Another great year in the dunes. Fun people, good rig watching and of course adventure. The Adventure Award goes to Seanz0rz.
Thanks to all that went into it, those that helped and those that attended. Also to the sponsors, Savage Offroad, Warn, Adventure Medical Kits, Overland Journal, Run Cool, Splash Cafe, Spunsor.com and Ultimate Yota.
I showed up on Friday to a somewhat small and dispersed camp. The 120 guys were down the beach some and at the main camp, Green Camp was in a different corner than I'm used to. Rigs trickled in throughout the afternoon with the normal stucks and good people watching.
After dinner and after the sun went down Sean, JC and myself decided to go out on a quick night run. Just a little something before getting a good nights rest. Needless to say we did have a short run but a three hour or so recovery.
Beginning of the night run:
End of the night run:
You can see the tire tracks up at the top of the light. Then the dark glass pieces a little way down. She came to rest near the middle of all the foot prints.
Flipping the truck back on it's wheels was the easiest part. Upon flipping the rear drivers tire lost the rest of it's air and the front drivers tire had a bead off the rim. We tried jacking, airing, pulling, pushing, digging and sweating to move the beast with little results. Pismo and camp is always alive and hopping so I made a way point on the GPS of the wreck and returned to camp to get some back up. I had visions of returning with at least 10 trucks, spots lights, winches and cheering but camp was a ghost town.
There were two guys still awake but they were folding up their chairs and heading to bed. It was about 1:15am at that point and I stared at a smoldering camp fire thinking CRAP. I walked over to Lance's trailer and thought for a moment before knocking. Inside was his 18 month old son and wife. I was certain the knocking would wake everyone and at that hour Lance would have visions of some drunk guy looking for a place to crash. I knocked lightly and whispered Lance. I think he likes dreaming while hearing his name whispered because it took about 10 minutes before he came to the door. I was just glad he was dressed and I didn't hear a shotgun being racked while on his stoop.
I gave him the news and he packed some stuff and we went out. I must say, he saved the day. It still took some time but his 100 series moved Sean's truck where the 3rd gens had zero luck. The truck would not roll, but rather pushed sand. The only way out of the bowl was to drag the carcass up hill and Lance was able to do it. At the top we had to double stuff Sean's receiver and have two rigs pull. In the end we moved him a little too far but not after some sand rooster tails.
At the top we went to reseating beads. We were having tough luck before Lance and even with him and his CO2 we had to do a lot of jacking, digging and strapping.
Uncle Lance to the rescue.
Waiting for that pop when a bead seats. The tank was pumping CO2 but no pop. I snapped a pic and ducked for cover. Sean and Lance wanted a front row seat to the action.
Lance had the beef to pull Sean to camp and did so like a champ. Pulling a heavy rig through the soft night time sand is a chore and we got to camp with zero issues. Bed time was 3am.