Tag Archives: four-wheeler

The Foreman 400 Rides Again

This month is already flying by and as I take my morning and evening walks between editing film I have noticed the coolness in the breeze and the smell of Fall in the air. The annual Halloween Party is just a few weeks away and more importantly it is camping season. My favorite time of the year. Now, to get you caught up the ATV had an issue and would not start. Mostly this could be because of me working in Dallas for a year and she was not run nearly at all. And this is a ’98 Honda Foreman 400. The same ATV my father bought brand new when I was a kid. I have so many awesome memories on this thing. I can recall a time back in the day when we were still in Alabama and we were riding this trail called “Powerline” the trail that follows the powerlines that ran for miles. Me and my little Suzuki 160 and my dad on his brand new Foreman 400. I can vividly remember this trail that started off pretty wide and slowly became narrow and more narrow until you reached a spot that your four wheeler could barely squeeze through. Once you were able to get through that though there was this big creek, nearly a river. It was beautiful, something out of a Bob Ross painting. We drove through this river and pushed through to the other side on the Foreman. At that moment I felt like we had crossed an ocean and me and my dad were explorers in an undiscovered forest. I was just a little kid then and the Foreman was a massive beast to me. Fast Forward twenty eight years later and I am upgrading it.

I had cranked it once since I had been back but the editing work was taking all day and I started getting in the hole of staying in my room working all day. I went out to move it and she wouldn’t crank and my heart sank. I could feel how bad she wanted to run in the woods and the fact that she couldn’t even crank made me feel so guilty. It was my fault. If I really cared I would have come out and cranked it everyday and I would have done a test drive every weekend and just keep her clean and beautiful but I hadn’t. My priorities had gone astray so to speak. The first shop I called gave me a long winded speech about how because the Foreman was from 1998 that they could not get any new parts. Then he dropped the fact that if I didn’t drop a deposit that they would not even look at it to tell me what is wrong with it. So that shop wouldn’t work, which was disappointing because I had used this place before, but alas never again. Then I found a place near me and immediately he told me to bring it down and guaranteed he could fix it. A few days later he did and then I pulled the trigger on updates and most importantly the winch I had gotten a year ago. We had used Adam’s and it made me want mine installed even more. That and a laundry list of issues that the previously mentioned shop never caught, or more likely never looked or even cared. This ATV is going to be like brand new. I am already planning the trip to Croom and I am praying that I get a call soon telling me to just come pick it up.

Some people may think that this is an overreaction to something trifle, or perhaps a huge waste of money, and though I did still pay less than I would have for a brand new four wheeler I can still understand why some people may feel this way. The fact is that you may not be wrong but you are also not entirely right. This petrol powered toy doesn’t really serve a huge purpose beyond just making me happy. I do use it to clean up my yard and during hurricanes it is a huge help, but these are tiny moments in my life. Realistically this ATVs main purpose is to bring me joy, make camping films, and bring happiness to my life. With that being said it is hard for me to say how important it truly is to me. Life is very short and often takes more than it gives so it is important to truly live happy and to be alive and present in life. I am blessed that a lot of gear and my ATV have a special story and that they were loved long before they were under my care, leaving them beautiful for me to enjoy. This writer thinks this could be the true secret to a long and healthy life and if not it is a sure good spot to start looking. Thank you so much for reading, God bless y’all and don’t forget to go outside.

Running Trails with the brand new 2026 Polaris ATV

When I got home from Dallas for the first time in months I first hugged my family, held my cat, and then immediately started prepping to head out to Croom for a day of trail running with Adam. Adam who usually rides a dirt bike recently bought a brand new Polaris. This beast was the trail model so it came with a lift kit on it, a winch and the bars you would usually see on an ATV have been removed. It is a black beast of a four wheeler. I never personally thought I would love an ATV with an automatic transmission but let me tell you this thing was so smooth running those trails.

We got out to Croom a couple weeks before the fourth of July and Croom was totally empty. The weather was brutal, to be specific the intense heat was brutal with a average temperature of about one hundred degrees. I can see what sitting on top of a extremely hot motor may not sound very fun to most people, especially my cousin who wears work out gear when he rides, but I am not a normal person. So I came anyway. The dust was intense at the sand pit but because there was no one there we got to really see the Polaris at speed off road which was apparently on half throttle. Adam is making a point of easing it in which I totally agree with just not great at practicing it. There has been a couple times that Adam had to be a little more clear about slowing down until it is completely run in. Sorry Adam, I am working on this.

We were pulling into the perfect spot with a good canopy lining up our trucks, Adam in his white Dodge Ram that is a beast just like the ATV it brought into the Withlacoochee Forest today. I, of course, was in Big Red, my ’79 Ford F-150 with my ’98 Honda Foreman 400. We didn’t waste time before jumping on the trails. Adam was eager to find some mud to put his four wheel drive to the test and maybe even to get stuck and give his new winch a test drive. The heat and how dry it was I wasn’t too sure we would find any serious mud but we had only been running the trails for about ten minutes before we found the same exact spot my ATV had gotten stuck the last time we came out there with Chris. When Adam saw that mud he went straight into it.

He hit the mud and at first he was plowing right through it until he started to come to the other side of this miniature lake and he got bogged down. I had gone through a smaller cut next to him so I wouldn’t get stuck since he was very stuck and I was gonna need to help pull him out. I cam around and he looked up with a huge grin, the kind you would expect on the kids on Christmas morning, and says out loud “WINCH TIME!”. Yes, it was indeed winch time. We first were going to set it to a tree, why not my ATV? Adam also wanted to see how long it was. When we couldn’t reach the tree so we hooked it up to my ATV. It came right out, I loved it. It was so awesome rolling through here now with a winch. I even bought one for my ATV, I just need to take it my ATV shop and have them install it because, surprisingly it is much more complicated than just bolting something on. So I would be visiting Haps in Sarasota very soon.

We probably rode for about three hours before having to return to reality but we already have started planning a longer moto-camping trip, something we have been talking about for a couple years. We are currently looking at the Ocala National Forest, since we already know the terrain really well, we can make that our first location for a full on, off the grid, moto-camping trip. Both of us having 4x4s, winches, and the ability to carry a decent amount of cargo. The possibilities are endless. I look forward to telling you more about this in the future. Thanks so much for reading, don’t forget you can watch this adventure at my YouTube channel Dan Goes Outside and check out Mud, Dust, and High Speed Rust. I promise that you will enjoy it, and please like and subscribe, it truly does help. I hope you have an awesome day wherever you are my friends, God bless, and don’t forget to go outside!