Derek Cooper

Hello folks, I go by the name of "coop" and have lived my entire life here in the beautiful Mojave Desert. I have the honor of being able to give you my humble and unbiased opinion of what the hell I believe is going on with our "public lands"

Well folks, here I am back and pissed as ever. King William has just locked up another 328,000 acres of land by declaring the Sequoia National Monument. Another 328,000 acres of my public land, gone. Once again King William has swung his magic green wand and stuck it in and broke it off in the vehicular recreational community's rear end.

My adventure started on the 30th of June 00. Me and my best friend Jake (my Siberian husky) left Ridgecrest at 5:30am and headed out for Elko, Nevada. As I had been planning on this trip since January, I was anxious to arrive at Jarbidge a few days early so I could spend sometime meeting others and checking out the road closure. After driving through Tonapah, Eureka and the back roads of Nevada, I finally arrived in Elko by 4pm. After checking into my hotel and visiting the large shovel on the courthouse yard of Elko, we settled down for the night in anticipation of arriving at Jarbide early the following day.

Hello folks, I go by the name of "coop" and have lived my entire life here in the beautiful Mojave Desert. I have the honor of being able to give you my humble and unbiased opinion of what the hell I believe is going on with our "public lands"

On the 30th of July I drove from Ridgecrest, California to Elko, Nevada where I took pictures of the shovel on the court house lawn and spent the evening. It was a long 9-hour drive but I was determined to get to jarbidge early on the 1st.

My wife and I recently returned from a wonderful trip to Russia. We spent three days each in the urban centers of Moscow and St. Petersburg. The remainder of our trip was spent cruising down the Volga River and driving by bus through the Russian countryside.