16:08):
oh my god and thousands of feet down just the
the panorama is amazing and i'msure you're looking at a video
of it right now from our dronewhich we were lucky enough to
have out there just beautiful
Speaker 05 (16:19):
well this is a little plug here for the youtube
channel because most of thepeople who are with us are
listening on the podcast waymore podcast views than are our
youtube channel views so if youdon't know we do have a youtube
channel it's called at talk isjeep show at on youtube and
(16:40):
there's a video component toalmost all the podcasts or at
least there will be goingforward i don't think every
episode has a video componentgoing back you know all 20
episodes but This one has avideo component.
We have some great video.
Tom, you shot most of it.
You did an excellent job withthe drone.
Thank you.
(17:00):
And the iPhone.
And we had some GoPros running.
Oh,
Speaker 04 (17:03):
yeah.
All of that.
It was fun switching it all.
And we had a mishap with one ofthe drones.
Speaker 05 (17:10):
If you're listening and you're curious, go head over
to YouTube and check out theYouTube channel.
The scenery out there wasbeautiful.
And at Top of the World Ledge,we spent a fair amount of time
there.
They...
You know, obviously, if youbrought your own Jeep, they
would let you put your Jeep outon the ledge and then take
pictures.
Right.
Because most of us had rentals.
(17:30):
There was only one or twopeople, I think, that had their
own Jeeps.
Speaker 04 (17:34):
Yes.
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (17:35):
And they got to put their Jeep up there.
Everyone else, we just used oneof the rentals.
Right.
We did a group photo.
We, you know, you could do afew different takes up there.
But it was, I think we hadlunch there, too.
And it was, you know.
We did.
It was epic.
I mean, the views were epic,but
Speaker 04 (17:53):
I think overall drive up there.
Speaker 05 (17:55):
It was.
And the overall trail by therewere, I do remember as you're
saying it, we'll show some ofthe stuff.
There were a couple oftechnical, I mean, you know, my,
my driving, it didn't reallyseem too hard.
I know a few people had sometrouble on, on some of the
obstacles, but if you, if youfollow the line and you, you
(18:16):
know, Yeah, I mean, I guessthere was no way to know really
everyone's level of experiencein driving.
Speaker 04 (18:26):
But being a passenger with you over the
years, I know you're willing totake some chances that other
people may not, and you come outon top 98% of the time.
So I know it was frustratingbecause you'd see something, and
I remember looking at your eyelike, oh, I want to go there.
Yeah.
But, you know, overall, andyou'll see looking back at it,
(18:48):
that it was a really, reallycool trail and definitely worth
the journey.
I'm looking at some of thepictures now, and it was even
nice seeing a few really nicelifted TJs, because that's my
soft spot, you know, with somenice lifts and 37-inch tires.
And there were a lot of happyJeepers out there.
Speaker 05 (19:07):
Once again, Amy.
Speaker 01 (19:09):
It seemed like, if you noticed, over the course of
the three days, the threetrails, Day one, everybody was
stopping.
They were getting us over allthe obstacles.
Day two, they pedaled it back alittle bit.
And by day three, what did hesay?
He's like, hey, if anybodyneeds us, just call.
We're on the radio.
And we were just jamming.
I'm not saying I can run outand do this by myself.
(19:31):
That'd be stupid.
But I felt confident in a groupsetting.
to be able to look at theobstacle that was ahead and read
it right or watch the person infront of me.
I'm like, yeah, I don't want totry that.
I'm going to go a little aroundthis way or that way.
(19:52):
Instead, I felt good about thetrails.
Speaker 05 (19:58):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 02 (20:00):
Something I did like was that every trail we did was
very different from the onebefore.
We didn't seem to be going oversame stuff you know like they
were all very very differentlike top of the world and steel
bender and metal masher like ididn't feel like we were
repeating things
Speaker 05 (20:21):
day two we did steel bender right i and from what i
remember definitely a littlemore technical
Speaker 04 (20:33):
yes yeah Steelbender, I want to say
that's the one we came in low.
