LA FAMILIA: WHO & WHAT WE ARE.
- Thread starter DUNE DUMMY 29
- Start date
my name is Rick, i came out to a ride with La Familia back in 08 with my friend AG who invited me to go along and it turned out to be the best time of my life. I came out riding a quad and Cisco, AG, and everyone else are slowly converting me to buggies and razors ect.... so i went out and got a jeep for my first car/ desert toy and cant wait to take it out for its first ride on dirt and with the family
WELCOME TO THE UNDERGROUND DAVE. YOU ARE ALREADY A MEMBER OF LA FAMILIA. THANKS FOR ALL OF YOUR HELP ON THE NEW YEAR'S LITTLE RUBICON RIDE. EVERYONE DEFINITELY LOOKS OUT FOR EACH OTHER & NOT A PARTY ATMOSPHERE, MORE FAMILY ORIENTED & NOOOOO DRAMA. WELCOME ONERICH. YOU ARE DEFINITELY LA FAMILIA & GLAD TO HAVE YOU IN THE UNDERGROUND. THANKS FOR YOUR HELP ON THE SAME RIDE.I would say try the little rubicon with us, but I don't know if a jeep could get through some of the tight, rock-valley sectioins. But, PB has a winch....I know from first hand experience
IT HAS DEFINITELY BEEN FUN BEING AROUND YOU & GEEK BOY. THE JEEP LOOKS GREAT. YOU NEED TO GET THAT THING DIRTY. BY THE WAY I LIKE THE DUNE DUMMY RED PAINTmy name is Rick, i came out to a ride with La Familia back in 08 with my friend AG who invited me to go along and it turned out to be the best time of my life. I came out riding a quad and Cisco, AG, and everyone else are slowly converting me to buggies and razors ect.... so i went out and got a jeep for my first car/ desert toy and cant wait to take it out for its first ride on dirt and with the family
Dune Dummy and all you other members of La Familia, you guys have it nailed and I salute you. DD reading your introductory post about your group and the story was like reading something I would write about our little group.
We are about 5-7 families, all in a small community in Northern California. Most of us have been friends for 20 or more years, and we have been vacationing together either with the off-road toys or boating sincee our well before our childern were born.
I am 52, and have been off-roading in one form or another for about 30 years. I got hooked hard on the sand when a close friend took a old funky front engine buggy in as payment for a transmission rebuild (he owns a trans shop)
This was in '81. My first trip to Sand Mountain Nevada, about 3 hours from home.
It changed my life.
Several sand rails later, starting with Pinto power and ending with 637 HP small block, two sons, a camper shell to a travel trailer and a rack to piggyback the rail, then on to a motor home/enclosed trailer, and now back to a cabover camper, we stll love it. All of our children are grown, my eldest has his own 33 ft toyhauler and quads and wants a UTV or a rail, the youngest has his own Quad and gave us our first grandaughter, and we are looking forward to her first trip in the Teryx this spring.
I am a retired sheriff's sergeant; when I was a young deputy none of the people at work, or outside our circle of duners could understand why we did what we did; why we spent money on all that "stuff"
I was the youngest guy in the Dept. to buy an RV. The other ones were nearing retirement age. They didn't get it.
I told everyone the same story.
"One day, I will be gone. There is no certainty that I will live long enough to retire. Waiting that long to live is foolish.
You can leave your kids all kinds of things, but the one thing that they will cherish more than all the material things are the memories of times spent together. Sure, we go to the desert to ride, but we really go to the desert to laugh, to sit around a campfire at night and tell stories, to be with our friends and those we love.
All the nghts spent getting ready, teaching the boys the basics of caring for a machine, of caring for the land they ride on and watching out for each other, those are things you just can't buy."
Some understood, some just could not get past the money thing. I was never rich, but we knew where our spare cash and my overtime went, and we knew where our vacatons were gonna be, and it wasn't a cruise ship or sittting in a hotel somewhere.
I trashed my back at work in 2002, I knew it was coming and I knew my hillshooter hot rod was gonna hafta go.
I stayed away for a few years and saw the UTV as a way to get back into it, albeit at a much mellower level. My wife and sons pushed me to do it as my wife missed the trips with friends and the boys, then on their own and wanting Dad to go, pushed too.
We bought the Teryx in late 2008. We haven't used it much, I am buying a Cognito LT kit and am hoping the ride improvement will change that.
Now that my sons are grown, and they are starting their own lives, they have told me more than once how much they appreciate what there Mom and I did for them, they tell me that outside our, "circle" their friends, many of whom we took along once or twice, were all jealous of the things we did as a family, and while they didn't understand why, they do now.
