Fall Camp is not the last event of the season for the EOTB, but it does serve as a beacon, letting us know that the prime wheeling season is coming to a close. It's usually a relatively small event, rarely attended by more than a dozen vehicles. This year's event was larger. In addition to having a larger contingent of campers, including guests from Muskoka and Montreal, several members made the trip to join us for individual runs, with some coming in on Friday night to run the Calabogie ...

When you're planning an annual event, there's always a worry that the event will become stale, or that it will be difficult to match the last one, but you don't want to change too much and mess with tradition. Tradition demands that we start with dinner at the Redneck Bistro in Calabogie. This wasn't a difficult one to stick with. The food, as always, was excellent and it was a treat listening to Teagan McLaren (remember the name) play a mix of excellent covers and original music. Let's c...

Despite it's classification as an Easy trail, the Darling Line has earned a reputation for wreaking havoc on trucks passing through. With a nice-sized group of about 15 vehicles, we wondered who the trail's victim would be this time. With the trail leaders coming from Almonte and Arnprior, we deviated from our regular meeting spot in Bells Corners in favor of meeting in Almonte. While this was a departure from tradition, it allowed us to forego a second meeting place and probably got us t...

Sunday was shaping up to be a beautiful day. The day started cool, but comfortable and all campers were headed to Sullivan Lake. In an effort to keep the day moving smoothly, the group was split with half the group heading up by Little Green Lake and the other half taking the Crag Lake back door, skirting the swamp and rejoining the Sullivan Lake trail. Before we could get onto the trail, however, Tom discovered his Suzuki had a broken hub and headed back to camp. Despite being one vehicle sh...

With campers arriving throughout the afternoon and early evening, everyone was excited for this year's Camp EOTB. Tents were raised, meals were cooked and soon the group converged around the campfire. Recent weather meant that we were under a fire ban, so we had to get creative. With some LED lights and a piece of orange tarp, we had our fire and our focus shifted to planning our trail runs on the first full day of camp. Saturday morning, we split into two groups, one headed to Bear Skull...

The Wranglers are always well represented on the trail, and four generations of Wrangler participated. Starting with Joel's timeshare YJ, a few TJs from stock to Norm's behemoth, the usual group of JKs and JKUs, and a handful of JLs and JLUs. Beyond the Wranglers, however, there were some other logos, including a Renegade piloted by Rupert who only used three wheels on many obstacles and several others representing Toyota, Nissan and the massive Chevy Suburban that managed more than I think ...

On Saturday, March 24th, the EOTB held our 2018 AGM at Biagio's Italian Kitchen. We had an excellent turn-out, with about 50 people in attendance. We held our election, handed out some prizes and awards and welcomed our new Board of Directors for the upcoming season. Election For the first time in many years, the EOTB held an election. We had five volunteers who accepted nominations for the three Directors at Large which prompted the election. This is a healthy development, and shows...

A few months ago, The EOTB was approached by Formula Special Projects representing Fiat Chrysler Automobiles about assisting them with a media event celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Jeep brand. After a brief negotiation, we came to an agreement whereby we would provide support for their event in exchange for a sponsorship of the club. The event took place in Calabogie on July 26th. The EOTB’s role was to help identify a trail that would appropriately highlight the off-road abil...

We had a relatively small group this year for camp, but it was a great camp nonetheless, with great people and generating some great stories. While a few of us arrived early, the majority of campers began arriving in the afternoon on Friday, and the evening was relatively low key as everyone got their sites setup and visited with each other throughout the evening. The consensus, however, was to try to get an early start the next morning, with the driver meeting scheduled for 9:15am. At pro...

First off I'd like to thank everyone who managed to make it out for yesterdays trail run to Darling Line. The group met at the usual spot in Bells Corners at 9 am. With a total of 8 vehicles meeting up in BC, we probably had the largest ratio of non-Jeep to Jeep vehicles that I have seen in a long time. 6 Jeeps, my Ford and even a Chevy!Jamie Wright with his mil-spec 85 Blazer with a 6.2 diesel was definitely something we don't see too often. And I think the diesel helped minimize the dam...

Thanks Ken for a good run in Carp. And thanks to Nick for being the tail gunner for our small group. There was a nice challenging rock at the beginning, and lets just say that Nick had a deja-vu moment in the mud, but he was able to winch himself out. We all got a bath at the end as Ken led us on a small detour through a line of water holes. Loved it! - Brigitte The rain and my neglect to air down stopped my climb. It was an excellent as always with the club. - Ken

We ran with a small group today, only four trucks including Jeremy Brooks, Tom Miller, Nick Dufresne and myself. We stuck to our schedule and left Calabogie at 10:15am headed to the dam to air down. It didn’t take us long to get ready and we headed down the road. Before we could reach the entrance to the Crag Lake Back Door, we ran into a man on an ATV, flagging us down. He told us he spotted a forest fire in the direction we were heading and a Jeep stuck in the mud nearby. He was headed back t...

