Elherbinator

Let’s do it! Unfortunately I am out of town this weekend, then I am leading the Bald Mountain MORG the following weekend so it’ll have to be a weekday or after that. I am up for either. Let me know your preference and also if there’s any other attendees that would like to join the podcast recap of the trip.

Besides bushings, high levels of travel will eat U joints. I tend to get 2 years out of the ujoints in my driveshafts before they get eaten up. Sounds bad, but ujoints are cheap and they are easy to replace. IMG_3568.mov

Can I get a headcount for who’s coming along with your general arrival/ departure/ camping/ trail plans?

Sounds like an adventure!

Years of extended travel suspension finally killed one of my radius arm brackets. Also managed to nearly totally pop out a bushing on the opposite side. Requires a little straightening out of the twisted bracket and some welding to fix. You have to be pretty precise for the bolt holes to line up with the radius arm, but I got lucky and it worked out. Replaced the 5 year old Johnny Joints and the bushings with Super Pro ones. Good to go!

We have a new podcast up! Don and I chat about club stuff and other BS we tend to talk about. Please give it a listen and give us a fair review. Thanks for listening Land Rover brethren! We appreciate your support and your support literally makes the difference between us continuing doing this or not. But we like doing it and we want to keep this small corner of the Land Rover going!

I am not making this trip, and am sort of the main representative for the opposite site of the wheeling spectrum compared to the overland guys, but I am still excited for this trip. Miles does, and continues to do, such an excellent job of planning this trip that I have little doubt that it will go off without a hitch. The overall planning from miles and the participants make it seem like it will be an epic and comfortable excursion across a fantastic swath of the north western americas. I look forward to hearing about it and hope some of you’s can join me on a podcast and tell us all about it!

Put in a new tank, pump, and sending unit. Got the buggy running and driving again. The kingpins need rebuilding before it can drive without the wheels nearly falling off. But this is progress. IMG_6201.mov

**********CANCELED *********** Now that the June MORG is in the books, time to move onto the July MORG. The July MORG will be the same trail run as last years Annual. We will running Bald Mountain near shaver Lake and this will be a rock crawling trip that can accommodate all Land Rovers, not just the built up ones with monster tires, lockers, and armor. But if you do happen to have those things, this trail can also provide plenty of challenges for you as well. The basic plan will be to find a place to disperse camp along Rock Creek Rd. There are plenty of spots that can accommodate large groups, so I don’t anticipate any issues with just showing up and finding a spot. I will be showing up Friday, finding a spot, and leaving a marker at on Rock Creek Rd to make camp easy to find. I will post up a picture of said marker once I figure out what that will be. There was also some talk about a group BBQ, details to come on that. We will be running the trail Saturday with a departure time from camp of 9am sharp. Depending on who and how many are coming we may run two groups. There is an easy and a hard (not really that hard) side up Bald Mountain. If all the vehicles can handle the hard side, that’s what we will be doing. If some can’t, then we will also run a group on the easy side and meet at the top. The trail is fun and has a bunch of satisfying climbs and plenty of optional obstacles to play on. There are plenty of hotel rooms and private rentals in the area of camping isn’t preferred. Also plenty of hiking and lake recreation opportunities, so making a longer weekend and enjoying the surrounding area is definitely worth doing if you can swing it. Even additional rock crawling is worth considering as there are a bunch of trails nearby worth doing (Brewer Lake, Swamp Lake, Red Mountain area). Map photo is of where you want to turn from Dinkey Creek Rd to Rock Creek Rd. From there you’ll want to just look out for our marker. I will also try to find some cell service and give a better description of where we are at on Friday.

It was a great trip and great trail run. Thanks to everybody that made it. We had a good group of 8 run the trail. It was surprisingly not that wet aside from the actual raining, which conveniently started as we approached the hardest section of the trail. We were able to make amazing time with 2.5 hours each direction. We weren’t trying to rush or anything, just had an efficient group of well built vehicles and capable drivers. We were able to get off the trail well before 5 and make a pit stop at Uncle Toms Cabin before heading to camp. It was nice to relax and have beer at the iconic establishment and makes for a nice post trail ritual. And we still had plenty of time to tend to our camp needs before it was campfire time. The campground worked out fine for us. We had plenty of room. The campground was clean, well groomed, and pretty spaced out, so we were able to socialize at the fire well past curfew without disturbing any neighbors. The space also gave the dogs (and cat) the ability to have a little space to roam before intruding on other camps. Being within a couple miles of Uncle Toms was also nice. It was pricey ($28 for a single, $56 double per night), but I’d stay there again. Carnage was at a minimum, and we were all able to drive off trail and back to camp and eventually to home sans tow trucks or major repairs. This is always one of my favorite trips and signals the start of the rock crawling season.

I am at Stumpy Meadows Campground now with Jeff. We have 4 sites locked down. We could use another couple tho. Right now there are a handful still available. We both came via 50 and Icehouse Road. Weather is warm. So whoever get here first (Mike Foster would be my guess) should go around the loop and try to get spot 31 which is just past Jeff’s D2. After that we should just get whatever is “OPEN” according to post tags in front of each site.

Btw, I believe there are a few campsites available for reservation on Saturday night only. There are none for Friday and Saturday.

