With an up, out, and run across California, I was out of the land of BMW motorcycles headed to Gary’s Jamboree filled with Rivians. The two events were surprisingly close on the eastern side of California. However, going straight there would’ve been too easy. Of course, I had to ride the bike across California back home, switch vehicles, and then drive all the way back across California to the next event. It certainly wouldn’t make sense to ride a gas-powered motorcycle to an event filled with electric trucks! So there I go, traveling across California twice! At least it’s the short way 😜!
The Consumes River Ranch was our home for the next three days. Usually, it’s quite difficult to find large group camping sites, but HipCamp made it significantly easier to search all the way across California for sites that can accommodate 50 people. The Consumes River winds through California’s Gold Country: gently rolling hills that were home to the massive gold rush in, you guessed it, 1849. I’m experiencing California’s gold rush this weekend, from the 49er Rally Ride Report: 2023 & 2024 to Gary’s Jamboree.
It was a dusty exit from the Consumes River Ranch. By late May, all the dirt roads have turned to dust bowls, and there would be no rain until at least September. Welcome to summer in California!
The morning activity was to head out to Prairie City SVRA just east of Sacramento. What an SVRA, you ask? An SVRA is a state vehicle recreation area. It’s an off-road park for trucks, motorcycles, and other motorized off-road vehicles. What’s even better? It’s only five dollars to get in! It’s one of the best dollar-per-fun ratios in well overpriced California!
The park has a series of rock obstacles to climb, which were certainly fun for some, but that’s not where my heart lies. On the other side of the park is a dirt track where the Rivian combines its sporty side and dirty side in one place. It was fun to put the truck into rally and drift modes and get a sense of how it performs at higher speeds off-road.
Once the water truck came through we all could get a sense for how the truck handled sliding in the mud around turns. We could practice evasive maneuvers while sliding to regain traction and completing the turns. Definitely huge, huge fun factor here!
This year’s Gary’s Jamboree wasn’t near a Rivian Adventure Network charger, so we all went different ways to find power to return to camp. In an ICE (gas) vehicle, I wouldn’t even mention getting gas, but in 2024, Northern California, while charging is relatively ubiquitous – there’s always a little bit of adventure in actually getting power.
Today’s journey brought me to Glennellen, a charger in the EVGo network. EVGo gives each charger in its entire network a different name, often themed together at specific charging sites. My track record with EVGo has been mixed; however, fortunately today, I was able to charge easily (albeit expensively at $0.54 a kilowatt).
Later in the day, I went back to Prairie City because the campsite didn’t have running water or porcelain bathrooms, lol. Fortunately (or unfortunately), I ran into another Rivian owner who was having some mechanical issues with their truck. The truck was drivable, but it was making some clunking noises and was limited to a maximum of 50 miles an hour. We called Rivian support to log the issue and see if they might be able to provide some guidance.
Alas, no easy fixes were available, so I followed them back to camp to see if there was something else we could do.
The great thing about rallies is you have people of all types and skill levels showing up and rallying around a central theme. I’ve garnered tons of information from more experienced motorcycle riders over the years. With Rivian being so new, the community knowledge is slowly catching up as more and more people get their trucks further and further out into the adventure. Two of the members felt comfortable pulling the plastic off the front end and removing the frunk. It was interesting to see all the electronics powering the truck’s front end. We couldn’t see what might be causing the fault with the truck, but a cool exercise, nonetheless.
I still get a kick out of cooking off my induction cooktop. Gone are the days of pumping up my Coleman stove with 100 tiny pumps of air. I simply plug-in and start cooking! What’s up for tonight: chicken tikka masala. I mean, why not have Indian food out in the middle of the woods? Gear guard Gary made an appearance at his own jamboree! He keeps all of our trucks secure and a hell of a nice guy!
As the weekend was wrapping up Monday morning, the owner of the ranch gave us permission to drive through the river. The road to the river is somewhat paved with large concrete blocks but deep enough to still be fun with the truck. I’m still wrapping my head around submerging a battery in that much water, but man it is super fun and may even get the truck clean!
Kudos to the organizer of the 2024 edition of Gary’s Jamboree!
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