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redcagepatrol
05-05-2003, 07:59 AM
Cleaned out the room at home yesterday - found some notes from the trip. I typed them up for ya'll. It started off with Bill Higgs writing and then switched to Aimee writing it.

redcagepatrol
05-05-2003, 08:00 AM
here it is not in a document:

Transcripts from MOAB 2000.

From Bill Higgs:
3/10/00
Ann and I loaded the gear into the expedition, dropped Step off at the Wilson’s, and headed to A&M. Drove through monster lightening storm (tornado’s & hail but we didn’t get any). Saw a jackknifed 18 wheeler and a fender bender. Ann and I slept in Greg’s bunk beds – I slid around in his satin sheets (-:

3/11/00
Got up at 6:00 – Ann was cute in her pajamas. Loaded Greg’s stuff in the exped & moved trailer from the truck. Cold out! We linked up with the club at 7:00. Headed out and remembered front if stereo was in truck so called mom to catch up. Then out trailer went buck, wavering side to side so we stopped to move the Jeep forward and mom caught us. Good by and we were off again. Pulled over after 120 miles to get gas (getting 5mpg). Steve was leaking from the rear differential, had to disconnect drive shaft and tighten the seal. Also James cracked the tow bar on his rig but should last. Later we pulled the Jeep off the trailer that Steve was pulling and we all drove to Abilene to Troy’s parents. Beautiful day. Ate hot dogs and chili and fixed things.
- Welded tow bar
- Replaced spark plugs & wires on Steve’s truck
- Loaded the Jeep back on the trailer, had to lift it on.
Back on the road doing about 150 miles between gas stops. Had to stop to move Lissa’s Jeep forward on the trailer after it went buck. Lot of flat land by Lubbock. Troy had a tire blow out around 10:00 pm. Whipped out a floor jack and changed it in about 4 minutes. At the next gas stop checked a noise in Doug’s Ford Diesel and found a bolt had sheared off leaving the tensioner pulley hanging. So we switched the boat to another vehicle (red Ford ranger) and left the F250 Diesel in Santa Rosa. Ended up staying in Moriaity at a Super 8 at about 1:30am.
Fast facts:
- It is a long way to Albuquerque
- $1.60 gas hammers the wallet at 5 mpg
- vehicle tanks good for 150 miles, girl bladders good for 125
- Murphy’s Law is in play – the system will find the weak link and apply force to break it.

From Aimee (Troy’s girlfriend at the time)
We are in Gallop
12:00 Noon Texas time lunch at Arby’s. Its 12:45 we are waiting for Bobby to get back so we can head out.
I don’t see why everyone made fun of my Poloroidf camera, it does the job.
Doug is worried about getting to Moab on time.
1:00 we are off
2:00 Texas Time, we are passing Shiprock. Why is it called that? It doesn’t look like a ship. We also see snow on the tops of the mountains. Ask Doug what ht wants to call Shiprock. Doug: What are we doing at a gas station?
CB Talk
Local person: gotta be an Aggie field trip. You must be an Aggie if you pull a Jeep. Advice from local person: It’s better if you actually drive the Jeep.

2:55 Texas time:
4 corners monument cost $1.50 per person. We are going to try and get a group picture. Leaving the monument and getting on to 41. Doug decided to go ahead of the group but he forgot one thing – his boat. We have it, beside that; he doesn’t know where we are camping. I hope he find’s us, if not, we’ll see what happens.

5:55 Texas time:
We just left Wilson Arch which is just outside Moab. Troy got the Frisbee out and played a little bit. We took pictures and are about 30 miles from Moab. Yea!

We are in Moab. Everyone is pretty quiet right now. I think the road was a little scary coming in.
It is time to set up camp. The site is wonderful. The bathrooms are great and 3 picnic tables are under an awning. The view is pretty.
Lissa, Scott, Bill Higgs, and Greg did a great job cooking supper. We had sausage and tortilla’s and baked beans. It was nice to have real food. Amie had to help the boys make a real fire, it was cold. James was a grouch; he spent a lot of time making his Bronco ready for the trail.
I think Doug is going to have a hard time given to him about his “new” Bronco. A horn blows when you just rev the engine!