There was a lot of waterways werode along and just high
arching walls on top.
And we rode over some arches.
And it culminated, I think, inthis crazy drop that I...
(20:56):
had no desire to be a passengeror a driver on
Speaker 05 (21:00):
it.
Well, that was the one where westopped for lunch at the top of
the obstacle, and everyone hada good hour to kind of stew over
it.
The problem with this one
Speaker 02 (21:16):
is
Speaker 05 (21:19):
you're being forced to go on the right edge as you
come down.
And if you can't stop for somereason, you're going over.
Speaker 00 (21:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (21:33):
That's the problem with that.
Because you can't come on theright.
You can't be driver, right?
You have to be passenger onthat rock.
Jesus Christ.
Right?
And if you miss the...
Speaker 02 (21:46):
If you miss the landing, if you don't stick the
landing...
Speaker 05 (21:50):
Yeah, you don't stick the landing...
Oh,
Speaker 02 (21:54):
my God.
Speaker 05 (21:55):
That was like, I definitely, there was a Parker
factor.
The way the guys were talkingabout it, they wanted to put a
tow line from the top.
From the top, yeah.
Especially if you had atwo-door, they wanted to put a
tow line or a safety line on theJeep just in case it wanted to
(22:16):
go over.
Speaker 04 (22:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (22:18):
Because you were definitely off camber.
Speaker 04 (22:20):
Oh, it was freaky.
And there was no forgiving areathat if you did go over,
because you were just topplingover the end.
Speaker 00 (22:28):
There was no bypass.
Speaker 04 (22:29):
No, and just shout out to the guides who really had
good eyes on the ground andknew everybody's vehicle and
kept an eye on everyone.
Speaker 03 (22:40):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
I'll say that if we had been onour own, and we had not been
with guides, we wouldn't havehad the nerve to go the places
we went.
So that was one of the, Ithink, great benefits is that it
safely allowed you to extendbeyond your comfort zone.
(23:01):
And...
Speaker 05 (23:03):
I mean, everyone was talking about that, you know,
all through lunch and even atdinner.
That was sort of, you know, thebig point of the day.
Speaker 04 (23:13):
It really was.
And to give it a littleperspective, too, for people
that are going to jump over toYouTube, you and I, you know, we
both work on the Iditarod up inAlaska, too.
And when you're in a plane oryou're out in an area like this,
the vast, open, unknown, youreye...
your cameras just don't captureand the drone didn't capture
(23:33):
it.
And the phones don't capturethe expanse, the drop of what
was going on on that particularone.
It's like, it's, we can talkall we want about it, but until
you're looking at it, oh my God,you know, it just, in fact,
just, just multiply times ahundred percent the, the fear
factor you get when you seethose visuals.
Speaker 05 (23:53):
That's true.
I mean, out of, out of all thestuff that we filmed, you know,
all the time, sometimes videocan't capture the, the reality
of it.
It always looks more tame.
Speaker 04 (24:06):
Right.
Speaker 05 (24:07):
Right.
Speaker 04 (24:08):
Yeah.
It doesn't, the, the puckerfactor filter doesn't a pucker
factor filter doesn't alwayscome through.
I
Speaker 05 (24:15):
do.
I do think though, the, the daythree trail, which was called
metal masher.
I think that was my favoritetrail of the, of the week of
Moab.
I mean, there's probablyhundreds of trails.
Speaker 04 (24:29):
Right.
Speaker 05 (24:30):
And actually, one of our participants that we became
friendly with, Amy, she had aguidebook.
There's a Moab off-road trailguidebook that I was never aware
of.
She had she's very detailoriented and her and her mom
were out there on a road tripand she had really done some
(24:50):
research into it and she let uslook through the book and it
looks like you know you couldbasically go out and do some
self-guided uh right trips ifyou wanted to though it's
probably not recommended to doit alone
Speaker 04 (25:04):
right and she was with her mom so it was they were
you know, families there.
