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The time came for another Phoenix trip; and for that matter, another wheeling trip! Raw Deal was this victim for this trip and FirstofMan, Brutal, Silverbullet and Taco were all able to attend; although Russell was unable to bring Taco because it was down for maintenance. We departed Prescott Valley on June 17th, 2006 and headed towards Phoenix, Arizona at 5:00 PM. We decided to meet with FirstofMan and have dinner at the Denny's in Anthem. The undesirable (100+) summer temperatures in Phoenix made for a night run; making it much easier to acclimate ourselves (and vehicles) to the harsh environment. The trip down was quite uneventful, which was welcomed considering the problems encountered in the Calico trip. Dinner was filled with great conversation, a prayer for the nights events, and great (well...somewhat) food! At this point FirstofMan (Adam) was tossing the idea of running Raw Deal in "one wheel drive"! Apparently, his new front driveshaft had not arrived in time for the run and he was down to an open rear in his Samurai. So did we discourage him from this notion? Of course not...we wanted to see it done...even if we did have to drag him the entire way through. At one point we were joking that if he couldn't get over an obstacle, we could always lift his lightweight Sami over it. Upon leaving Denny's, we continued to observe Adams rig capability with only one headlight, a failing alternator and no rock lights. However, his "go for it attitude" and willingness to entertain us all, well made up for it! Once we got to the trail, we unloaded the rigs and headed for the trail. Silverbullet was in the lead this time! We headed down a dirt road in search for the trailhead. The unfamiliarity of the trail combined with the dark made it very difficult to gain our bearing. In fact, we are still unsure whether or not we actually ran "Raw Deal"! We headed down what we thought to be the trailhead and began our journey! The first few obstacles were easily conquered by Silverbullet and Brutal. As FirstofMan approached the first obstacle, we all had our camera's out ready for pictures. It was tricky spotting his one-wheel-drive rig through some of the obstacles. On a few occasions, Taco would yell, "Just floor it!...Think if it as a ramp...you'll get over it with a little momentum!" On one obstacle, that's just what Adam did. After flooring it through an obstacle, his momentum managed to carry his Sami atop a very large boulder rendering his rig stuck! Brian, Chris and Russell came to the rescue and lifted the front of Adams Samurai as he backed off the boulder. Later, Brian got the chance to test the break over angles of Silverbullet and impressed all with his willingness to take the most aggressive off camber route. At one point Brian yelled, "I'm going over!...Russell!...Grab the rear bumper!" followed by..."Anyone! Grab the Bumper, I'm going to roll!" Fortunately Russell secured the body roll and Brian did not roll. As we furthered our journey through the trail we shared a mutual anger to see the trail littered with so much debris. There were multiple times that we had to move large appliances and objects from the trail just to get by. After seeing this, it was no wonder to us that local trails are being shut down so frequently. We soon approached the end of the trail and we were ready to head home. We loaded the trailers and were home relatively early compared to what we expected. The trip was a success and we had a great time fellowshipping, wheeling, and challenging each other! Now for a trip to "Judgment Day"!