December can be a truly exciting month, with all the Christmas decorations, parties, etc., or a truly stressful one. It's all in your attitude. But when your BIRTHDAY is in December on top of everything else, well, that's just fun!

No, my birthday is not in December, but my husband's is -- 6 days before Christmas. And this year, he had a MSD change (as he likes to put it). You know! MSD...most significant digit? Like changing from 20 to 30 or 30 to 40 or 40 to 50! So, last summer, I started plotting. I wanted to surprise him with something that would help him remember this MSD.

The plans started coming together and I had to figure a way to pay for everything without him figuring things out. With joint bank accounts and a husband who (thankfully) tracks every penny, that wouldn't be easy. So, I told him I wanted to surprise him with something - I wouldn't say where or when and was letting him know that I needed to spend the money. Whew. That worked. But THEN, I found out that if I put the charge on the credit card, the exact thing I had planned would show up on the statement - that's no good! So a friend from work let me put it on his credit card and I turned around and wrote HIM a check. Yay!

Next, I wanted to throw Kirk a surprise party. First, I had to locate a host. Well, generally, the only time we aren't together is when we are at work. That makes it hard to work up an invitation and start mailing them out. There is also the challenge of getting the names and addresses of friends of his - I wanted to invite his family, church friends, work friends AND friends he grew up with. Fortunately, I bumped into Rod (one of the guys he grew up with) a

Labels: Daily Life, Events, Family, Food, Holidays, Offroading, Travel

Kirk and I decided to take a little break and head to Death Valley for a few days, to meet up with our 4-wheel club. Friday, we spent the day packing and I prepped our food for the trip. Friday night, we went to my friend's (Rena) wedding. We left before the reception started, as we had a 4+ hour drive ahead, of us to Olanche.

We spent the night at a teeny little motel with a bed that should be used in a comedy act. When we arrived (around 11 PM or so), the manager was out working on the hot water heater - apparently it had stopped working. Saturday morning, we awoke fairly early (although later than many others, as we could hear them outside packing up already) and managed to get a hot shower. Then we all headed over to the Ranch House Cafe for breakfast, where we were meeting the rest of our group.

All total, we had 18 Jeeps on the trip (5 Wrangler/Rubicons, 2 XJs, 1 Comanche and 10 KJs). The drive out to Saline Valley, where we would spend our first night, was fabulous! We had excellent views of several valleys, hit several water holes and even had an amazing drive down Lippencott Mine Road (very steep and winding). Then we had a long drive across dusty washboard.

We camped at the springs - an oasis of sorts in one part of the valley. There was a hot springs, a warm springs and one additional springs in the area. We all pooled resources for a pot luck on Saturday night (I brought my new favorite soup, Southwest Chicken Soup).


On Sunday, we broke into a couple of different groups. We took 6 Jeeps (2 KJs, 2 XJs and 2 Rubicons) on a loop. We went up to see the Marble Bath (whoever decided to put a bathtub filled with blue marbles in the middle of the desert certainly created a popular stop along the way!), checked out a geo cache, saw the 700 foot tall sand dunes. Igor got a flat along the way coming back. Chuck's diffs kept locking, although we are on pavement and going, 45+ mph (when they had no business locking!). We ended up pulling the fuse to try and fix the problem. On the last few miles, we got behind a camper pulling a trailer and a Land Rover that wouldn't pull over and wouldn't let us pass. Finally, our trail guide went off road and around them, then slowed down and stopped so they would have to let us pass. They were going around 10-15 mph while we had been going about 25-30 before we had come upon them.

Sunday night, Mario (of Adventure Trailers) held a barbeque for everyone (he is the one who had arranged the trip). Afterwards, Shawna, Angela and I walked down to the hot springs. I had avoided it up to that point because it had been over run by people from a nudist colony. However, JJ had just returned from the pool nearby and said it was deserted except for folks from our club. We went down and hung out for a bit. It was quite dark, so you could barely see much of anything anyway. I decided to head back to camp after a while. The others were still soaking, so I dressed and headed back on my own.

As I walked up the hill to our camp site, I was thrilled with the beauty around me. And it was virtually deserted. I took a step with my left foot and suddenly it slid out from underneath me -- fast! I rolled my ankle hard, heard a loud "crackk!" and fell to the ground. I had done something really bad to my ankle. I thought of the time I had done something similar (and heard a similar awful sound) a few years ago (I rolled my right ankle and detached the ligament, pulling a small chip of the bone out in the process). Ugh! I tried calling for help and no one could hear me.

