American Buggy Association

ABA meets the first Wednesday or Thursday of selected months at a local restaurant in the San Fernando Valley or Simi Valley. Starting at 6:30 PM. See schedule for meeting dates. Applicant attendance requirements are two meetings and two outings. Yearly membership dues of $55 are payable every January, this includes $30 for CORVA membership. 

Highlights for Febuary / March 2003

Dumont Dunes  Feb. 19, 20 

CORVA Convention  Mar. 7, 9 

Garage Sale  Mar. 22 (date changed due to rain)

Oceano Dunes  Mar. 28 - 30 

       Next Meeting  Thursday, April. 3 @ Carrow's Restaurant Chatsworth

Health & Welfare

Eliot Fisher is recovering without any major complications.

December Meeting Minutes

Meeting called to order at 7:02pm

Guests: , Buddy

Applicants present: None

Minutes: approved as read. Yes

Treasures Report:  

Correspondence:  None

Committee reports:

   Newspaper: The WEB page is going fine. Need truckhaven outing report

   ABA Store: Rob Cover says ok, call him if you need anything.

   Equipment: Jeff Fields,  The medical kit was found

   Health and Welfare:  

   Historian: Barbara will start bringing old photo albums to meetings.

   CORVA Rep: No Rep. present

Old Business:   The Dinner dance is on track, we need all the money in by mnday.

   The garage sale went VERY WELL it brought in $569.00, thanks to everyone that helped and donated their stuff.

New Business:

ABA officer elections were held with the following results:

;                  President: Scott Swanson

                   Vice President: Wayne Berg

                   Treasurer: Jeff Shelton

                   Secretary: Jill Berg

                   Guidance Committee: Eric Pifer

                                                     Eliot Fisher

                                                     David Swanson

                                                     Rob Cover

                                                     Brian Phillips

Meeting Adjourned: 8:14pm

Respectfully submitted

Jill Berg

January Outing Report

Truckhaven Hills Poker Run

Rick and I arrived at Truckhaven Tuesday to begin setting up the trail. Due to stops at 4WEST and Tri-County Gear to pick up last minute raffle donations, we arrived later than we planned and only had about an hour to plot the start of the trail. We did get the first mile figured out though.

On Wednesday, we did much better and by spending the whole day out in the hills we managed to "rough in" over 90% of the orange route. Probably one of the most efficient days of trail marking we have ever had. One thing we noticed as we laid out the route was that this was definitely going to be a "toughie". Not only was it our longest trail yet (with very little sand wash), but there were some very tight sections as well as a real nasty downhill we dubbed "Oh S--t Hill". We knew very few participants would be bored this year!

On Thursday we finished marking the orange route and began putting in the green trails. Due to the technical nature of the orange route we figured we wouldn't need quite as many green routes this year, and we didn't mark as many as we had in the past.

We had a relatively easy day on the trail Friday with just a few "fine tuning" adjustments to be made, and we were back in camp by early afternoon. It was nice to be able to kick back and relax for a couple hours before registration opened. Once registration opened at 5pm however, an immediate line formed and the event began! By the time we closed registration at 10pm that evening, the pace of registrations was ahead of last year.

Our checkpoint crew left camp early Saturday morning (after loading up the night before) in order to begin their trek out to their assigned checkpoints. Those of us working the starting line began setting that up soon after. As had happened last year, vehicles didn't start lining up until about 8:45, and at 9:00 (starting time) the mob descended on us. The 3 lane start and having 6 people helping really made a difference this year, and we got the majority through the gate and on the trail by 10:00. We were able to shut down the start by 11:00 this year as opposed to noon last year. Much better!