There were, you know, Jeep guyslike us that were just having
fun being together because theylove Jeeps.
It was a really, again, a cool,diverse cross-section of Jeep
lovers, which was a neatexperience.
Speaker 05 (25:22):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 03 (25:23):
We had so much fun with everybody on the, the other
people who did the trip plusthe guides and Fred was a great,
It
Speaker 02 (25:34):
was a great crowd and we had a lot of fun.
Speaker 05 (25:36):
The trails overall, I guess, not as technical as I
would have liked, I guess,overall.
But again, maybe we werelimited by skill of
participation overall, plus therental Jeeps.
Speaker 04 (25:51):
I'm sure there's...
I think that's a big part of itbecause, again, you're so used
to doing the cat skills andreally getting dirty in there.
And this was...
as much about your surroundingsas it was about climbing some
rocks and getting and seeingsome amazing vistas and taking
some funky climbs to get there.
Speaker 05 (26:12):
Well, let's talk about it from this aspect
because I think this gets intosome of the other areas of the
jamboree that make this oneunique.
And that is, like, who is thisjamboree for?
Because it's not your typical,like, go-out, hardcore wheel...
And you're camping or whatever.
(26:34):
This is more...
I would say this is more likethe Disney World variation of a
Jeep Jamboree.
In the sense that you can bringyour wife.
You can bring your girlfriend.
It's comfortable.
It's expensive.
But you're getting niceaccommodations.
You're getting certain thingsthat make the trip more of a
(26:58):
luxury experience.
trip.
When you go to Disney andyou're going to stay at Disney
property, when you're on site atDisney, you know you're paying
upper level.
But you have a certainexpectation that they usually
live up to with that Disney...
Speaker 04 (27:17):
They deliver the goods.
They deliver the
Speaker 05 (27:19):
goods.
And Jeep Jamboree is pricedthis one, I would say, in that
stratosphere.
It's the higher echelon ofpricing.
It's $11,000 for two people
Speaker 04 (27:29):
right
Speaker 05 (27:30):
but i think what they gave you what they gave us
was a very good trip and that'swhy i say like i would never
bring my wife to like thecatskill mountains jamboree just
because she wouldn't enjoy youknow the accommodations but i
could bring her to to moab onthat signature trip I think she
(27:52):
would enjoy it.
She would have the option ofnot even going to the trail but
still having something to do.
The hotel had spa services andthere were other things to do in
town.
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 03 (28:07):
I think we were the perfect audience.
I think it's good for peoplewho haven't done a lot of
jeeping that want to push theboundaries a bit and do a few
things they might not do ontheir own before they get into
(28:28):
trouble.
And I think it's highly suitedto people who have to come from
the East Coast or elsewhere thatwon't have their own vehicle,
that as well.
Yeah,
Speaker 02 (28:41):
and I think we learned a lot.
Like, I feel like we wereprobably the least experienced
people that were part of thejamboree.
But gosh, I learned so much.
And I learned a lot from Fred.
Fred was very good at sharingand teaching certain things.
(29:05):
I mean, I know he wasn't thereas a teacher, but he definitely
was guiding us and helping usalong the way.
If we had questions, he wouldanswer them.
Speaker 03 (29:17):
And...
We broke a Jeep, but it wasn'tours.
Speaker 04 (29:22):
And also I'd look at it as well about, you know,
it's also an opportunity to seea part of the country that
you've maybe never seen from aplace that not a lot of people
get to see.
And there's a lot of peoplethat can't get their Jeeps out
to places where their bucketlist is.
So it's an opportunity to say,you know what?
I don't have to throw cautionto the wind with my Jeep and get
(29:43):
it across country.
I don't have to take chanceswith something that, might break
down.