I arrived at Munfords a little before 9:30 to find Paul, Nick, Martin, and Andy our guests for the day. After fueling up, I grabbed a $2.99 poncho. We decided to wait five minutes for anyone else to arrive and as we started up the jeeps Tom and Tony pulled in. It started to rain. The group headed to the trailhead and (most) aired down. I took the lead having a gps and a winch. A nice fall drive through the forest to the first obstacle - Bear Hug. (more…)

Karen and I showed up at Bells Corners. At the appointed time, we left in a very orderly convoy and proceeded to Munford’s in Calabogie, where we found Tom, Eric and Luc waiting for us. Eric is a recent new member, but has done the Bat before earlier this Summer. Since that time he has significantly upgraded his jeep, adding 37 inch tires and 5.11 gears. Also participating as a guest in a silver JK was Luc. Luc is a friend of Eric and is also planning to join. Both are from the Perth area. (mo...

Earlier this week I mentioned that I was looking for a Sunday adventure. Evan was suggested taking a trek down Straddlebug and kindly supplied a recent track. This set the scene for Sunday’s “May or May not be Straddlebug” run. The “May or may not be Straddlebug” run started Sunday morning at 9:00 with four Jeeps meeting at Loblaw B.C.. Marc was there in his CJ7, Tom and Tony in their TJs and Serge in his four door. (please forgive any mistakes with names, it’s one of the things I have no...

A total of 5 trucks and their intrepid owners met yesterday at the Loblaw’s parking lot in Bells Corners. After the normal period of chatting and comparing of fixes and changes, we left at 09:30 sharp and headed out to Hopetown, arriving at 10:25. At Hopetown we found Chris Palko waiting for us with another 5 trucks, making us a mixed band of 10 stock(ish), slightly modified, and somewhat more modified trucks. After exchanging pleasantries and a brief drivers’ meeting, we headed out to the tr...

It all began on a soggy Sunday morning in Bells Corners. Five trucks, with their brave drivers gathered in the parking lot preparing for a fun day on the trail. The rain was light, and we were all hoping it would subside before we reached Burnstown. We left Bells Corners a few minutes ahead of schedule, and we were no sooner headed towards the Queensway when the skies opened up, and it truly began to rain. We made our way to Burnstown, hoping the sky would rain itself out before we hit the tr...

We had a small group for Saturday’s trail run, with only four of us, myself, Burns, Etienne and Craig B. leaving Bells Corners and collecting Tom at Munford’s. When we arrived at the dam to air down, there was a quite a crowd with the OVO Spring Fever campers everywhere and a significant ATV crowd. Having confirmed OVO’s agenda for the day, we decided that the back door would be feasible with this small a group. (more…)

After the cleanup we headed to the trailhead to air down and do a little disco'in. Mark op-ed out due to a trackbar issue and Ross figured his Subaru was not up to the challenge! (more…)

Pic: Carp at Night: Last night we ran the Carp Trail. It is stock-friendly, but there are a few interesting obstacles, and going at night always makes things more interesting. (more…)

Meeting at Bells Corner on an overcast day, there were already a couple trucks ready to go. Greg made a grand entrance through the flock of sea gulls basking in the pavement heat. For a few brief moments it reminded me Alfred Hitchcock's, The Birds. They weren't deterred and resumed their basking although they seemed to be discussing the next move against Greg. After some banter, a few more trucks arrived bringing us to 6 trucks. Pierre in his Liberty, Greg, Christoph, and myself were flyi...

It was a last minute decision. When I say last minute, friday night. Mark W. talked to me about the Quinn. "Hey!" I said. "The rear of the Jeep are on jackstand waiting for 2 new shocks. So what! Let's put them back and let's goe wheeling. It will be fun." Arrived in Munford at 10am and OJC was there. I was waiting for Mark W. Tom was there. And Paul D Showed up. Great! So we went. As a tradition, we got lost leaving the dam to go to Quinn. Funny! We did a few loops me and Paul before...

(I apologize for the long trail report, but it was a long day!) As is often the case when camping is involved, we got off to a bit of a late start on Saturday, not knowing exactly what trail we would be running, and waited until the group met at the front gate to make a decision. After some discussion, we decided to head to Killer Lake leaving Bon Echo just before 11:00am with a convoy of 10 trucks including the Palko’s two Rubicon’s, Nick, Mike, Dana, Grant and myself from camp and Tom,...

Camp EOTB 2012 was a blast! Good times, good camping, good trail rides. On Friday before camp started, the real work started: Evan C. led a team of explorers through the Quinn Loop in reverse from the front door to the back door. This is a tight challenging forest trail that can be passed with stock vehicles but tests even the most skilled drivers. Thanks to Norm, Mark, Peter, Paul and Dominique. Saturday featured split runs to Crag Lake: Norm led the way in the Back Door for modified ...

Well that was quite the trail run. 7 of us headed out from Bells Corners Craig B, Greg C, Darcy in a monster JK on 37s, Martin, Mark G, Burns (coming out for the drive to Calabogie for a fishing trip) and myself. We headed west on 417 and picked up another 6 at Munfords including British Matt, Nick C, Darcy's friend (I think her name is Val) Tom, my brother who came in from Petawawa for the ride. I am sure there were a few more I just can't remember everyone's name . At the trail head w...

Ouf! I will make this short so people can read it fast and get the most important parts. I Love Crag Lake! We did the trail from "Front to Back" since it is more difficult in that direction. But man oh man! It is tight/technical/demanding/tiring/concentration needed,etc. We were 4 Trucks that made the trail in 6 1/2 hours. We got out at 5:30pm. THIS IS WHY I WANTED A LIMITED OF TRUCKS. (more…)