Date:         Mon, 29 Jul 1996 22:46:26 -0700
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         busgirl@netcom.com (Martha)
Subject:      disastrous reconnaissance mission!


Last week, Bradley Prunehead and I set out on a one-day
reconnaissance mission to scope out future potential campsites for forthcoming CCC events near the Bay Area.  Apparently our VW karma
was way out of whack; read on.

Our goal was to check out a few recommended sites in the area south
of the San Francisco bay area, down toward the Monterey/Carmel area.
We left mid-morning - ample time for the 300+ mile round trip at
a leisurely pace.  We figured on getting back to the bay area by
around 10:30 p.m. comfortably.

We checked out Henry Coe park, then headed south to San Juan
Bautista in search of the road to Fremont Peak.  Just inside
the city limits, my '81 westy starting making a horrible sound.
Bradley got out, listened while I drove in slow circles around
him, and decided the noise was coming not from the engine (as I
always fear since I assume the worst), but rather either perhaps
the CV joints or the brakes/wheels.  

The day was a scorcher, dry, and dusty in the farmlands, so we
sought some shade and pavement on which to check under the car.
The only nearby possibility was the side of a service station.
Bradley jacked up the car, removed the wheel, and I pretended
to "help" by trying to make artificial shade over him with a small
umbrella.  

I digress here as I must explain that I normally carry quite an
assortment of tools with me in the car, but they (with several
other things) were unfortunately stolen from my van about a month
or so ago.  Bradley normally carries enough tools to fix ANYTHING,
but he'd recently left a good portion of them in my home garage.
Upon getting ready for this scouting trip, I thought at the last
minute that I had better grab them, checked on my workbench,
but then saw that all the tools he'd left there were intermingled
with my chaotic piles of wrenches, etc., and decided to just
grab his tool bag (which was about 1/4 full, and looked to
contain at least a screw-driver, and a few wrenches), rather than 
try and at that moment decipher who's tools were who's.  Besides, 
I reasoned my car was in good shape, and we weren't likely to 
encounter any problems which would put us in a position of needing 
tools, after all, right?

At any rate, as luck would have it, nearly every tool we really
needed and could have made use of to solve this sound in the
wheel/brake area were of course all lying on my workbench at
home.  Bradley, mechanical genius that he is, made do really
quite impressively with what we had, but lacking the proper
instruments, couldn't get the wheel off. It sort of just looked
rusted in place.  :(  The local proprietor or employee of the
service station where we'd parked soon appeared, angry that we
might cause him some liability if our van were to, say, suddenly
drop off the jack, and land on Bradley.  Bradley offered to finish
up and get out of there if he would just give us 30 minutes, but
he insisted we had to move immediately, which we did.  Two
blocks later, we suddenly found ourselves on the road to Fremont
Peak, so Bradley made a judgement call that since this sound was
not an engine one, we could probably go up the mountain, come
down, and then look for a small VW repair shop after.  We indeed
did find the site, and came back down, but in the meantime, the sound
had lessened somewhat, so we decided to keep going.  Bradley figured
out that lifting the e-brake just to the first notch mitigated the
sound enough without hurting anything else, so that we could probably
manage to limp along.  Soon thereafter, we released the e-brake
entirely, and the sound had disappeared, so we decided not to look
for the VW shop until/unless the sound returned.  

Earlier in the trip, I had been commenting to Bradley that my
auxiliary batteries mysteriously were losing their charge, almost
immediately after stopping.  My ignition batter has always been fine,
but going out into the wilderness, I never feel comfortable without
a good strong second battery source, just in case.  I didn't think
much about this for this trip, though, because I figured we'd not
run into any problems.  For that same reason, I also didn't empty
the bit of stale water in my water tank and replace it with at
least half a tank of fresh, as I normally do when going camping.  Also,
the day was hot, and as our mission was less than 24 hours, we were
both dressed only in clothes for hot summer:  t-shirts, shorts-type,
etc.  And I wasn't carrying much of anything extra in the westy, since
the trip was only for the day.  I'd packed sandwiches and a few drinks,
and we kept consuming those, so as not to have to stop.

As the car seemed now to be working well, we decided to proceed deep
into the Ventana Wilderness, which is a forest inland, east of Big
Sur, but not accessible from Big Sur.  One goes around the north
side of the wilderness, and then in on a remote dirt road to climb
a mountain to an elevation of 5,000 feet.  The road is serious dirt,
about 14 miles long, and nary a soul.  We trekked up, spewing dust,
and found in fact two very nice potential campsites which we thought
would suit the group fine in fall or spring, but not at present, as
we were being eaten alive suddenly by mosquitoes.  My accessory-laden
air-cooled car got a lot hotter on this climb that I would have liked,
but we were pulling steep hills to ascend, and it was mighty hot 
outside.  

