Brown Camp, Tillamook State Forest Bill Lewey (78 CJ5) Roger Christal (96 Wrangler) Dave Taylor (95 Wrangler) Doug Carman (The Burb) We met at 8:30 at the gravel pit on Hwy 6 near Rogers Camp. Although I stated the Falls wayside it was actually a ways past Rogers Camp. I won't make that mistake again. Heading out on University Falls Rd we ride the power lines and drive right past the mud hole George was stuck in. Our first obstacle was the first hill on this trail. It was deeply rutted. Because of my 31 inch tires I chose to straddle the deepest rut. But I slip into the rut plus the right side is up on the bank so now my tilt-o-meter is pegged past 40 degrees and my right front is up in the air. Just short of going onto my side I gingerly back up and try again but this time staying in the ruts. No problem, this clay is not as slick as it looked. Soon we are headed down hill. The ruts are deep and my axles are dragging pretty good. Good thing we are 20 degrees or so downhill. I know I could not make it back up this thing. Crossing the road we continue down the trail. The first formidable obstacle was a washout about 8ft across and 4ft deep. I am last at this point and I can barely make out the Wranglers going down slow and coming up fast but I can't see what's happening. The Burb goes up to it and stops so I get out to see what this is all about. After watching the Suburban make a few attempts Doug is just not making it mostly because of approach angle. Roger hooks the winch up and Dave hooks his Wrangler to Rogers for extra support on the hill. After I hit front and back again because of approach angle and give a little gas we are off again. Next stop is down Cable where the big washout is. Gordon and the Brush-Busters did a great job of building a trail around this one. Looking at the wrong end of a one-way only trail we head back out and look for the next trail which turns out to be Firebreak. As we start the climb the fun factor going up due to the big rocks loosely strewn about. This hill taught me a couple of lessons this day. 1. Ask for spotters when clearance is questionable. 2. Check out damage more thoroughly before making assessments and cutting a good day of wheeling short. 3. Don't leave wires and tags attached to brake lines. 4. Check for wear on brake lines occasionally. Getting into the thick of the rocks I need my brakes and gas to compensate for not having a granny gear (3spd only). Suddenly after popping out a rock the brakes go to the floor. Insert expletives and colourful metaphors here. OK after some settling down I figure out that I still have a little bit of brake and using that and reverse I graciously scrape over rocks until I am turned around. That was pretty stupid since I could have broken more than just the brakes. After going over the obvious spots looking for that ripped brake line I find nothing. But the right rear tire is covered with fluid on the inboard side. Making a guess that I somehow blew a slave cylinder I decide to head home. Here is where I leave off to let the other guys continue the report. But first I must say that the mysterious leak was not from the slave cylinder but indeed from the flexible rubber line that goes from the frame to the wheel. It turns out that a tag attached to the line with a wire had finally worn a thin area on the hose. When I was stomping on brakes a hole would open up and squirt fluid all over the tire then close up clean as a whistle. I didn't even notice it until I removed the tire and noticed nothing in the drum. That could have been fixed as Roger said with a cut, fold and tie wrap jury-rig. And to top off the good times some kid side swiped our Grand Cherokee Monday. Bill Lewey blewey@cv.hp.com Part 2--by Roger Christal Well, I think Bill got most of the really interesting stuff that occurred on this trip. After Bill took off, we continued up Firebreak 5. Doug couldn't get up the section Bill was working when he lost his brakes, so he detoured back to the road. Co- pilot Mike Millen spotted for me through the tougher section. I went on up the road to check out the rest of the trail. Dave got a little wedged and couldn't continue forward or backward, so I came back and winched him up about 5 feet so he could continue. We got back to the main road (C-Line I think), found Doug and continued up Firebreak 5. After a couple miles, we arrived at the base of the gated road that led up to the top of South Saddle Moutain. It was about lunch time, so we took a break. For awhile, we sort of wandered around aimlessly until we came to a familiar looking trail. Can't remember the name of it, but those who were on the run last July will remember the place where we ended up at the top of a small peak and met the USFS Ranger the first time. I remembered the road we came up that hill and decided to try going back down. It sure looked different this time - much steeper and narrower than I remembered. We decided it might be better to take an alternate route down the hill. We eventually ended up at South Fork Camp. A sort distance down the road, we decided to try the power line trail. The first obstacle was a narrow washout in the road. Crossing it got everyone's wheels tetter-tottering about 2 feet in the air. The next small problem was a deep trench, between 12 and 18 inches across. The banks were just topsoil and looked a little mushy. I was volunteered to cross first. With Mike spotting, it was actually quite simple. Dave followed in his Wrangler without incident. The heavier 'Burb widened the gap when it came through, but made it quite safely. Well, that's about all the really fun stuff to write about. I don't think we did anything new from the last trip, other than doing some of the trails in a different direction. There must be many more areas that could be explored. We should plan to take another "expedition in force" there within the next three months. No, I'm not volunteering to lead it, but I certainly would attend! Roger Christal