When Mosko Moto announced the 2025 Dusty Lizard event schedule, I was stoked to see Moab, Utah was the first stop. The 2024 Moab Dusty Lizard was an epic event, so it was exciting to put what promised to be a great event on the calendar for 2025. With its iconic landscapes, unique terrain, and miles and miles of tracks and trails for all riding disciplines, Moab is a Mecca for those who practice moto. When you combine Moab’s riding opportunities with Mosko Moto’s community-centric, non-commercialized, choose-your-own-adventure style events, you get the outstanding experience of a Mosko Moto Dusty Lizard.
Pulling into a Dusty Lizard event, it’s always interesting to see the bikes and the riders who show up. This isn’t a fan club for one bike manufacturer or for one type of riding. You’ll find riders with liter-plus adventure bikes camped next to riders who brought two-stroke enduro bikes. Some riders bring their massive campers and toy haulers while others camp off their bikes. Yet my favorite part of arriving at a Dusty Lizard is seeing familiar rigs and rides from the people I’ve met at other Dusty Lizards. Think of the Dusty Lizard as a community of riders that meets up in epic places to ride, and you’ll get the idea.
Mosko Moto has gone to great lengths to cultivate this sense of community at these events, and one of the main ways they do that is with the Dusty Lizard Lounge. It’s hundreds of square feet of comfortable couches shaded by netting to keep things cool during the day, and propane fireplaces to take the edge off at night. In the mornings, riders gather here over breakfast and Bivouac coffee. In the afternoons, as folks roll back from their rides, they kick back in the lounge with a cold drink in hand. Dinner and live music round out the evenings, making the lounge the natural gathering point. One of the Mosko trailers serves as a wall to the lounge, and it's here where you’ll find a few massive maps with dozens of suggested routes. Over coffee in the morning, or a cold drink in the afternoon/evening, you’ll find riders here discussing the awesome riding that’s all around camp.
The Dusty Lizard is a choose-your-own-adventure event. That means you don’t have to queue up for your turn to ride “the day’s route” with everyone else in attendance. Here you’re encouraged to do your own thing and make it up as you go. Feeling leisurely and just want to mosey around and see the sights? There’s a suggested route for that. Want to get after it, and challenge yourself with a big day or some hard trails? There are suggestions for that as well.
This year, we ended up bringing 300s to the Moab Dusty Lizard, as we were in the mood for some of the area’s famous technical trails. To recalibrate to what’s possible on Moab’s Slickrock, we made the predictable choice to start off with a lap on the Slickrock trail. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – the Slickrock trail needs to be sampled by every rider. It’s fun on a dirt bike, it’s fun on an adventure bike (if you’re an advanced rider), and it’s fun on a full moon with a good lighting setup. (Just make sure you don’t ride anywhere you can’t see.) If you’re in the mood for some bigger lines, or some more challenging moves, you can switch over to Hell’s Revenge, which is a famous 4x4 trail that crosses the Slickrock trail in several places. This is exactly what we were planning on when we ran into a crew of Canadian ADV riders who were also part of the Dusty Lizard. After riding with the Canadian ADV crew for a bit, we lead them to Hell’s Gate – one of the most famous obstacles in Moab.
As is common during busier times of the year in Moab, a small crowd was at the top of Hell’s Gate watching folks try and climb the obstacle. Jeeps, UTVs, 4x4s, and motos were all giving it a go. A couple of dirt bikers failed the climb and went back to the bottom to try again. After watching these riders for a few minutes, one of the Canadians on a T7 gave it a shot and made it up without issue. The other dirt bikers that were there were quite impressed to see a several hundred-pound adventure bike climb this challenging obstacle. That’s what is neat about the Dusty Lizard – It brings riders from all disciplines together for good rides that turn into good stories. After playing on the rest of the Hell Revenge / Slickrock trail system, we grabbed a bite in town before heading out for an afternoon ride on another famous 4x4 trail.
Poison Spider is a hoot on a moto, as it starts serving up fun technical climbs right from the trailhead. After a few miles of climbing, you’ll wind up on top of the mesa where you can connect to numerous other trails. That’s what’s awesome about Moab, you can make a shorter afternoon rip like we chose to, or connect multiple trails together for an all-day safari. After sampling some of the fun lines, and a viewpoint that overlooks the Colorado River, we made our way back to camp for cold beverages, live music, and an awesome taco bar dinner.
The next day, we opted to create the aforementioned all-day safari of a ride. Lured by the promise of cold drinks at the top of Hurrah Pass, we started from camp and rode Behind the Rocks, Hunter Canyon, and Pritchett Canyon to Kane Creek Road, which would get us to Hurrah Pass. A full serving of technical obstacles, stopping for photos, and some unscheduled maintenance meant that we got to the top of Hurrah Pass just as the Ruby Moto guys who were running the refreshment stop were starting to pack up their nearly empty coolers. Thankfully, they had a couple of sparkling waters left, which we were stoked to take off their hands.
Our route back to camp was to retrace our route to Kane Creek Canyon, which would take us almost all of the way back to camp. Kane Creek Canyon is one of those trails you have to see to believe. Fed by Kane Springs, the trail spends most of its length in a lush riparian area tucked into the bottom of a sandstone canyon in the middle of the desert. The creek bed is the trail in many places, and plenty of cottonwood and other deciduous trees provide shade in this desert oasis trail that’s full of sandy bermed corners, cool Slickrock features, a little single track, and at least one deceptively deep mudhole. Ask me how I know.
Kane Creek Canyon is a trail I always try to ride when I'm in Moab. It's just such a fun and unique riding experience (who doesn’t love a desert oasis?) and is great on dirt bikes or small to mid-sized adventure bikes if you're an advanced rider. We caught up with CF Moto's ambassador and freestyle legend Ronnie Renner aboard the new CF Moto Ibex 450 in Kane Creek, and their stoke on the trail was obvious. The new Ibex 450 also sounds killer with a full Yosh exhaust system when played at high revs in a sandstone canyon.
Back in camp, the Dusty Lizard Lounge provided a great spot to kick back, enjoy a refrigerated beverage, and recount the day’s adventures with our crew and other riders at the event. A tasty dinner, live music, and good company made for a great evening.
Mosko Moto has something awesome in their Dusty Lizard Events. Quite simply, they’re among the best moto-specific events that I’ve ever experienced, and it’s easy to see why: Take an epic riding location that has something for every discipline and skill level of rider. Stand up a rad hangout spot complete with comfy couches, shade netting, and propane fireplaces. Add in cold drinks, good food, live music, and a carefully curated vibe, and you’ve got an outstanding gathering place for a community of good folks who all enjoy motos and good times outside. The bottom line is that you need to put a Dusty Lizard on your calendar. Here’s hoping you’ll take that advice, and that we’ll see you in Ouray, CO for the next Dusty Lizard in August!
