Ed. Note:Due to the number of pictures on this page,
I created thumbnails for them. To see the full size picture, just click on the
thumbnail.
Hi guys,
I know a few of you have tried to email me in the last few days and were
probably wondering why you haven't heard back from me. Well...I just got back
from a trip to the desert areas near Death Valley with a few friends of mine.
Don't worry, I'll reply to the messages later tonight. First, I wanted to start
telling you guys about the trip!
After taking the day off on Wednesday to take care of some last minute
preparations on the '81 Cherokee, like an oil change and tire rebalancing (Boy,
does it run smooth now!) and some shopping, on Thursday morning I met up with my
friends Scott (who rode shotgun with me) and Jim, Jim, and Doug (all riding in
Doug's '89 FSCB - that's "Full-Size Chevy Blazer") and we hightailed
it on out of Santa Barbara and headed east toward Death Valley.
We worked our way downcoast through Ventura and then east into Valencia. From
there we made our way through Mojave and then over to the Panamint Valley and
the "beautiful" chemical processing town of Trona. Trona is situated
on the banks of Searle "Lake" which is really a dry lake bed and there
are at least 3 chemical processing plants extracting various chemicals from the
lake bed remains and the output of local mining operations. We gassed up in
Trona and then made our way to the ghost town of Ballarat. They had an
interesting sign outside of Ballarat that talked about the last resident, a guy
named "Seldom Seen Slim". The sign also mentioned that the 1908 New
York to Paris auto race winner, a Thomas Flyer, had stopped in Ballarat during
the race.
This is were the pavement ended. We then headed south through the Panamint
Valley towards the "road" heading east into Death Valley National Park
called Goler Wash. Luckily, the road south of Ballarat was still being used by a
mining operation and so the it had been recently oiled which cut down on the
washboarding a lot! Just past the entrance to the active mine site, the road
wasn't oiled and the "Washboard from Hell" began. We're talking 3-4
miles of the worst washboard I've ever seen. Since Doug was leading the way,
Scott and I dropped back a little bit and tried to find a low speed that would
make the washboard somewhat bearable. Wasn't gonna happen. Remembering the Baja
"5 or 50 mph" rule I sped up to around 30-35 mph and started to float
across the top of the ridges. Not a whole lot smoother, but a little more
bearable. Made Scott and I feel like the little vibrating football game guys.
Floating across the tops of the washboard also makes the steering a bit
squirrely, too. After a little bit, we were coming up fast to the rear of Doug's
Blazer and had to slow down. This was not fun. As we slowed down, we managed to
go through a series of vibes that I thought was going to break loose every spot
weld in the body! I guess this was a washboard road's version of
"re-entry". The Jeep was to suffer the effects of this "vibration
testing" for the remainder of the trip (more later).
We finally made it to Goler Wash and stopped to have lunch at an abandoned
mine site. Crawled around through some of the old operations and generally had a
good time.
It now was time to make our way through some of the tougher parts of the road
and head toward our destination for the night, Butte Valley. Goler Wash winds it's way east through a narrow canyon. A few miles up we came upon the only
really challenging portion of the road where Goler Wash lived up to it's name.
Out came the video camera and Doug and I took our turns at negotiating a narrow
wash section with some wet boulders. Doug went first in the Blazer and didn't
have much problem, although there was a fair amount of tire spinning and rock
kicking due to the wet rocks caused by the local spring draining down the middle
of the road. I went next in the Cherokee and happened to take a slightly more
difficult route (not on purpose, and Doug had kicked out a few of the loose
rocks that would have made it easier). A review of the video reveals the Big
Jeep getting air under the driver's side front tire in one spot and the rear end
compressing over a big drop and coming within an inch of the bottoming on the
bumper. I sure am glad I had the extra 3" of lift! One of the Jims was
shouting "showoff" and commenting on the fact that I intentionally did
it the hard way. I just replied that there is no hard way for an FSJ!
Just after this section, we worked our way up the wash some more and came
across another abandoned mining operation. This one didn't look that old and
featured...get this...an abandoned Wide Track Cherokee Chief!! It looked to be
about a '74 or '75 and had last been registered in '80. It was orange, had a 360
and Quadratrac and was pretty much complete except someone had taken the Chief
emblems from the rear quarter panels and the radiator was gone. The body was
relatively rust free and didn't seem to have any damage. I guess I know where I
can find some Wide-Track fenders if I ever need them.
We made our way further up the wash and passed one of Charlie Manson's old
hideouts. We didn't stop to check that place out...too creepy. Eventually, we
came upon a sign, out in the middle of nowhere, that stated "Welcome to
Death Valley National Park". The road worked it's way through a pass called
Mengel Pass which is named after Joseph Mengel, an old miner who was buried
there in the 1940s. Mengel pass was the entry to our destination for the
evening, Butte Valley, which is named after a 700 ft. butte made of rock layers
tipped vertically that's called "Striped Butte"....Right at the pass
is the grave of Joseph Mengel. Apparently it's good luck if you add a rock to
the monument so we each added one...The extra luck came in handy later.
The other side of the pass led us into the Butte Valley. As we drove along,
we passed a couple old cabins that are available for people to stay in, but we
didn't stop. Our destination was a bit further along at a place called Anvil
Springs and a cabin known as the Geologist's Cabin. We were in luck, the cabin
was empty and we unpacked to stay the night.
Let me describe this cabin. It was approximately 10'x15' and the walls were
made of rocks. On one end was a fireplace built as a part of the wall.