All the while, I kept thinking what a great place this was for 
camping, but what a horrible, unfriendly location it would be if
one got stuck there.  These damned bugs, the heat, the dirt/dust,
no water, no cell-phone service, no phones, no civilization of
any kind, no one on the CB, and no cars encountered for at least
an hour.  It was getting dark by the time we got to the last
campsite.  We parked to check out the place, then Bradley suddenly
noticed that I had a flat right rear tire  Visions went thru my
head about "gosh, I hope my spare has air in it."  Once again, poor 
Bradley was out in the heat, on the dirt, jacking up my car.  He
expertly put on the spare and we were in luck that it performed
fine.  After looping around the campsite to get a last glimpse,
we proceeded in the dark, back up toward the summit about 2 miles
back, Bradley at the wheel.

Suddenly the van lost power, then wouldn't go at all.  Bradley
checked a number of electrical and other connections in the
engine and couldn't find anything amiss.  This worried me, because 
Bradley really knows these cars in and out, and I began to fear
that the lack of something obvious amiss, meant that something
was quite serious, and hidden.  And of course, with no tools, and
our location, the reality of our potential plight set in.  After
much wiggling and inspecting and testing (for spark, etc.), Bradley
decided that we should coast back down the hill, but up close to
the mountain on our side, so that IFJan oncoming car should appear,
they might have a chance of getting by us on the narrow one-lane
road.  Also, since the brakes and e-brake were barely holding, we 
wanted to be aiming at a safer angle.  We misjudged the angle a
bit, and touched the back bumper and side to the side of the
mountain.  And of course the car was pointed going up hill, and
now the rear hatch "caught" on the rocks, so that we couldn't
lift it to access the engine hatch any longer.  

Looking bleaker and bleaker, I tried the CB and the cell-phone,
all to no avail.  We realized we'd be hiking 14 miles out of there
(in casual clothes and flimsy shoes with no water or supplies),
and/or that temps at 5K feet during the night might suddenly drop.
We figured we'd "wait" for a bit and see if anyone came along.
After what seemed like an eternity, someone did, and of course
they could not get around us.  I should point out that had we
not been stuck on an incline, between the two of us, one of us
could have pushed the van while the other steered, but confined
to the incline we were on, that was not possible.  Fortunately
in this car which came along, there were two people; they took
pity on us, and between the 4 of us, we were able to push the car
up hill just enough to make room for their small car to squeeze
by.  They promised to make phone calls for us, including one
to the AAA.  We suddenly wondered IFJthe AAA would come up
this remote dirt trail in the wilderness, but then Bradley
noticed that thisJroad was on the AAA map, and suggested the
people helping us mention this to the AAA if they got any flack.
We did a few mental exercises, thinking how long it might be until
the two got to a phone, how long it would take to dispatch a tow
truck to this location, and decided we'd be there for at least
1.5-3 more hours, if help came at all.  

After about an hour of waiting, Bradley went back to wire jiggling,
now that the engine hatch could be accessed.  Something must have
suddenly dawned on him as a possibility, and I heard a delirious cry
of happiness as he announced that he thought he'd found the 
problem - a stuck air-flow meter!  It had frozen itself into
mid position somehow, and once he set it free, we could start!  He
warned that it might stick again, but at least we knew the 
temporary fix and could now proceed.  

At this point, we were just waiting for the next thing to go
wrong.  Another flat tire, perhaps?  More problems from the
awful wratcheting sound of the brakes/wheel?  This time, luck
was on our side, and we made it out of the wilderness, down to
a phone, just in time, apparently, to stop the AAA truck, which,
according to the dispatch lady, was almost to us.  Phew.

To make a long story short, we finally made it back to the bay
area, about 3 or 4 hours later than expected, but thank goodness
alive and well.  I credit Bradley with saving not only the car
but perhaps also our lives up there.  There's no substitute for
traveling prepared with supplies and tools just in case, and I
learned my lesson.  There's also nothing like having an
encyclopedic-type mechanic brain and knowing these cars like
the back of your hand.  I'm in awe and jealous of mechanical
prowess such as I was privileged to witness time and time again
on this day, and If I'd been up there alone, well...I
probably wouldn't be here to write this.  

And as for those 2 kind strangers who took pity on us and gave 
us their last food, I will never forget.  Part of me 
thought maybe we'd die up there on this ridge; the other part
was profusely thankful for the goodness and generosity of
this wonderful couple, and if they one day ever read this
trip report (I was in such a state of upset that I neglected
to get their phone or any way to contact them), I hope fate
will decree that our paths cross again sometime - so that
I can repay that favor.  :)  

/martha