Plan is to leave camp at 9am sharp. There’s a bit more plan and trail description in the original post, but basically I’d plan on meeting at the trailhead or staging area on the opposite side of the road at 9:45-10. Probably better than trying to catch us at camp unless you want to drop off stuff prior to the trail run. In which case I’d pay attention to a location update for camp tomorrow and try to show up at no later than 8:30. We will make sure to include your truck in our Saturday night camping plans.

So here is who we will be looking out for and trying to save spots for: Don - Friday Midday Sasha - Friday Midday Mike - Friday Midday Matthias - Friday evening Tyler +1 - Friday Evening Greg - Friday? Jeff +2 - Friday morning Eric - Friday morning Nick - Saturday morning Robert - Saturday morning total cars - 13 if you’re not on this list, then you haven’t stated your plans and we won’t be looking for you. We will be looking to find accommodations for this precise amount of people. 6 campground spots should work or a fairly large dispersed camping area. So if you’re coming, I would suggest stating your plans on the forum. Non club chat groups won’t suffice. I’ll update this post as plans are added. And make sure to look out for updates on Friday. I should be able to update this thread when I’m up there and hopefully clarify exactly where we are camping. And if some unexpected obstacle pops is that prevents you from making the trip, please update your status with a post on this thread. Then we can call off the search party.

Last year on my home from Rovicon 4, I got misfire on the highway just past Sac. Only last a handful of seconds and didn’t happen again on the way home. I also got it on the way to the Annual, but didn’t experience on trail or on the way home. Didn’t get it any other time until I started the D2 up over the weekend to make sure it ready for this weekend. Since Hell Hole will be hard enough this weekend without engine issues I decided to do a tune up. So I gave myself a short work day yesterday and today to do it. I replaced the the coils, injectors, plugs, and wires. I also installed a coil relocation kit while I had everything torn apart. The job took a while and was kind of a pain in the ass due to lack of room. Removing the secondary air system would have made it a lot easier to get around, but I didn’t want to mess around with that this week. Everything is up and running again. Fingers crossed I don’t get a misfire anymore. I’m pretty sure it was due to the spark plugs. IMG_3254.mov

There is one sure way of guaranteeing the cards get done in time…

Small update to my plans. Merlyn will not be joining me on this trip. That means I don’t have to wait until she finishes her dialysis, which was my reason for a 10am departure. My new plan is to leave the bay around 6am and make it to Stumpy around 10:30-11 spending on traffic. I will be meeting fellow member Jeff Blake there. He has Star Link, so we will be able to update the forum on how our plans are working out. So if we are forced to improvise and camp somewhere else, be it dispersed or another FS Camp, we should be able to inform most folks ahead of time. Plus getting to Stumpy early ensures us the best chance at getting a decent spot. So like Greg said, let’s get a roll call and include your plans. That way we can best plan for a successful trip for everybody

Comfortable clothes/shoes and breathable underwear 😉👌🏼

They’re no dispersed camping near the trail we can count on or fit more a couple trucks at. The reality is that Stumpy Meadows is not really much farther drive time wise than our usual campsite at Lewis Campground. If it was a small group arriving in the area at the same time, then finding something closer may be an option, but we need something we can pin down and have a couple handful of vehicles arrive at at various times. Stumpy Meadows is the best option as I see it.

I have decided to stick with the general plan to run the trail. It’s a fun trail that I can’t easily fit in at another time. Plus other options have the same issues for the most part. The only change will be our camping plans. This will require a little improvisation as most campgrounds in the area are closed, and the open have no available reservations. So we will relying on the large number of “first come, first serve” sites available in the area. Here are the options in order: 1: Stumpy Meadows Campground off Wentworth Springs Road 2: Union Valley Reservoir, they have many campgrounds. 3: dispersed camping along the way. I know some for sure spots we can use in a pinch. I don’t anticipate getting skunked on a campsite. But it will mean that an earlier start Friday will be preferred. I am planning on leaving the Bay Area around 10 and arriving at Stumpy’s around 2-3 Post up with your plans so we can coordinate potential caravans and also know to look out for you. More vehicles coming on Friday the better chance of us snagging enough camping sites to accommodate everybody comfortably. Saturday folks can meet us at the trail’s staging area per the original plan. Any early birds who would like to stop by camp before heading to trail will have to hope we can post up where we are onto the forum Friday, catch us on the radio (146.460), or just get lucky and find us at Stumpy Meadows Campground on your way in. please feel free to DM me or call/ text me (408)772-8534 with any specific questions. This new plan should work out fine. Don’t let a little uncertainty get you down, this sort of thing usually makes for a more interesting trip and sometimes forces you to find a new gem of a spot that you otherwise would never have known about. So I hope we don’t lose too many folks due to these circumstances

Looks like the campsite will No be open for our trip. I’ll update th plan tonight

Golden Pines is near Bear Valley in Arnold. It’s the same place we had the 2019 Annual. heres a link: https://www.goldenpinesresort.com/

Finally out in some work on the Buggy Classic. Fixed the 3 transmission leaks it had. The dip stick and the plug were quick and easy. The shifter seal was a major pain. Getting out the old seal took hours due to the frame rail getting in the way and prevented me from using the special shifter seal removal tool. But after a while, it got done. Also got rid of the old shifter and installed a Sidewinder. The old shifter was stock, and it has a Turbo 350 transmission in it. The old shifter wasn’t the right throw and it wasn’t engaging in Park properly.

Watching the classic movie “Ronin” tonight. Spotted a classic. Didn’t get to participate in the car chases, but still…

Yeah, but no need to address it yet. We will see how it plays out