Unbelievably, this place is immaculate! Apparently, some regular visitors have
taken it upon themselves to periodically add improvements and they have fixed it
up to the point that people who stay there feel obligated to leave it in a
better condition than when they found it. The place even had a flagpole and a
flag (properly folded) waiting on a shelf inside. The only furnishings were a
couple of chairs and a table with a CLEAN table cloth. There was even a sink
with a drain! People leave supplies and wood and books and magazines for the
next people visiting. Inside was a log book where people jot down their
impressions and experiences. There were even photocopies of some of the older
notebooks that went back 4 or 5 years. Just below the cabin was a running spring
which supplied water to the only tree in the valley, a large cottonwood. Looking
out the window of the cabin you saw an expansive view of the floor of the valley
and looked straight out at the feature the valley was named after, the
"Striped Butte". Overall, pretty cool.
Although I had been hearing some new squeaks and clunks up the whole Golar
Wash, I didn't bother to check over the Cherokee that night. It seemed that a
Gin and Tonic was more appealing than climbing under the rig. I figured it was
just some of the new suspension parts that needed to be retightened and would
take a look in the morning. We had a great view of the Hale-Bopp Comet that
night and basically marveled at the fact we actually would be sleeping indoors
with a fire that night. When bedtime came around we just rolled the sleeping
bags out on the concrete floor of the cabin and listend to the wind rattle the
rope on the flagpole.
The next morning, after breakfast, I went to look over all the suspension
parts on the Cherokee. Nothing was loose and I was kind of puzzled about where
the noises were coming from. One thing that HAD come loose was the charcoal
cannister which had been shaken right out of it's mounting hoop. Well...we went
out hiking around the cabin and checked out some of the mining digs right by the
cabin. This took all morning and we then headed back to the cabin for lunch.
After lunch, we fired up the rigs and drove over a small pass to a back canyon
called Wood Canyon which ended up in another mine site whose claim was still
being kept current and had an interesting collection of tin shacks and even had
a school bus. How they got that bus up that road boggles the mind! I still was
hearing the new squeaks but now it also sounded like the fan was hitting the
shroud every once in awhile...hmmm. Since I had done some work on the radiator
and shroud last week, I thought something had settled. So, back at the cabin I
loosened the mounting bolts and readjusted the shroud. We then cooked up dinner
and had another great night of shooting the bull and watching Hale-Bopp.
Saturday morning we awoke to another cool sunrise over the valley. I also
awoke to it being my birthday! After eating breakfast, we started cleaning up
the cabin to leave it in better shape than we had found it and a guy and his two
sons drives up and asks if we were planning on staying there that night. We told
him we were just leaving and it was all his. Looking through the log books the
night before, we came to realize that rarely does a night go by that the cabin
isn't occupied. Simply amazing. When we started up the Cherokee to leave, the
fan was making all kinds of noise hitting the shroud. This was really wierd.
Still thinking that it had something to do with the radiator work I had done, I
loosend the mounting bolts and shifted the shroud over so it wouldn't hit and we
finally left. After leaving the cabin, we drove the rigs over to the base of the
Striped Butte and planned our assault to the summit. After about 45 min., we had
climbed the 700 ft. to the top of the butte and found a sealed aluminum can that
had sheets of paper in it that people had left, another log book! The view of
the valley was incredible. Doug decided to try out his cell phone but didn't
think he'd get any service since he had tried it from the cabin with no luck.
Unbelievably, the cell phone worked and he gave a call home. It'll be
interesting to see what city is listed on the phone bill. After making our way
back down the Butte, we climbed back into the rigs and began traversing the
floor of the valley which led through a small pass that emptied into Death
Valley. I was still hearing the squeaks and stuff that seemed to be coming from
the suspension but thought I would take care of them once we got home.
The road out of the valley wasn't anywhere near as difficult as the way we
had come in and obviously had suffered a lot more traffic. In fact we passed a
group of Ford trucks that was working their way in. There were at least 3 built
up Broncos, a brand new Expedition, and a lone CJ-7 in the group. We checked out
a couple of talc mines on the way out, and one of them even had a hot spring fed
swimming pool! Boy, those miner's really had it rough.
We were about 5 miles from the paved road that goes throught the middle of
death valley when all of the sudden the fan starts hitting the shroud again...Arghhh.
Checking under the hood, I could see that the fan was within a 1/2 inch of the
lower radiator hose. A quick look at the driver's side engine mount showed that
the rubber section was being split apart! But why was the engine moving down and
to the left? A closer look showed that the engine mounting bracket attached to
the block was missing one of the three bolts, the other bolt on the bottom was
completely loose and was only being held in by the exhaust pipe, and the top
bolt was in the process of loosening up. AHA! That's why the engine was moving
down and the mount was being torn apart. Luckily the mount wasn't completely
separated. (I found out later that the engine mounting bracket was actually
broken). We got out the bottle jack and jacked the engine up so I could get the
remaining two bolts tightened back up and then found another bolt that would
take the place of the missing one. Once this was all back together and the jack
was removed, you couldn't even see that the motor mount was seperating and the
engine was being held in place.
Whew! We took it easy over the remaining washboard and the noises I had been
hearing all disappeared except for a slight squeaking over big bumps which I
think is the two halfs of the rubber mount (where it separated) rubbing
together. Once we hit the pavement, Scott and I decided to stay on the pavement
and try to make it home that night. So we said goodbye to the Jims and Doug
(they were going to camp out another night) and pointed the rig towards home.
About 6 hours later, the Cherokee was tucked safely into bed in the driveway and
I was feeling very lucky about catching the problem before the motor mount
completely gave way. I'm pretty sure the first bolt vibrated out over that
initial "Washboard from Hell" and the other two were slowly trying to
make their exit. Unbelievably, these bolts didn't have any lock washers on them.
I think I need to go over any thing that was touched during the engine
replacement that the previous owner paid for. Every problem I've had so far has
been related to this botched up job. Anyway, that was the trip...Hope I didn't
bore you.
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