Desert Messenger

cious breakfast and then walking the track and suiting up for riding. While one group rides another group chooses between hiking, crafts, games, horseshoes or just hanging out watch- ing the other kids ride. The day also includes a giant treasure hunt and depending on the weather water gun fi ghts and sno-cones. Brown- ies, cookies and milk are plentiful and we've gone through thousands of pop- sicles over the years, the kids are wel- come to as many as they want. Saturday night brings a delicious din- ner followed by chapel service and s'mores around the campfi re. More tag and hide-n-go-seek and they're ready to pass out. Sunday morning's incen- tive to get the bunkhouse cleaned up, bags packed and loaded in the van and sponsor thank-you letters written is one more motorcycle ride before the van leaves for the city at 11 a.m. They take home a 19"x13" camp poster packed with photos and a goodie bag fi lled with off road stickers and other treats. And what do we get for the thousands upon thousands of hours the guy-in- the-garage and I have invested in this adventure over the years? Seeing the smiles, hearing the laughter, listening to the excited voices of all the kids talking at once as they exuberantly relate their adventures on the motor- cycle track. Time and time again. Camp after camp. It's a wonderful exhaustion and there is no better return on an investment than knowing we've sent hundreds of kids home fi lled to the brim with marvelous memo- ries they'll carry in their hearts for a lifetime. Sherri Kukla is the editor and co-pub- lisher of S&S Off Road Magazine. She along with her husband, the guy-in-the-garage, are also the founders and directors of Thunder- ing Trails off road camp for inner city kids in Southern California. She can be reached at ssormag@gmail.com or www.ssorm.com 16 www.DesertMessenger.com May 17, 2017 Read Desert MESSENGER ONLINE @ www.MyQuartzsite.com UPCOMING EVENTS AT THE VFW VFW MEMBERS AND GUESTS NOTE: VFW Auxiliary is collecting coupons you may have that you won't use. These go to the military families who can use them up to 6 months after expiration. Please help us in this endeavor to assist our Veterans. Coupons can be left at Post. We are also collecting labels for the school and National Home for Children. You can leave items at Post Lobby. VFW Post 769 VETERANS OF FOREIGN WARS 305 N. Central, Quartzsite, AZ, 928-927-7697 FRIDAYS – 5:00 PM TO 7:00 PM – Hamburgers -- $5.00 donation Cheeseburgers -- $5.50 donation. New York Steak Sandwich -- $7.50 Includes choice of fries or green salad MAY 20 – ARMED FORCES DAY. Be sure to fly your flag, please. Flag raising at 10am at the Post MAY 29 – MEMORIAL DAY – Ceremony at 10am at the Cemetery. Will be serving hamburgers and hot dogs at Park beginning at 4pm JUNE 10- VFW & AUXILIARY MEETINGS 10am JUNE 14-18 VFW State Convention at Ft. McDowell JUNE 18 FATHER'S DAY - Check with Post JULY 4 - PICNIC AT THE PARK - VFW Volunteers will be serving hamburg- ers & hot dogs. PLEASE CHECK AT POST AS ADDITIONAL EVENTS MAY BE SCHEDULED Check at the Post or on the VFW Post 769 website for information on additional activities being planned. www.vfwpost769.org Comrades meet –2nd Saturday each month –10:00 a.m. at Post Auxiliary meets – 2nd Saturday in the dining room area at 10:00 a.m. House Committee meeting – 2nd Saturday each month -9:00 a.m. at Post Missing dads. Multiple half and step siblings. Prison waiting rooms. Homeless shelters. Small motel rooms rented by the week. Sleeping in a garage. Sleeping in a car. Missing parents. Drugs. Alcohol. Financial problems. Suicide. Abuse. These are the facts of life for too many. And when it's kids who are forced to deal with these challenges through no fault of their own it's especially tragic. Adults who fi nd themselves in these situations are often there because of their own poor choices and lack of self control. But the kids. They did nothing. They were just born into a lifestyle of dysfunction. It's hard to say exactly when the idea came to us. But sometime in the 1990's would be a safe guess. We were raising our kids in an off road environment with regular desert trips and a love of motorcycles. Friends and neighborhood kids were always welcome on our desert outings. It was the late 1990's when we named our dream: Thundering Trails. It would be an off road ad- venture for kids from dis- advantaged backgrounds. Still living in the city at the time we didn't know when or where we would do it. But we knew. One day Thunder- ing Trails would become a reality. In August of 2004 we had the awesome privilege of acquiring the desert land that would become the home of Thun- dering Trails and on October 24, 2005, our 31st wedding anniversary, Thun- dering Trails was offi cially declared a non-profi t corporation by the State of California. Thirteen months later we held our fi rst camp. Meeting with an inner city ministry the administrator told us he had hundreds of kids who would love to attend. We told him we could accept about 8 boys for the fi rst camp. Four showed up and we were devas- tated at the small turnout. But 36 hours later when they went home we were ex- hausted and felt like they had been here 36 days. We never could have handled 8-10 kids in the beginning. It was a huge learning curve and we were to dis- cover that an off road desert adventure with four kids who have never been out of the city and are not your own kids fa- miliar with riding and camping -- and family rules -- was a whole new ball- game. Theft and vandalism and disre- spect in the early days helped us to fi ne- tune our requirements for kids to attend camp. The goal is not to rehabilitate troublemakers, it's to provide an awesome desert adventure for good kids who come from diffi cult situa- tions. Along with a group of dedicat- ed volunteers we have hosted 61 weekend adventures for groups of 8-12 kids since the fall of 2006. We rent a van and provide transportation from the city and the fun starts the minute the kids arrive. Playing tag and hide-n-go-seek are camp favorites shortly after they get off the van until dinner is served. Later it's a hayride and campfi re. Saturday is packed full of fun from the moment they wake up with morning hikes to "Big Eyes" the giant binoculars sitting atop a hill, to fi ring off rockets, a deli- Sherri's Turn

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