Oregon Bushhackers Trip 24b Trip Report by: Gil Meacham Trip Date: 1/19/97 Trail Boss: Bill Lewey, Nichole Lewey (daughter), 1978 CJ5 Participants: Gil Meacham, Karen Brown (sister-in-law), Sharkey (wonder dog), 1993 YJ "Sharkey's Machine" Date Catton, 1994 Ford Ranger (1st timer) Guy Hammer, "Babe, the Blue Ox" 1987 Suzuki Brian ?, ? ?, 198? Suzuki Andy Marshal, Doug Carmen, Charles ?, Toylet (pronounced Toy-Lay) Land Cruiser Dave and Gil joined Bill at the Rickreal Light at 7:30am and proceeded to the Sand Lake store. A little later Guy showed up with Babe sporting a new set of 225x75x15 BFG MT's. The folks at the store are really great. When Dave needed a bracket for mounting his flag, the guy just pulled one off one of his flags for sale and dropped it on the floor. When we asked him "How much?" he said, "Well ya gotta pick it up". We thanked him, and went about mounting the flag. We moved on to the end of Derrick Road and aired down. 10-11 pounds was the order of the day(Pic or_24b_1.jpg). Babes new skins didn't even hardly bulge with the low pressure. We speculated that Guy may be able to run 0 pounds in them, like the Hummers and Super Swampers do! Then we went up a series of progressively tougher hills. Everyone made it up the first one with no sweat. Bill made it up the second one with a little wheel spin going over the top. Guy took one shot at crawling. He got about halfway up, and had to retreat and hit again on less steep with more speed. He was successful. Gil gave it 3 shots at the steeper spot where Bill made it, and kept losing momentum right at the crest. He resigned to the less steep and made it. Dave hit it hard, dented his plate, threw wet sand up all over the top of the hood, and made it about 3/4 of the way up a steeper section. He also had to resign to the less steep section. At this point, Bill was king of the dunes. The next hill was a monster. It had at least 100 feet of vertical with a steep crown and big enough whoop tee doos at the bottom to preclude a fast approach. Nobody cared to give it a try, so we took the bypass road through the trees around it. A few hundred yards further, we came to the largest bowl, with a lake at the bottom of it. Several ATV's were flying up the steep sides of the bowl and grabbing huge air off the crest. Andy and Brian met us here(Pic or_24b_2.jpg). They had driven in from the Sand Lakes campgound entrance (south of the end of Derrick road. Brent's Suzuki was only putting power to the rear wheels, but the combination of light weight, good sand tires, and good suspension made it quite capable on the sand, Someone commented that it was close to an ATV anyway. We parked for pictures and such, and Guy demonstrated his crawl ratio by putting Babe in 1st Low and getting out to walk along side. We found a nice spot northeast of the big bowl with the lake and everybody flew up the sides of the dune with relatively little problem. At one point, Brian dug himself into a hole, and Guy pulled him out. We joked with Guy that he usually does not mess around towing such lightweight stuff. (The last two recoveries that Guy did with Babe were Toyota trucks!) >From here, we went to the spot where Doug stuck the Burb last year. We parked in a small clearing at the top of the trail he had to be winched up. It was a tiny little road specifically built for ATV's! It was hard to imagine the monster Burb being down on this trail that was barely 8 foot at it's widest. >From that point, we moved to the beach, and ran north up the beach until it comes to an end where the cliffs come down to the water. Everyone was taking their own routes, and when we all congregated, Andy had found a log that served as a Flintstone's version of the ramp. Andy demonstrated the great articulation by pulling all the way onto the log until his front tire was up on the widest part of the log (about 30"). (Pic or_24b_3.jpg) His back tires were still on the ground. After he pulled down off the log, Guy pulled Babe up on it and got about 3/4 of the way up on it before losing traction. After that, Bill tried it and got about a foot short of where Andy reached(or_24b_4.jpg). Then Bill pulled back down, and climbed up on top of the log sideways(or_24b_5.jpg). After contemplating whether he could turn right and make it down to the end of the log, Bill prudently backed down the way he came up. Then we all wound our way around the dunes and paralleled our way up the small creek a few hundred yards. After crossing the creek a few times, we played some more on the sand hills at the southwest end of the dunes. Everyone was taking their own routes in the dunes. At one point, Bill was coming up a narrow chute between two dunes and stopped to allow Dave to cross in front of him. A few attempts and a smoking clutch later, Bill decided to go back down to the bottom and give it some more speed. Gil, Bill, and Dave met down by the creek, and decided to break for lunch. About that time, Andy called on the CB and said he needed some help. He had been traversing an off camber stretch, and slipped too close to a major drop off at the edge of the dunes. No one could get close enough to him to pull him out without getting stuck themselves. Fortunately, Bill had the winch, so the cable was pulled out most of the way, and Andy was inched slowly up the hill(or_24b_6.jpg)(or_24b_7.jpg). It appears that "Jeep-eater" was being saved by his meal this time! We wend back to the dune northwest of the big bowl with the lake and played a little more. After stopping in the middle of a steep downhill for comic effect, Gil noticed steam coming from the hood of the YJ. Closer inspection revealed a split heater hose. After shortening the hose and putting in a couple of bottles of yuppy filtered water ($1/quart!), we were underway again. We worked our way back to the steep hill that we had bypassed. Andy moved over to the right side of the dune. On it's right side, the dune was actually a little steeper at the crown, but the approach was smoother. This allowed Andy to hit the bottom with a pretty good head of steam and he made it up to the start of the crown before stopping. After a couple of more shots with increasing speed, he made it over! Bill was dethroned and Andy was the king of the dunes. At this point, Andy and Brent took off. The rest of the group moved to the dunes east of the end of Derrick road. We drove around in circles there for a few minutes, and then drove the long way back to the Southeast entrance. We drove out to the Sand Lake store, and aired up for the drive home. The day had been a typical Oregon winter day at the beach. A little drizzly but warm and good company. We had spent from 9:30AM to 2:30PM out on the dunes.