Monday. Its noon and we are on our first trail. Poison Spider Mesa. Trail damage 1st Bobby had his on the first obstacle. Ouch! But Bobby kills the 2nd obstacle.

James is having trouble at the end of Poison Spider Mesa. We end up turning around and going back before continuing on the next trail. We are trying to get back before the parts store closes. We have got some really good pictures and some of us even have sun burns. Aimee got to drive Troy’s Jeep and put the first scratch on his newly painted red front bumper. It is almost 5:30 and I think everyone is getting tired.

Its 8:30 and we are still on the trail. “Vapor lock” is what James Bronco has. Not only do we have to stop several time for him, Mark has it as well. This stop, they both have it.
Well James is running. We are checking on Mark.
Waiting –
We are putting a piece of James towel around the fuel pump and wetting it down with water. Let’s see how that works. It’s almost 9:00 and we are finally off the trail.
Troy, Aimee and Mark made beef fajita’s, they were really good. They everyone pretty much crashed.

Tuesday morning. The guys are spending some time doing some stuff to their vehicles. The girls are getting restless. The girls finally decided to go for a walk because they were tired of waiting for the guy’s.
11:30 – Amie, Jennifer, and Lissa go into town to go site see and do the girl thing. Troy and Aimee are going to town as well.
We did the shopping and after that we went to Lions Back. First it was Troy and Aimee, then it was Lissa, and bring up the rear was DOUG!

Doug scared everyone so bad we were speechless. We do have it on video. Bad things! Dinner was really good – hamburgers. Lissa talked Greg into riding his motorcycle; she hit the gas just a little too hard and ended up on the ground.
Tuesday was a good easy day.

Wednesday – we broke off into groups to run trails. It was locked people running “Golden Spike” and the unlocked people running “Top of the World”. Golden Spike was absolutely breathtaking. Today it was really windy and it looks like a storm coming. Everyone was extremely cold all day. James had two flats Lissa ran into a really big “bush”. Bobby said it was a tree. Poor Doug is still having problems. He lost he keys this morning for a few hours. He found them in his pants pocket.
We all met back up at camp. It’s too cold to stay here so we decided to go out to eat. Mr. “Bill” Higgs bought us a wonderful dinner. I don’t think any of us ever laughed so hard. OK, its Steve’s birthday today. We bought him a cookies and cream pie. He said it turned out to be a good birthday. I really don’t think the hostess at the restaurant will ever be the same.
One the Golden Spike trail Bill Higgs did a dive on the motorcycle. I got a picture of him on the ground. He’s OK though.
Bill told me to mention all the tea that Steve drank. The boy downed 6 or 7 glasses of tea.

Thursday – we all got up and slowly got ready to do the last day of wheeling. The plan is to do Gemini Bridges and then metal masher.
Once we got to Gemini Bridges Troy let me drive. It was a really east trip for everyone. We also took pictures of a natural bridge while we were there. It was cool. Just a beautiful place.
We started up Metal Masher, got past 2 or 3 obstacles and Greg’s Jeep messed up. James Bronco had to pull him down that mountain and we went back to camp. Once we got back to camp some of us wanted to do Lions’ back so we drove over there. Troy let me drive up Lions back. That was the best! Lissa and Scott, and Bobby and Jennifer also did the run. It was great! After Lions back we went back to camp and took shows in order to go out and eat. Doug’s dad wanted to buy this night. We went to “Bucks” it was a really nice place. After dinner, we went back to camp, had a few beers and went to bed.

Friday morning – we pack up and move out. We are actually making good time.
Poor Doug! Just ask everyone (except Doug) what a Red Mustang is all about or maybe ask Bobby how bad he wants a cold beer. They are really getting that boy. Let’s just see what they do to him next.
I fell asleep and the group made really good time. Downhill Troy was hitting 90~95 mph. Santa Rosa NM is our stopping point for the night.
Saturday morning we get up and rolled again. Today we got to see “Billy the Kid’s” grave. It was nice “William H Bonney” cool!

