Rough
Wheelers Trip Report for Labor Day Weekend 1996
PISMO = FUN!!!! We got all our gear stowed and headed out
Friday afternoon up 101 making quite a few pit stops along
the way. First was Mission Buenaventura with its church
painted with colors made from the earthy pigments available
and patterns made from animal skins. Animal protested this
stop until he had the opportunity to buy an old horn in an
antique shop. MMBA (motor mouth with a bad attitude) was in
agreement with me that we should also take advantage of the
fact we were in no hurry and had no commitments so we raced
up the road to Mission Santa Barbara. Got quite a few
pictures around the fountains (my weakness). We got there
just before it closed and had just enough time to take the
tour before getting back on the road with some ambition to
get where we were going. Animal entertained the traveling
crowd by blowing his new horn out the back truck window.
Sounded more like a moose call so we told him keep it up and
he would see the mule eared deer pop their heads up in the
grass.
Arrived in Pismo about seven hours later after all the
sightseeing tours and entered the beach without airing down.
Mistake number one. Got stuck about half way down the beach,
got out and aired down. Some young kids came by with their
strap already out so we let them pull us out anyway. Did
their egos good. Five minutes after we arrived at camp the
rest of the people started showing up. Rooster, Pappy, Nancy
and Inky, then Sandman, Fidget, Sean and Sparky. We all set
up camp and settled down by the campfire to relax and
eat.
Iceman, Chicken Hawk, Kevin, and Oozie showed up the next
morning and off to the dunes we went. My truck got
christened, first time I've driven it into the dunes.
Sandman slowly broke me in on the little hills and then off
we went to do circles around the bushes. Did pretty good
there for awhile and then got stuck and had to be strapped
out. Oh well!! Chicken Hawk did a great job out there
showing up both his dad and Sandman on given hills. Pappy
got stuck and Rooster broke some-thing pulling him out.
Rumors have it that Nancy drives better than Pappy, at least
that's what my notes from MMBA say. We all took turns going
into town that day for various reasons and on our way back
we figured it was a good idea to be nice so Pappy and I both
pulled out some poor souls that were stranded by the water.
Good carma. And by the way they do take down the bird fence.
When we came back from one of the runs it was gone! Our camp
looked kinda funny all strung out along the invisible fence.
Paul seemed to be the "good?" luck charm of the day. In the
afternoon I stayed in camp to get some school work done and
he rode with Rooster. Rooster had a bike land on his front
tire and the rider flew over his jeep. After a near heart
attack Rooster recovered and luckily the biker wasn't hurt
either. Although I'm sure by the next day he had to be
pretty sore. Some body damage to that new Wrangler though
did not leave Rooster very happy. That night we went to
idiot hill and had a good time watching all the fools play
around. No major events/disasters to speak of. Rooster,
Pappy and Nancy left Sunday morning. The rest of us went
back to the dunes to play. And the luck continued, Paul was
riding with Robert and after a nice climb up a steep dune
Robert got broad sided by a dune buggy. Again no one hurt
but a nice dent to Robert's front rim. We let the youngsters
practice driving quite a bit on this trip. Animal, MMBA, and
Sean all took their turns behind the wheel and did pretty
good. Rough Wheelers in training. Back at camp both Animal
and Sean kept Sandman busy wrestling. We hoped he would wear
them out but it seemed to work in reverse. They wore him
out. We all ate dinner and got ready for another night run.
I was convinced to leave my truck at camp and was glad I
did. Bobbo (Sandman) and Chicken Hawk were racing up Idiot
Hill with Chicken Hawk winning. (He was also carry-ing less
weight.) But Chicken Hawk also beat a V8 up the hill.
Chicken Hawk perfected crabbing at the top of Idiot Hill and
most spectators thought he was crazy and couldn't believe he
was doing that on pur-pose. We all had to move from our
birdseye viewpoint because some fool couldn't drive and
almost slide into us. So off into the dunes to play we went.
Chicken Hawk broke two motor mounts pulling Sandman's truck
off the top of a hill. Animal rode with Iceman this time and
shortly thereafter Iceman had to change his fuel filter out
on the dunes. Fidget's jeep was a little low on gas and at
one point just died. Iceman started towing us and at a level
spot the jeep started again so we did make it back to camp
on our own accord. We wearily arrived back at camp and
burned off the last of the wood and dropped into bed.
Monday morning was the disp-leasure of having to tear down
camp. Bobbo was giving MMBA lessons on how to get in the way
of fixing a jeep (Chicken Hawks). I told her to forget those
lessons and all the other ones Sandman was teaching her this
weekend. All in all we had a sunny (no wind) wonderful
weekend at Pismo! You should all join us next time!"
Written with the joint efforts of MMBA, Animal and
Patti