There were a lot more motorcycles and ATV's this year, and we were surprised that they didn't start returning to camp until 3 hours had passed. Hey, it was only 20 miles! Well it turned out it was quite a tough 20 miles for the bike riders as they were very tired upon returning. At that point we knew it was going to be a looooong day for a lot of people. We hoped that the posted 4:00pm course closing time would deter a lot of folks from just playing around out there, and motivate them to complete the course before dark. Turns out that it did do that, but as usual there were folks that got lost and missed the last checkpoint. There was also a rollover on the trail. An early Bronco turned over going down "Oh S--t Hill" and the driver lost part of a finger. He had his wife, kids and 3 dogs with him, but thanks to a well designed roll cage no one else was hurt. Two of the dogs ran off but one was later recovered. Sadly, as far as I know, the third was never found. John Oldham was there and helped to right the Bronco with his winch so it could be taken back to camp. He also sent me some pix of the Bronco and I put them below.

When the Trailmasters Club started serving the BBQ dinner around 4:00, we began setting up for the raffle and awards ceremony. Joe loaned us a really nice PA system (we gotta buy something like this!) that made it much easier to hear us in the back of the audience. Thanks again, Joe! We started getting rid of the raffle and awards stuff a little after 7:00, and were pretty much done by 8:30. We didn't have a winch to give away this year, but we still sold a bucket load (literally) of tickets. It was then time to relax again!

On Sunday morning Terry and Faith put together a fun scavenger hunt for the little kids, and there must have been twice as many there as the previous year. They all really wanted to win that nice aluminum scooter donated to us by Honda of Glendale! Later that morning, Rick got some help to go out and clean the trail of all markers, and many began to pack up for the trip home. The best Poker Run yet! Thanks to all below that helped!!!

Report by:

Geoff Teare

Febuary ABA Outing

 Dumont     canceled

March ABA Outings

CORVA Convention in Bakersfield  

@ the Four Points Sheraton February 7-9     Friday - Sunday

Garage Sale at the Berg's 

February 15     Saturday

 Starts at 7:30am and done by 3:00pm,  need volunteers and Junk to sell.

Oceano Dunes  

March 28 - 30     Friday - Sunday !!!

This outing is looking like there will be a good turnout.

We will be camped just before Mile post 4.

Here is the Tides for the weekend   

2003-03-28 01:23 PST 1.90 feet Low Tide
2003-03-28 05:55 PST Sunrise
2003-03-28 07:11 PST 5.07 feet High Tide
2003-03-28 14:08 PST -0.60 feet Low Tide
2003-03-28 18:21 PST Sunset
2003-03-28 20:36 PST 4.31 feet High Tide

2003-03-29 02:04 PST 1.45 feet Low Tide
2003-03-29 05:54 PST Sunrise
2003-03-29 07:55 PST 5.15 feet High Tide
2003-03-29 14:39 PST -0.50 feet Low Tide
2003-03-29 18:21 PST Sunset
2003-03-29 20:59 PST 4.49 feet High Tide

2003-03-30 02:39 PST 1.07 feet Low Tide
2003-03-30 05:52 PST Sunrise
2003-03-30 08:33 PST 5.11 feet High Tide
2003-03-30 15:06 PST -0.30 feet Low Tide
2003-03-30 18:22 PST Sunset
2003-03-30 21:19 PST 4.65 feet High Tide

2003-03-31 03:11 PST 0.75 feet Low Tide
2003-03-31 05:51 PST Sunrise
2003-03-31 09:08 PST 4.97 feet High Tide
2003-03-31 15:29 PST -0.03 feet Low Tide
2003-03-31 18:23 PST Sunset
2003-03-31 21:39 PST 4.79 feet High Tide

April & May ABA Outings

If you plan to attend either April or May outtings register to receive free food and T-shirt for your help

the following links will bring up the registration forms, print them out and send them in.

April --  Moose Anderson Days at Jawbone Canyon April 26, 27

May --  El Mirage Days at El Mirage Dry Lake

Next Meeting April 3 at Carrow's Restaurant

 located at Mason Ave. and Devonshire Bl. 

just West of the intersection on the North side of Devonshire. 

Click here to go to this page in PDF format (this will be the snail mail version)