Life is short, memories are priceless, and you folks have assembled a great group who are living and generating those friendships and memories...the ones that last a lifetime..and beyond.
Sorry for the long post, folks...
We are about 5-7 families, all in a small community in Northern California. Most of us have been friends for 20 or more years, and we have been vacationing together either with the off-road toys or boating sincee our well before our childern were born.
I am 52, and have been off-roading in one form or another for about 30 years. I got hooked hard on the sand when a close friend took a old funky front engine buggy in as payment for a transmission rebuild (he owns a trans shop)
This was in '81. My first trip to Sand Mountain Nevada, about 3 hours from home.
It changed my life.
Several sand rails later, starting with Pinto power and ending with 637 HP small block, two sons, a camper shell to a travel trailer and a rack to piggyback the rail, then on to a motor home/enclosed trailer, and now back to a cabover camper, we stll love it. All of our children are grown, my eldest has his own 33 ft toyhauler and quads and wants a UTV or a rail, the youngest has his own Quad and gave us our first grandaughter, and we are looking forward to her first trip in the Teryx this spring.
I am a retired sheriff's sergeant; when I was a young deputy none of the people at work, or outside our circle of duners could understand why we did what we did; why we spent money on all that "stuff"
I was the youngest guy in the Dept. to buy an RV. The other ones were nearing retirement age. They didn't get it.
I told everyone the same story.
"One day, I will be gone. There is no certainty that I will live long enough to retire. Waiting that long to live is foolish.
You can leave your kids all kinds of things, but the one thing that they will cherish more than all the material things are the memories of times spent together. Sure, we go to the desert to ride, but we really go to the desert to laugh, to sit around a campfire at night and tell stories, to be with our friends and those we love.
All the nghts spent getting ready, teaching the boys the basics of caring for a machine, of caring for the land they ride on and watching out for each other, those are things you just can't buy."
Some understood, some just could not get past the money thing. I was never rich, but we knew where our spare cash and my overtime went, and we knew where our vacatons were gonna be, and it wasn't a cruise ship or sittting in a hotel somewhere.
I trashed my back at work in 2002, I knew it was coming and I knew my hillshooter hot rod was gonna hafta go.
I stayed away for a few years and saw the UTV as a way to get back into it, albeit at a much mellower level. My wife and sons pushed me to do it as my wife missed the trips with friends and the boys, then on their own and wanting Dad to go, pushed too.
We bought the Teryx in late 2008. We haven't used it much, I am buying a Cognito LT kit and am hoping the ride improvement will change that.
Now that my sons are grown, and they are starting their own lives, they have told me more than once how much they appreciate what there Mom and I did for them, they tell me that outside our, "circle" their friends, many of whom we took along once or twice, were all jealous of the things we did as a family, and while they didn't understand why, they do now.
Life is short, memories are priceless, and you folks have assembled a great group who are living and generating those friendships and memories...the ones that last a lifetime..and beyond.
Sorry for the long post, folks...
Thanks guys...I get wordy sometimes glad it made sense and conveyed what I was trying to say.
Brev it is about a 9 hour haul just to the I-5/I-210 split for us, we've done Glamis back in the 90's..no regrets but no real desire to go back. If I am gonna do a 1500 miler it'll be back to St. Anthony's in Idaho.
I hit Dumont once in the late 90's and it was fun, but with diesel at 4 bucks plus towing south...wel I'll never say never but it ain't in the cards right now. Any of you folks that decide to come north and hit Sand Mountain please let us know...and it would be cool to get everyone togther for Idaho..if you ain't been ya gotta do it.
It is the best duning in the western U.S., maybe in the whole 48.
Brev it is about a 9 hour haul just to the I-5/I-210 split for us, we've done Glamis back in the 90's..no regrets but no real desire to go back. If I am gonna do a 1500 miler it'll be back to St. Anthony's in Idaho.
I hit Dumont once in the late 90's and it was fun, but with diesel at 4 bucks plus towing south...wel I'll never say never but it ain't in the cards right now. Any of you folks that decide to come north and hit Sand Mountain please let us know...and it would be cool to get everyone togther for Idaho..if you ain't been ya gotta do it.
It is the best duning in the western U.S., maybe in the whole 48.
If we ever get to do a trip down south I'd love to camp /ride /eat wth you folks. I appreciate the invite more than you know. Getting, "established" on a new forum takes time, I fgured I'd just throw it out there and let people know who I am, and what I am about in one at-bat, LOL.
After reading DD's first post in this thread, I felt like this was where I belonged.
Thanks for the kind words, everyone.
After reading DD's first post in this thread, I felt like this was where I belonged.
Thanks for the kind words, everyone.