Keith--- I'd say Sunday, 21 June. Just because that date is the farthest out and allows the most time for final event planning and/or trip modification. One thing you should consider-- many of the VX'ers are traveling great distances (over 2 hours each way). Therefore, the event should be spectacular and very meaningful; and not just a quick "how ya' doing" and then "good-bye" (these are only successful if people live within 30 minutes to each other). People who have to travel many miles and allocate a lot of their personal time, and gas money will be really pissed-off if the event is not worthwhile, and highly likely not participate in any future event(s).

That's why I recommended www.Trails.com as a possible source for event planning. Please consider the "MARBLE MOUNTAIN" trip as a possibilty. For example: We could all meet in Woodland, WA (I-5, Exit #21) and have lunch, photo shoot, top-off gas & check-oil, hand-out route map flyer, and then all convoy to Marble Mountains. The lead VX and the kaboose VX should both have a walkie-talkie in case of a middle VX convoy break-down to prevent the other lead VX's from simply driving away.

If we do go on any "off-road/off-highway" adventure, then the actual off-road site should be re-conned by a VX'er first (extremely important). This will ensure we have a familiar "lead trail-head" VX'er to actually lead the convoy as a tour guide (because they've re-conned the site beforehand) and we are not just traveling blindly into unchartered waters waiting for something bad to happen. By doing a site re-con beforehand may determine that the route is too difficult, too dangerous and unworthy of a possible selection; thereby, eliminating it as a possible choice. You won't actually know unless a pre-site re-con is performed first.

I would recommend that since you live very close to Woodland, WA (I-5, Exit #21), that perhaps you can first do a "re-con" of the actual site of Marble Mountains beforehand as pre-event planning. In that way, you'd know the route, know the difficulty of terrain, and keep track of "total time of event" (from start to finish). You'd then be able to make out an accurate event time-line schedule, so that we'd all return back to the starting point of Woodland, WA before darkness (very important).

Then we could all once again re-meet in Woodland, WA just before final good-byes (top-off gas & check oil again) and very quickly organize a "Southbound I-5 mini-convoy" & a "Northbound I-5 mini-convoy". This will allow the other VX'ers to convoy together (either South or North) on their way home as a combined group, and then just exit I-5 as they approach their own personal home exit. This would be the frosting on the cake-- kinda' like "fighter jets peeling-off from formation" as they approach their own I-5 exit for home departure (way cool).

If you need help in event planning, just let me know. I won't be able to actually drive a re-con route with you, but I can give you pointers to help organize the event using a time-line schedule method. This will then determine the actually start-time/end-time based upon the total time for all event components (lunch, photo shoot, gas-up, road-trip & return, etc). Riff Raff