The weekend really starts Friday night as most of the wheelers arrive at Walker Island Family Campground. We must be making a good impression up there, as they remembered each of us by name as we arrived and checked in. It was nice. By dark on Friday night we had me in the Barkmobile, with Bark the Jeep-dog, of course, with Mark Silverback in Snow-white, Bob Scoutmaster in his newly constructed as-yet-to-be-named Scout-Willys hybrid, “Thrasher” Rob in his beefy XJ, Rocky Bulldog, with Angie and Kaiser-pup in Big Red One, and rolling in for a real treat was last but not least, Ted the Fed with Lucy-dawg in his back seat. We sat around searing meat over the flames of the little grills, swilling beer and bull-sh—ing until about midnight when we all rolled off to get some sleep for the next day.
The weather was spectacular. Warm enough to sweat but not to suck you dry, we headed down into Chester proper for breakfast at Carm’s. Saturday morning we were joined by Mikey B. in e-Bay and Trevor the Fan-man in his CJ (we’ll call the Fan-dancer for now), making it a total of eight trucks for Beacon. I haven’t been with the club all that long, 5 years, and I can remember this as a run where we’d have 15 trucks up in Massachusetts. Again the question goes out, “Where is everybody?” The trail opens up right away with an obstacle I like to call the Sifter, because if this one seems extreme to you, you should just turn around and go home. It is a rock ledge that extends about ¾’s of the way across the trail from right to left, with a bank of dirt on the left side creating a sort of ditch to straddle as you work up over the ledge. Here I felt my newly installed Detroit locker up front (replaced my Ox-lock after damaging the control cable a second time) work the way it’s supposed to, and I love it.
From here on the trail climbs pretty steeply past the next set of obstacles and up to the turn-off to the Waterfall where the grade eases a bit until you get up to the Pinnacle. Just up from the Sifter the trail climbs, curves to the left and then hard to the right, which is the beginning of the series of ledges we call “Mess-your-pants.” There is a bypass of this obstacle that swings to the left around the ledges, but I had decided I was going over these this time. I think only one truck took the bypass going up; it was different later, coming back down.
The first of these ledges emerges out of a steep dirt bank on the right side of the trail, getting steeper and higher as you go right to left. The safe line here is to hug the bank on the right and as your rear climbs the ledge cut over to the left to be in position to approach the next ledge, which you really have to come at from the left on an angle. As you clear this you have to come back to the left to climb the last ledge, from which the name Mess-your-pants has derived. Here the trick is to stay waaay over to the left, with your driver’s-side wheels up on the dirt bank. In past years this dirt bank was much higher, and there was a dirt bank just above the ledge which required some puckery off-camber moments that could crush walnuts, if you know what I mean. However, partially to my relief and partially to my disappointment these dirt banks had eroded somewhat in the last year, making this obstacle a tad less scary than in years past. Going up, anyway. The last ledge did still have the hole at its base which, if you tried to back down once starting up would trap your right rear, inviting a roll to the right. No one rolled here, on the way up, but ominous baroque organ music should swell up now indicating foreshadowing of some sinister moment ahead . . .
We all came up past Mess-your-pants. Silverback got himself a little more vertical than he felt comfortable with and threw on a winch cable for the last three inches of the last ledge. We rolled up past the turn-off to the Waterfall and on up to the Pinnacle. I decided straight out to go up the bypass. The bypass has been excavated and eroded to a ditch filled with loose rock and forest debris. Tough to get traction but no problem until you get about ¾’s of the way up, where a rock ledge lies across the trail. It seemed to almost have a ramp to it on the left side so that’s the way I went. I still have a lot to learn, and really should have just climbed straight up over it, like the Bronco who came up the trail a little later did without too much difficulty. Anyway, I got hung up and ended up pulling cable to get over it, just a little boost was all I needed.