We had one participant whosepersonal Jeep did break down and
again, twisted Jeep stepped upand got them a rental.
So it is, it's a bucket listkind of an event that you don't
have to worry that everything'sgoing to fall apart if something
(30:03):
does fall apart, right?
Once again, Amy.
Well,
Speaker 01 (30:07):
Jesus, what if I go somewhere and I break it and
it's not an easy get it home andyou've got to get it repaired
out of state.
So, It was difficult.
I felt silly bringing my ownJeep, and it's sitting in the
parking lot, but I also feltcomforted that at least I have a
ride away to get home.
Speaker 05 (30:28):
The thing that I like in general about the Jeep
Jamborees is that if you breakdown on the trail, the guides
will go above and beyond to getyour Jeep running again, get it
at least off the trail, orbetter yet, back on the trail
for the next day.
They go through tremendousamount of effort to to make sure
(30:51):
that, you know, you're notstranded.
Speaker 04 (30:54):
Right.
Speaker 05 (30:55):
Right.
So I think you could say thatabout all the jamborees.
But again, like this one, thisone had some more creature
comforts that the others don't.
But but again, you know, youyou're paying a higher price for
it.
For sure.
Yeah.
Now, let's talk about the FredWilliams part because, again,
the Fred Williams part, as Ialluded to earlier, was the real
(31:17):
hook
Speaker 04 (31:19):
for me.
Right.
I didn't know as much as youdid coming into it, but you had
been a subscriber to those showsand shared a lot of it with me,
and I'm like, this guy's crazy.
crazy
Speaker 05 (31:32):
yeah he's he's he's a genuine character and a
genuine person yeah but here'shere's the thing so you know the
way it was sort of built up wasthat he was going to be the
host of the jamboree and as yousort of pointed out he wasn't
really the host he was more oflike a guest he was a guest
Speaker 04 (31:52):
of the jamboree he was ed sullivan to johnny carson
Speaker 05 (31:56):
He was– in a sense, he was there at the meals and he
was there on the trail rides.
I thought that he could havebeen more leadership, so to
speak, like more– like I wouldhave loved to hear him talk
about– and he did a little bitif you got him one-on-one and
asked him a question.
(32:16):
But as a group, I would haveloved like after dinner to have
a little Q&A or just talk aboutsome of his– experiences, his TV
stuff, some of the crazy thingsthat he's built or done with
Jeeps.
It
Speaker 04 (32:31):
wasn't organized.
It wasn't organized like that.
And it could have been becausefor you, like you said, that was
a main draw.
So it could have been Q&A chatwith Fred after dinner or
something like that.
Or show and
Speaker 05 (32:46):
tell, like he could show clips.
Now, what was surprising to meis that when we got there and I
was talking to people as we weregathering and meeting, a lot of
them, I would say maybe 75%didn't have a clue who Fred
Williams was.
Speaker 04 (33:03):
Right, right.
I knew his name, but didn'tknow as much.
Speaker 05 (33:08):
But I guess that wasn't really the appeal for
them, which is interesting.
That was the main reason Iwould pay extra to go on that.
And I think that's how JeepJamboree thought it was going
down.
Right.
But in retrospect, I think manypeople didn't know who he was.
Speaker 04 (33:31):
Which is interesting because his name has been in
the game for so long.
And like you say, it didn'tcome out with all the variety of
people that we had out there.
Speaker 05 (33:42):
But now I think if you took...
Like if you brought FredWilliams to like the Casco
Mountains, I think like 80% ofthe people would know who he was
as opposed to 25%.
I think it just depends.
It depends.
Because I think, again, thistrip, I think the people who
wind up going on this tripweren't necessarily the hardcore
(34:05):
four wheelers.
Speaker 04 (34:08):
As
Speaker 05 (34:09):
much as people who were...
There was a father and son.
There were a couple of marriedcouples, mother-daughter, couple
of buddies.
But it was much more of a...
