If you’re looking for ideas and inspiration on having the most fun with your ATV, you’ve come to the right place.
I think all forms of ATV riding are fun, but in this post, I’ve gathered 14 creative ways to use your machine you might not have thought of before.
Explore Your Local Backroads
Where I live, there are miles and miles of old logging roads that almost no one knows exist. When I have a few hours off on a Sunday, I enjoy packing my lunch and hopping on my ATV to explore old, rarely-used roads.
Part of what makes backroad exploring fun and exciting are the challenges you meet on the way, whether it’s a washed-out part of the road or a fallen tree that needs to be winched out to clear the road.
Old roads were usually built with a purpose, and one of my favorite parts is the things I came across that I never knew were there, whether it’s an old mine or an abandoned old cabin in the woods.
Visit a Remote Restaurant
Depending on where you live, remote restaurants near lakes or mountain holiday resorts are often accessible through a network of trails. Why not look up one in your area, leave your car at home, and combine the visit with a thrilling ATV trail ride?
Go ATV Camping
With an ATV, you can up your camping game to the next level.
While car camping can be fun, you can only visit spots accessible by road. With an ATV, you can get far away from crowded campsites to more unique and remote locations where the fishing is better, and the views are more breathtaking.
Some prefer hiking to get out in the wild, but an ATV got you covered if you’re more of a glamping (glamour-camping) type of person. Gather your friends and family, bring as much gear as you want, and go further and faster than ever before.
Go Trail Riding in a National Park
While trail riding in your local woods can be fun, hauling your ATV to your favorite national park allows you to experience nature like nothing else.
Experience scenic landscapes, breathtaking views, and hidden nature gems that take days to get to by foot.
Go Mudding
The basic principle of mudding is pretty straight: Find the biggest, muddiest, wettest patch on the trail and try to get across with your ATV.
Expect to get covered in mud, expect to get stuck, expect things to break, and expect hours of cleaning as you get back home.
For some, this sounds like nothing but trouble and annoyance, while others consider mudding the most fun one can have on four wheels.
Before you dive in, you should consider a few modifications to make your ATV more capable of handling the strain and extreme riding conditions.
Begin by installing oversized mud tires for traction, add a lift kit to gain more clearance, and top off with a snorkel kit to prevent damage from submerging the engine in mud or water.
When your ATV is all set, suit up with a pair of waders and get ready to have some fun in the mud.
Try a New & More Challenging Trail Ride
If you’re tired of your local ATV trails, why not plan your holiday around trying new and exciting trails?
Polaris has elected these as the best ATV/UTV trail rides in the U.S.:
- Poison Spider Mesa (Moab, UT)
- Wildcat Mountain: Hidden Falls Adventure Park (Marble Falls, TX)
- Drummond Island (MI)
Practice Your Technical Riding Skills
One of my favorite forms of ATV riding is technical riding in rough and challenging forest terrain.
Navigating natural rock formations, passing through narrow creeks bottoms, or maneuvering bumpy forest floors push the rider and machine to its limit.
This form of ATV riding is technically challenging and requires total focus, good coordination, and fine-tuned riding skills.
Take a Guided ATV Tour
If you’re visiting an exciting new location on holiday, sign up for a guided ATV tour or rent one to go self-exploring.
ATVs offer one of the best ways to get out and see places you otherwise would never see.
Find Your New Favorite Fishing Spot
If you like fishing, you probably know all the good spots in your area accessible by road. However, you’re hardly the only one that knows and uses these spots, and finding peace and solitude can become a challenge.
But what about all the lakes and rivers that almost no one visits because you have to walk to get there?
So grab a map, pick out a few good candidates, and see if you can find your new favorite fishing spot where the big fish bite and the chance of disturbances are slim to none.
Bonus tip: Install tire chains, and you have the perfect base for creating the ultimate ice-fishing rig.
Ride in The Sand Dunes
If you live near a desert, why not take your ATV out to explore the dunes?
Off-road riding in the dunes requires unique skills to prevent tipping over, getting stuck in the loose sand or taking off an unexpected steep dropoff.
Ask someone with previous riding experience to go with them to learn skills like navigating up the dunes at an angle to avoid hitting “which’s eye holes” and how to know when to stop and reverse in time before getting high-sided in the sand.
Go Bashing in the Snow
While many put their ATVs in storage through the winter season, nothing stops you from using an ATV all-year round.
Where I live, we have a saying: There is no such thing as bad weather, only wrong clothes.
With the proper gear and suitable tires, you’ll be ready for a fun day playing in the snow.
When the snow gets too deep (more than 8-10 inches, tires might not cut it, but a pair of tracks can transform your ATV into an unstoppable all-season off-road vehicle.
Fun ATV Riding for the Thrill Seeker
These forms of ATV riding are only for those seeking extreme challenges to push themselves and their ATV to the limit.
Caution: These forms of riding involve a high risk of accidents or tipping if you don’t know what you are doing. Always wear the proper safety gear and understand the hazards involved.
Rock crawling. Slow-speed maneuvering through technically challenging rocky terrain.
Quad Racing. Closed-course racing that involves high-speed cornering and long jumps.
Learn how to wheelie. While potentially very dangerous, learning to wheelie your ATV driving on only the rear wheels can be a fun challenge for the dear devils out there.
Get Creative Around Your Property
Who says work cannot also be fun?
One of the main benefits of having an ATV around your small farm or homestead is its superior versatility, only held back by your imagination.
Some of my favorite utility activities that are made much more enjoyable with an ATV include:
Creative Winching. The primary purpose of having a winch is self-recovery which can be a fun experience on its own. However, if you feel creative, there are many other ways to utilize the power of your ATV winch.
Collecting firewood. Out of the many chores around a farm, collecting firewood is usually one of the more fun ones.
While not as effective as the bigger machines, the amount of firewood you can collect in a day may surprise you.
Attach a logging trailer or a logging arch to boost your ATV log-hauling capacity.
Related: My Favorite ATV Logging Equipment and 23 More
Fix your driveway. Add a box scraper to the back of your ATV to make it into a mini-grader. Not only is this a fun task, but the satisfaction of looking down a freshly graded driveway will make this job even more enjoyable.
Snow Removal. The snow isn’t going to plow itself, so you might as well turn it into a fun experience. While some prefer the comfort of a heated cab on a small tractor, others enjoy plowing snow with their ATVs.
Start a food plot. ATVs are great for small-scale farming and homesteading. With a large selection of attachments available, you can use your ATV to plow, sow, rake seed, and mow. So if you own a small piece of land, why not start growing some of your food?
Visit an Off-Road Park
Off-road park solely aims to cater to off-road enthusiasts looking to have fun with their vehicles.
Rent an ATV or bring your own and check out some of the many off-road parks and resorts available nationwide.