This put me up at the top of the Pinnacle. When everyone else heard that I winched up the bypass they decided to try the Pinnacle; they’d be winching anyway. Amazing how a trail changes from year to year. I remembered the Pinnacle as a ledge with a few big jags of rock jutting out of it at the top of a steep loose-rocked approach, requiring a left turn into it with little room to back up and try again due to a 20 foot drop off to the right as you come up. There wasn’t much ledge left, and the Pinnacle had eroded into a barrier of jutting rocks like dragon’s teeth. The area just above the ledge had eroded away into a shallow depression rather than a flat plateau leading up to the next ledge at the very top. Here, to the left had eroded into a rocky incline and easily driven. To the right was a steep ledge about 30” to 40” in height, uneven at the top and hemmed in by trees to the right of the base. If I am not mistaken in my memory, not one of us made it up over the Pinnacle without winching. Bulldog gave us the first real thrill of the day by bouncing up the second step, landing way over to his left, wavering way up on both left wheels with everyone frozen in expectation of the final slam down onto his left side, before crashing back onto all four wheels. This time.
We had lunch up at the top. Mikey B. had to do a repair on e-Jay; he’d overextended the front drive-shaft trying to climb the Pinnacle and had to put it back together. As we had lunch two Broncos came up the trail behind us, one drove up the bypass (to my chagrin) and the other ended up winching over the Pinnacle. We decided to bag the trail to the tower at the top of the mountain and roll on back down, maybe try to hit the swimming pool at Walker Island. I started down the bypass and thought, wrongly again, that the best line down over that ledge that had hung me up on the way up was to the right side. Well, my right front dropped into the hole that had grabbed my left rear on the way up and I hung precariously until Mikey B hooked his winch cable onto my rear to help me ease down over the ledge without testing the strength of my roof supports. The rest followed, to the left, without incident.
As we passed the turn-out to the Waterfall I pulled over and parked. My check engine light had come on, and I wasn’t going to try the Waterfall anyway, so for me it was nap-time. We ended up being there for nearly two hours. One reason was that even the lower parts of the obstacle were nigh on impassable. It seems it was a traction issue, every time a driver would try a line the rocks would just roll out from under his wheels. In addition, we came upon another ‘wheeler up there who’d broken an axle, but in such a way as to cause the differential to be jammed in place, making it impossible to remove the broken axle. We tried to help him for quite a while. It is remarkable how much time guys from our club have spent and will continue to spend, helping others on the trail. When it is one of us it is easy to understand. However, I have never seen our club walk away from anyone who is in need of help on the trails without making a serious concerted effort to help out. In this case, there really wasn’t anything anyone could do. Apparently, these guys were going to bring in an entire spare rear to swap in. There really was no option, without a helicopter.
While I was waiting the two Bronco guys came down the trail, showed me how to do a self-diagnostic on my XJ, and we pulled up a code for a bad O2 sensor, so I stopped worrying about the check engine light. Shortly after that, up the trail came Chris and Paul of Eastern 4-Wheelers; they’d been over to Ma Bell, run it in an hour and a half, and were looking for more thrills. We chatted for a few; our guys started rolling down from the Waterfall, so we parted ways, them up the hill, us down.
Coming down is always the fastest easiest part of the trail ride. He said. I was out in the lead on the way down. As I came over the top ledge of Mess-your-pants it was a little puckery, off-camber to the left, so I turned into it and eased on down. Behind me was Bulldog in BigRedOne, who I think of as one of our very best drivers, so I wasn’t really worried about him. As I rounded the curve just below Mess-your-pants the radio called out to stop. I picked up my FRS and asked what happened and the answer came back, “Bulldog rolled.”
I whipped around in my seat and, sure enough, 50 yards back up the trail sat BigRedOne on its left side, with Bulldog mashed against his driver’s door, Angie hanging over him from her seatbelt, and poor little Kaiser blinking open from his nap wondering why he was lying against the roll cage in the back instead of on the floor. After about 35 minutes of wrangling we got Bulldog righted again and here Angie proved her worth. I’ve seen trucks go over with wives and girlfriends in them; the responses can be amusing (for the casual spectator). F’rinstance, Ted the Fed’s Susan is scarce since Teddy plopped his TJ on its side. I’ve heard women scream in fear at the roll-overs (and near-roll-overs). Angie was pissed off all right. Only her main concern was that there would be so much damage that repairs would eat up funds needed to build up the Jeep she just bought for herself. As was mentioned to Johnny that evening, she’s definitely a keeper. We knew that before, but this just verified it. Angie; just one of the guys.