We're here for the experienceas opposed to the Fred Williams
(34:29):
hardcore rock crawling.
Speaker 04 (34:31):
Because Fred was...
if you could, if you were ableto engage him and get him aside,
he just kind of let loose andit was great.
Speaker 05 (34:39):
Yeah.
It wasn't hard to get himengaged.
It's just, it wasn't, it wasn'tstructured.
You had to go up to him andengage him.
He wasn't necessarily going.
And he did try to ask somequestions a little bit of like
who you were or whatever.
But like what I thought wouldhave been cool was have him ride
with everyone in their Jeep fora little bit.
That would have been easy todo.
Speaker 04 (35:02):
100%.
Speaker 05 (35:03):
They were all four-seaters.
He rode with the guides, and Ithought that was a little bit of
a missed step, a missedopportunity.
Speaker 04 (35:11):
I didn't even think of that until you brought it up,
but absolutely.
Maybe they just didn't use himto the extent that he could have
been used because I think ifpeople got to know him, it could
have been like a two-way thing.
It could have gotten more forhim as well as the participants.
Speaker 05 (35:28):
Absolutely.
So that part of it was like amixed bag.
Now let's talk about the otherparts of the trip that were not
the jeeping or the Fred Williamspart, the hotels and the meals.
Because all of the meals andthe hotels were included.
That part of it was, again,based on double occupancy.
(35:51):
We sort of alluded to the factthat we had these townhouses in
Moab at the Hoodoo.
But I think that was in error.
I'm not sure whose error, butthat was in error.
I think we were supposed to bebasically in a shared room.
And so we had a much differentexperience because we had this
nice townhouse.
(36:14):
I
Speaker 04 (36:15):
just want to say, coming back after day one...
the guides who, you know, theyput in serious hours and, you
know, they had our Jeeps readythe next day.
They had them gassed up.
So that part of the experience,there was nothing we had to
worry about.
You know, the next day we wereready to go and they were on top
(36:35):
of all that, which I think is anod to them as well to, you
know, be on top of the rentalsand, you know, make that part of
the experience all that it was.
Speaker 05 (36:46):
Yeah, there were three guides plus Fred.
They all were workingtremendous hours to make it
smooth.
I mean, lunches, beverages,like you said, fueling it.
Yep.
You know, mine didn't getwashed every night.
I'm not sure if that was anoversight.
I had requested that.
Speaker 04 (37:06):
Well, you were the jerk that put your top down when
no one else did.
Speaker 05 (37:09):
Oh, it was so dusty.
It was so, so dusty.
And then when we had to, so wehad to check out on day three.
Oh, day two.
Right.
We had to check out on day twobecause we were moving hotels.
Right.
And when I say hotels, so wehad the beginning and the end of
(37:32):
the trip was at the Hoodoo.
But the middle night of thetrip was at Ulam Resort.
Speaker 04 (37:41):
Yes, in Monticello, Utah.
Speaker 05 (37:44):
Which was not a hotel per se.
Resort might mean differentthings to different people.
It was basically a glampingresort.
It was a tent resort.
That was like a platform tentwith a fireplace and a bed and
(38:05):
running water, you know, toilet,a sink.
Speaker 04 (38:09):
Almost no Wi-Fi, which somebody will say, oh, you
don't need it out there, right?
Speaker 05 (38:14):
Yeah.
Well, when you're trying to getstuff done, either cameras or
firmware.
That's true.
Whatever.
But yes.
But anyway, it was a greatexperience.
Speaker 04 (38:26):
Oh, yeah.
It was beautiful.
It really was.
I didn't expect it to be thatneat because it was– I don't
camp.
It's not my world.
But being able to have a greatdinner there, get good coffee in
the morning, and start your ownfire, it just– it really was a
(38:48):
Disney type of experience.
Speaker 05 (38:49):
Again, we were supposed to have double
occupancy.
We were supposed to be sharinga tent.
