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I left Sacramento on Thursday evening about 2pm, following Sean, from River City Differentials. He was towing his Toyota wheeler down to the desert, not to compete but just to have some fun and a nice way to get around since the area is pretty huge. His tow rig is a new Toyota Tundra with that new V8. Man, he was haulin butt. Even up the hills, it had no problem. I wasn't pulling anything and I had to really push to keep up. Of course he took his trusty Labrador, Crystal (aka, Roo) (cause she goes 'Roo-Roo' all the time). Great trail dog though. Todd, who works with Sean, came along as well. These guys do great work and you'll find them extremely knowledgeable and friendly. So, if you ever have a diff problem or need an upgrade, give River City Differentials a call. Tell em 'Glenn' sent you... We drove into the night and made some pretty decent time, stopping in Barstow to camp in the Comfort Inn before heading on into JV the next morning. We had a continental breakfast at the hotel which was excellent. I pocketed a few bananas for the trail later. We arrived a bit late for the start of the first competition. They started at 7 damn 30. Man, I wasn't even awake that early. We actually got there about 9 damn 30. Doh! So we missed the first several vehicles up the trail. We didn't know exactly where to go till someone told us part of the group was at Clawhammer so we made our way in that direction. Sean drove his Toy and I, like a dummy, took my 92 Explorer out thru the desert. Over hill and dale, thru the sand and rocks we went. Finally, we found the trailhead. Much to my surprise, I was able to drive up pretty close, for which I was thankful cause I hates to walk. The wind was taken out of my sails though when I saw what I had to climb just to watch. I keep forgetting I'm not as spry as I used to be so after climbing around on those rocks all day, I was pooped. Not only that, I bruised my foot (can't imagine how that happened) and barely limped back to the comfort of my newly discovered wheeler. Sean informed me that the Explorer actually had a locker in the rear with 373 gears. Imagine that. After that, I got brave and wheeled that sucker all over the place. Except for the total lack of ground clearance, it did pretty good. Beats walking too. One thing I did hate about it though, was that 'shift on the fly' crap. It shifted in real good but getting it out of low range tested my patience a bit. Maybe I need to read the book. Ha! As far as the competition, it was great except there was a lot of slack time due to broken rigs and broken bones and the inability of some to navigate the rocks very well. One poor fellow got his finger smashed (severed) by a rock as he was hustling to help his driver by stacking rocks under the spinning wheels. Yikes!! Don't do that. We were supposed to meet up with the Pirates and some other folks but somehow we missed them in the sea of people and our paths never crossed. Found out later they were camped actually real close to us. And we worried our butts off that something had happened to them on the way down. All the time, they were partying right next door. Double DOH! At the end of the day, we made it back to camp and cooked up some cow and washed down the dust with a few drinks. Then darkness fell and so did the temp. Man, it got cold. We bedded down about 8:15 (thinking we wouldn't miss the early start next day). I had my air mattress in the back of the Exploder and it was pretty comfy. About 7:15 the next morning, we peeked out and it was still damn cold. I assessed my physical status and found the foot really sore. Walking and climbing rocks again all day didn't sound very enticing. I also got a little too brave with the Exploder the day before so I figured I'd better not take it out again lest I get really STUPID. I've been known to do that. :o) Then came the wind. Something told me it wasn't gonna quit so I decided to pack it in and head for home. I felt bad leaving Sean on his own (he did have Todd with him) but I was in a 'get outta Dodge' kinda mood. From what I heard later about the winds, I think leaving was a good idea. I've been to the desert before and I know how bad the wind can get. So I cranked it up and made it from the lake bed to my house in Folsom in 7hrs & 15 mins. That's not to say I was speeding or anything but traffic was good and there was a tailwind. :o) It was an interesting trip. I won't go back without my Jeep though. Like I said, I hates to walk. The desert is not such a great place. I didn't see one single living thing (except us crazy humans). No snakes, lizards, bugs, birds, rabbits, not even flys. Well, maybe I did see and ant or two but that's it. No wonder it's so sparsely populated. I hear you can get a few acres there real cheap. Thanks for taking time to read and look at the pics. If anyone would like a full sized, quality copy of any of these pictures, just email me and I'll be happy to send em to you. My address is at the top of the page or it's here, 'Glenn@Hammack.com' Be sure to visit my homepage at |