After Bulldog was righted several guys chose to take the bypass around Mess-your-pants to come down the mountain. We got kind of spread out here, I think people figured we were close to done; we were tired and eager now to get back to camp to clean up and start the fires. Scoutmaster Bob, who was at the tail, also had a problem coming down over Mess-your-pants, and with some help and counterweighting, managed to make it down. We rolled back to camp where we built a big fire-ring near the new pavilion at the top of the hill at Walker Island and proceeded with the feast. Mikey B had brought up a sack of cherrystone clams which they steamed in beer, along with the plethora of tubed meat and beef patties, beans, salads, lots of stuff. Bulldog did his usual thing with the blazing conflagration and we sat around the fire for quite a while. I wandered off around 1:00 am, leaving Mark Silverback, Bulldog and the Thrasher by the fire.
Sunday dawned, well, early. We didn’t get away from Carm’s until nearly 11:00 am. Overnight we lost Trevor and Ted, but gained Eric the Red in his red XJ. We managed to find the trailhead for Old Chester Road without any difficulty. Old Chester Road has changed over the last year. It is a much tougher trail than it used to be, and I would hesitate to call it a stock trail anymore. A stock vehicle could make it through if the driver were excellent; and a few tugs would definitely be needed. We worked our way down to Rock and a Hard Place, a short side-trail that is basically a jumble of boulders down a run-off gully, at which point e-Jay sprung a leak in its left front; cut side-wall. Mikey successfully plugged the sidewall and we decided to try Rock and a Hard Place before going to the bottom of Old Chester Road and turning around for the ride out. As it turns out only Bob went down RaHP (figure it out) in his new hybrid; after a team effort spotting him down, no one else wanted to try it. It has gotten truly extreme. It even took major effort and winching to climb out through the woods (the “easy” way out).
We decided to turn around here; it was already early afternoon. This put Eric the Red in the lead. As he came up on one of the tricky spots we met coming down he chose to try to squeeze between the right side of a big rock and a dirt bank that (used to have) a tree growing out of it. To the left of the rock was do-able, but required a moment of extreme off-camber, and I like to be spotted through there as well. As he passed the big rock on the right, the trail pushed his left side up, smacking his right side-view mirror into the bank, basically knocking it off his Jeep. As his rear passed over the same hump it threw his right rear quarter into the bank, actually into the tree growing out of the bank, denting the panel and smashing his rear right window. Although I had considered going to the right as well, after we cleaned the glass off the trail, I decided to go left, pivoting around the rock on my rocker panel (what’s left of it, that is). I rolled up and parked behind Eric, and heard a chopping sound further back down the road. That tree was being removed from the roadway, which made for a much easier passage.
What I didn’t know at the time is that before the roadway improvement was made,Thrasher, despite his protests, earned himself his first Bonehead Award by trying the same line that Eric the Red took (in an XJ as well) and did essentially the same damage to his Jeep as Eric the Red did. Despite seeing Eric do it, and despite warnings from those watching him that he would do that very damage should he try that line. Thrasher says he doesn’t deserve the Bonehead because he doesn’t care if he dents his Jeep; I say that remark alone is worth a Bonehead, but we’ll grant him only the one.
We were out by 3:00 pm, and headed back up to Walker Island. Scoutmaster, Thrasher and Eric the Red and his family remained for Sunday night, everyone else went on home. What a great weekend. Western Massachusetts never fails to deliver some great ‘wheeling, Walker Island is like a home away from home. I’m already planning on being there for the Willie Vasquez 2nd Annual Memorial Trailride next year. And remember, from your Poobah, to keep it paint up, rubber down.