Unknown (38:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 05 (38:56):
Again, that would have been interesting because I
don't think they had tents withdoubles in them.
Speaker 04 (39:02):
Right.
Speaker 05 (39:03):
And they wound up basically you got your own tent,
I got my own tent.
Other people who had thatsituation, I think the father
and son wound up getting theirown tents.
So I'm not sure if that was anoversight or a fortunate
accident or just the fact thatit was maybe the time of year
where they weren't busy gettingAnd they were able to do it for
(39:26):
us.
Speaker 04 (39:27):
I mean, in my mind, it really might just be that
that was one element they didn'tthink of going into it, you
know, so I don't fault themhugely for it.
But, you know, so somebody hasto sleep on a couch for a night.
big deal no
Speaker 05 (39:40):
it's not it wasn't a fault or criticism oh yeah yeah
just it worked out that we hadour own tents yes but again it
might have been it might havebeen a different experience if
someone you know slept on acouch or a chair or whatever
Speaker 04 (39:55):
especially if i'm snoring in the tent you know
Speaker 05 (39:58):
so but but again beautiful beautiful
accommodations the only the onlyyou know It was chilly at
night.
Overnight, it got really cold.
Speaker 04 (40:07):
It did.
Speaker 05 (40:07):
And the fire goes out.
I mean, I don't care how muchraging fire you have when you go
to sleep.
It's only going to burn aboutfour hours.
Speaker 04 (40:16):
No, and that canvas is only as thick as canvas gets.
Speaker 05 (40:20):
And so I remember having to get up at about 3 a.m.
and get the fire started again,which was, you know.
whatever it was you know anexperience i mean it was
beautiful and i wish it was wishwe had some more time like to
just you know even take videolike we just didn't have a lot
of time we were tired as it was
Speaker 01 (40:43):
once again amy i kind of felt like when the the
morning came that we had to dothe pack all your stuff up
because we're going to adifferent place i was kind of
like Not excited about it.
But when we got to Ulam and sawthe accommodations and just the
resort itself with all thetents, is that a yurt?
(41:08):
I don't know if I would ever dothis on my own, like
intentionally, purposely booksomething at a place like this.
So once we got there and I sawit, I was okay and it wasn't
that bad.
much of irritation because wegot the experience of doing
that.
But then also we were kind of,I felt like kind of cut short on
(41:30):
that experience because we wereout on the trail so long.
Speaker 04 (41:33):
And I was so excited to get up that next morning
because the day before onSteelbender, We had ditched the
drone.
I was taking a shot.
You were going up rocks next toa river.
I hit a tree.
It fell in the water.
And for some odd reason, itworked throughout the day.
And we were able to get allthat great video of that crazy
(41:53):
drop that we were going on.
But that next morning,everything went to hell.
And there was this great,feature of the desert where
there was a great big hole inthe middle of this natural
statue out there and I wanted tofly through it and I couldn't
get it to work so we have noaerials from that area but it
was just such a beautiful area
Speaker 05 (42:14):
it was the stars that night were very epic and I
would say that the fact thatthat was in the middle of the
trip and it was very far out ofthe way It was.
It wasn't really close.
Right.
And so granted, I enjoyed it,but I probably could have done
(42:37):
without that experience justfrom a convenience standpoint.
Speaker 04 (42:42):
Right.
I mean, if you bring some ofthe factor in, you know, with
people that want a differenttype of experience, it was cool.
You know, the food was great.
The surroundings were amazing.
You know, time of year, youdefinitely had those cold, cold
evenings and cold earlymornings.
And so I get that.
(43:04):
But that's kind of nitpicking.
I mean, it was a cool.
It is nitpicking.
We got to see a lot.
Speaker 05 (43:15):
And this kind of brings me to the last point,
which is obviously the cost,because the cost will deter a
lot of people.
Look, there's a market forluxury in everything, right?
There's a luxury market inevery aspect of our lives.
