It was the most spectacular potluck in recorded history.
What posers ...There were hamburgers, cheeseburgers, teriyaki chicken, BBQ chicken, spicy hot wings and brown-sugar-and-garlic grilled salmon. There was the tastiest pasta salad you've ever experienced. There were olive-oil-grilled veggies (red and orange peppers, zucchini and mushrooms), macaroni salad and rice-with-vegetables. There were dinner rolls and Emerald Salad.
And of course, there was a potato salad that Mr. Clean declared "unfit for human consumption" and that he would confiscate it in the interests of public health ... odd that it disappeared anyway. And there was a slew of people that ate so much they could hardly move ... and it was good.
But that comes later, I should start at the beginning ...
We'd scheduled a camping/Jeeping weekend that included White Knuckle and former White Knuckle members. Scheduled to go were the Hunters, the Hordyks, Dave Maulding and Kathy, the Russells and possibly Chris and Cara Schmaus. The Russells and the Schmaus bailed, but we picked up Ed and Deb ... high school friends of the Hordyks (Ed is a high school chum of Harold's, and Deb works at Bethel High School with Wanda).
The plan was to secure a nice camp spot somewhere up the Little Naches River Road, possibly at Crow Creek. The reality was that when we turned off Highway 410 we encountered a road block manned by the ORV Ranger. The Little Naches drainage was closed because of a forest fire.
The Ranger said a guy in a white Jeep with a WK sticker (Mr. Clean) had already stopped, and would be waiting for us at Whistlin Jack's, so we started that way.
En route, I happened to give a shout on the CB and discovered Dave and Harold were already exploring secondary options. We ended up at Halfway Flat Campground, in the primitive area, with the whole place to ourselves and only a short walk to the out-houses for the women-folk.
We set up camp, and ate a quick dinner before dark. We then clustered around a Coleman lantern Harold had positioned in the fire pit – no fires allowed – and swapped all manner of stories and lies catching up with how everyone had been. Periodically someone would crack a joke about Harold needing to throw another log on the fire and we'd all laugh like we'd never heard that one before.
About 10:30 or so, Harold and Dave, who'd been sampling Dave's new margarita-making machine, jumped up, pointing skyward yelling "did you see that?!?!?" I never did see anything but I'm relatively certain it was an extra-terrestrial craft just leaving the Naches area ... or it was the Tequila ... you decide. We star-gazed for another hour or so, then decided it was time to turn in.
Saturday morning was cool and partly cloudy. We ate a leisurely breakfast and then headed out for a day of wheeling, stopping to post a paper plate for tardy KnuckleHeads at the Forest Service road block.
Zooming by ...We ran to the road's end of Milk Creek (FS 1708) and unloaded bikes and aired-down. Justin and Tyler led the way on their Hondas, with me, Harold and Mr. Clean following in our Jeeps. We ran Woodpecker to the top of the ridge, then turned right and made our way across Summit Springs to Bald Mountain, having lunch on the lee side of the ridge. Afterward, we made our way down to the Bald Mountain Road (FS 1701).
We decided to turn north and see if we could find a trail we'd never been on, the 698, that goes by Manashtash Lake and comes out on the back side of Funny Rocks. Wasn't difficult to find, and we started up the hill.
The trail was rated medium, but had some good hill climbs and some fairly gnarly roots in the trail. After a short while, I thought I felt something ... "odd" ... in Wimpy. A bit further, just after a fairly deep hole, there was a distinctive "tink, tink, tink" from underneath that sounded like a front driveline tapping out a rhythm on the exhaust pipe just behind the header. I babied Wimpy up a short hill looking for a flat, and preferably shady, spot to check things out.
Crawling under Wimpy and shaking every driveline/axle u-joint I could find, exposed nothing, so Harold took a quick look. Still nothing. So naturally we moved on to stress testing.
First we gingerly rolled backward while everyone listened for the culprit, then forward ... again, nothing. Now it is time for serious stress testing, going a bit faster. No noise. So I put it in second, popped the clutch and romped on it. BANG! Clunk, clunk, clunk.
I looked at Harold, Dave and Eddy. Eyes like saucers, I heard them say "what the heck was THAT?" and "THAT sounded serious!"
Harold poses for the cameraFortunately, it wasn't. I hopped out and spotted a u-joint cap under the rig. Sure enough, the joint between the front of the transfer case and the front driveline had let go ... the strap that secures the u-joint had either stretched, or more likely, the bolts had backed out. And one bolt had broken off in the yoke.
Harold and Dave went to work with the aplomb of the professional mechanics they are. The broken bolt was bettered by a pair of vise-grips and we swapped in a couple caps from a spare u-joint. In about 20 minutes, we were good as new.
It was here that Harold pointed out you should ALWAYS check u-joints with the transmission in neutral. Otherwise, the drivetrain can bind up and even the sloppiest joint won't wiggle a bit ... thanks for the belated advice Harold.
Fun at Funny RocksBack on the trail, we wound our way past Manashtash Lake and into Funny Rocks where Harold scared the silly out of Eddy. From there, we hit the ridge trail again and came down Five Fingers. Negotiating the steep, dusty hill was the only time all day I saw the Hordyk boys have problems on the bikes. Tyler had to lay his down to stop at one point, and when he got going again it was pretty much a controlled slide to the bottom.
We headed back to camp and the afore mentioned potluck.
"Mmmmmm ... potluck!"
Afterwards we sat and BS-ed and played three rounds of Sequence (the board game).
We slept in Sunday morning, then took our time packing and visiting. Eddy took Harold, Justin and Tyler to the river and showed them how to pan for gold. They returned with a nice collection of gold flakes that Ed put in one of those little glass vials filled with water ... it was really cool.
Then we headed home. Another great weekend in the woods with some of the best people I know.
-- Wimpy