We are 40 miles from Lubbock. I’m getting excited. Home is getting closer. Oh, every time we stop, Mr. Higgs checks out the toy section in every store. He is so funny.

Broncocustom
05-05-2003, 09:01 AM
The write-up is a little late (3 years) but better late then never.

That was a great trip. The morning of fixing trucks when the girls got bored was a busy morning/day for Mark. I replaced the fuel pump and reran fuel line to fix the vapor lock issue and Mark droped his fuel tank and changed out his fuel pump. Also the latch on my tail gate gave out so we welded it shut.

StevenAg03
05-05-2003, 10:48 AM
ahhh the memories.....that was one hell of a trip....the birthday at the resturante over the hill, bobby almost kickin dougs ass when he high centered on his rocker pannels on poisen spider mesa, lissa's attempt at riding a motercycle, dougs attempt at flat towing a stock bronco, and last but not leaste the horror i went through when lissa decided she wanted to drive my truck while pulling her jeep.....now thats something i will never forget....:flipoff2:

redcagepatrol
05-05-2003, 10:54 AM
I remember her saying "I looked in the mirror and My Jeep was going all over the place" or something like that.

I think I drove it after that while you slept.

StevenAg03
05-05-2003, 10:56 AM
i couldnt fawkin sleep....doug wanted to listen to :rainbow:motzart the whole time....

StevenAg03
05-05-2003, 11:27 AM
yeah dumbass...we were towing with jeeps..:rolleyes: :rolleyes: ....if you can read you can obviously see that we all had trucks with the exception of one expedition.


the problem with my truck was as follows: unknowningly used a broken torque wrench to tighten rearend. used good one on road and fixed it. forkin headers burnt up spark plug wires on the way there.

dougs truck: when he changed the belt he tightened down the tensioner pully down too much. it sheared

troy's truck: tire blew....replaced it.

Chadnutz
05-05-2003, 11:43 AM
Why would Doug tighten the tensioner bolt?

Don't you just use a 1/2" ratchet to remove and replace belts? That's how I did mine anyway...

StevenAg03
05-05-2003, 11:54 AM
i think he had to remove it when he was attempting to replace the water pump....he ended up taking it somewhere to get it done

mark
05-05-2003, 06:43 PM
The best part for me was Bill Higgs up under my jeep helping replace the fuel pump.

Ah, and the comic relief of Doug. That's where his bronco got the name "el duce." Greg named it that because it was a huge pile o poo, ie. drop a duce. I completly forgot about the engine activated horn, but the lawnmower blade holding the door hinges to the body was unforgetable. Also unforgetable was his run up lions back. I had already started dialing 911 before he was half way up. Having to step over a quivering doug the first morning on the way to the shower because he forgot his sleeping bag was too funny. Then I step out of the shower to find doug sitting in the bathroom trying to warm up (he was either warming up or he's a meat gazer).

Ah the good old times...

Mark

lissa
05-05-2003, 09:46 PM
Originally posted by redcagepatrol
I remember her saying "I looked in the mirror and My Jeep was going all over the place" or something like that.

I think I drove it after that while you slept.

Im never going to live that down am i (pretend its in green)

BMFScout
05-05-2003, 09:52 PM
Doug wonders how he got the repuation he has, or maybe he doesn't, that is a cool way to write up the report regardless, we need to start taking a laptop along and doing the play by play like that with someone with a comedic writing style. that was cool to read.

Krawler68
05-06-2003, 08:09 AM
Reputation? What reputation??? :flipoff2:

I was the only one whose wheelin' rig didn't break... although it should have and made a lot of great noises...

Doug

mark
05-06-2003, 08:41 AM
Originally posted by Krawler68
I was the only one whose wheelin' rig didn't break...

Doug

That's because it came pre-broke for no extra charge...

Mark