Some people can afford theluxury and some people can't.
(43:35):
And at the end of the day, ifyou have it and you want to do
it, you'll do it.
And they have people, I mean,they sold out the trip this
year.
They sold out the trip lastyear.
People will pay it if they, youknow, think it's worth the
experience.
And at the end of the day,let's just say five years from
(43:58):
now, 10 years from now, I'm notgoing to remember the money
part.
I'm going to remember thepictures and the videos and the
memories of From that trip, thepeople that we met, I'm not
going to remember the moneypart.
So here
Speaker 03 (44:12):
again, Peter and Julia.
It really felt like, in spiteof the fact that it cost what it
did, was that you were gettingyour money's worth.
We didn't feel like we weregetting gouged or hosed at all.
Speaker 01 (44:25):
Once again, Amy.
To me, the Moab price wasbecause we were celebrating my
birthday, my milestone birthday.
It hadn't happened yet, butnow...
Now I am 50.
I guess it kind of, to me, thatwas the, not excuse, but, you
(44:46):
know, you earned it.
It's your birthday.
This is your birthdaycelebration.
But so that way, when we werelooking at the Iceland trip, I'm
like, yeah.
That's too much for just aregular vacation.
And I said, why don't we putthat on the back burner maybe
for when I retire?
And we can see what kind ofsignature trip they're offering
then and do something like thatthen.
(45:07):
So, yeah, the price was notthat expensive for Moab.
But, yeah, it was because wewere doing it for a celebration.
So
Speaker 05 (45:19):
anything else that you remember or you want to
share about the trip?
Speaker 04 (45:23):
You know, the one thing I would say is there
wasn't a lot of away time and wemade our own away time.
So people, I think, would loveto go somewhere.
They want to experiencesomething.
And it was very segmented.
And it might not be a bad thingto consider that, you know,
that last night we saw, oh, myGod, there's a barbecue place.
(45:44):
Let's check it out.
One a little bit of time away.
And we went out, had somedrinks.
Very good.
I wouldn't say it was the best.
Barbecue and a beer and just alittle alone time to sort of
explore where you are.
And I think that's somethingthat they could consider that
might be a little bit of savingson people.
Like you don't have to provideevery night for meals and things
(46:07):
like that because it gives youa chance to explore and see
things.
Speaker 05 (46:12):
Right, well, maybe they could option out the
package a little bit, like youdo it with the meals or without
the meals.
I don't know if it makes itharder for them or not.
I think they're about trying tomake it simple on many fronts,
so it's probably simpler to justhave everybody in on the one
plan.
But like I said, I do thinkthere could be ways to make the
(46:35):
trip cost less.
I'm not sure they'renecessarily interested in that.
I would have liked to have seensome more difficult trails.
Maybe I didn't need the tentcamping part of it.
I would have been okay juststaying at the Hoodoo.
But overall, great trip.
I would definitely love to goback to Moab with my Jeep.
(46:57):
And that will be something thatI will be planning for maybe
next year.
We'll see how my cross-country
Speaker 04 (47:07):
trip
Speaker 05 (47:07):
goes
Speaker 04 (47:08):
this year.
I'd like to hear that for you.
Speaker 05 (47:12):
We'll have to see how that goes.
But I think overall, the peoplethat we met, the things that we
saw, the experience as a wholewas A+.
Speaker 04 (47:21):
Absolutely.
Stories shared, people that wemet.
It was just a cool experienceto get outside of your own area
and what you're comfortable withand to experience that.
So, yeah.
Speaker 05 (47:35):
Here again, Peter and Julia.
Speaker 02 (47:36):
It was really nice and very personable.
You know, it was...
It didn't seem like it was themand us.
It felt like we were all oneunit, like a team, just all of
us together, which was great.
All
Speaker 05 (47:53):
right.
Well, until next time, I'm Art.
I'm Tom.
Talk to you soon.
Thanks for listening.
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