I tried putting some weight on my foot. No, that wouldn't work either. I hopped/crawled up the hill a bit further and called for help. No answer. I crawled closer. Still no answer. Eventually, I heard Clint call back "Are you okay?" "NO!" "Where are you?" "In the middle of the road." Less than a minute later, 3 guys came running up the road. Shortly behind them, John drove up in his jeep. they helped me into the Jeep and then John drove me back to camp. As he drove by the campfire, he leaned out the window and said "Don't you know an ambulance when you see one?"

Kirk helped me into the tent and we used our little remaining ice to try and bring down the swelling. I slept with it elevated (on top of my duffel bag).

The drive home Monday was a blur. We all drove out together (as far as the Saline Valley Road turnoff). In the process, we had another flat tire (Igor again), a leaking radiator and another transmission overheat. Once on blacktop, Kirk and I rushed back as quickly as possible. I was trying to make it to my "Authentic Woman" bible study at church. It's only seven weeks long and I really didn't want to miss another class (I missed the one while we were in Berkeley recently). I did make it in time for class.

On Tuesday, I was at work (using my crutches) and my ankle was starting to hurt (even though I was staying off it as much as possible). With Kirk and Linda's encouragement, I went to have my ankle x-rayed. It was just a precaution, really. I was quite sure it was only sprained. Maybe a ligament detached again, but surely that was all.

NOT. It's broken. It's not a bad break, but I'm out of action for 6-8 weeks. Oh well. I'm just terribly thankful that it happened at the END of the trip AND that I had such great people around to help me!

Hopefully our next trip to Death Valley will be a vacation, but not a "break"! Check out our photos!

Labels: Food, Friends, Health, Offroading

Okay, so when I first heard about Camp Jeep, I thought, "yeah, right". But seriously, a camp for jeeps? What's up with THAT? Here's the skinny: Camp Jeep is like a huge party put on by Chrysler Jeep for owners of Jeeps. You really have to be an owner to go (or you can go with an owner). We originally were thinking of volunteering with our Four-Wheel Drive Club (KJ West) to help out at Camp Jeep; however, we ended up attending as real live "guests". No commitments, no working - just fun.

But what IS Camp Jeep, you ask? Well, you actually can't camp there. Not at the site, anyway. We had to go and find a campsite (which was about 20 miles away). Camp Jeep is a large site that included a variety of off-road trails on which you drive YOUR jeep, plus some off-road courses that you get to try new jeeps on (everything from the brand spanking new 2005 Grand Cherokee to the new Jeep Unlimited).

We arrived at our campsite late on Wednesday night. Most of the KJ West club was already there - they had all come up a day early for orientation as trail guides (not to mention that they had come up for a whole weekend earlier in the summer to go over the trails). We set up camp and went and chatted with some of our friends.

We went to sleep fairly early, since we were on the first trail ride the next morning (and you had to be there by 6:30 for checkin). When we signed up for the trails, we took an easy trail (first) and an intermediate trail (you were only permitted to sign up for two). At the time, we knew we had a lift kit to put on, but not whether it would be on in time for Cam Jeep. Well, Kirk and Clint and a few others had put the lift kit on the car only a week or so before.

Kirk made me drive on the easy trail - to get a feel for what it was like and to teach me a little about how to drive offroad. The scariest part for me was while we were driving along a pasture and it felt like the car was DEFINITELY going to tip over!!

From there, we headed over to the Camp Jeep Village, to see what it was all about. It was really cool. They had all sorts of things there: you could test drive the new 2005 Jeep Grand Cherokee on an obstacle course, drive any of 5 different models on the Jeep 101 (an off-road obstacle course) or a Rubicon on the Rubicon challenge, climb a climbing wall, climb a tower and zipline down, learn to scuba dive, ride bmx bikes, talk with the engineers who designed your jeep at a round table discussion, shop shop shop at the Jeep Store, watch a cooking lesson/demonstration, make crafts, watch a short version of the new Warren Miller Movie, watch concerts concerts and more concerts, drive more jeeps and get lots and lots and lots of swag! Every where you looked, they were giving away swag. The cafe wasn't all that exciting, but it's the only place to eat lunch. For dinner, they gave away a free voucher for free food plus a Sobe (one of the sponsors was Sobe). Yummy!

Needless to say, we had a great time! On our trail run the second day, an XJ in front of us tipped over on its side. Everyone was fine, but it was quite the ordeal. Alex, who was driving one of the rescue vehicles, busted an axle trying to help. Afterwards, the trail guide decided that the trail had deteriorated too much so we turned around and went another way.

We had such a fabulous time! I am sure we will go back next year! To see photos, go to Kirk's blog about Camp Jeep!

Labels: Friends, Offroading, Transportation, Travel

There's nothing like a summer barbeque to help you relax. Tonight, we tossed some ribs on the barbeque and sat down to a couple of movies with our yummy beef, and a great fresh salad. This week is going to just get busier and busier as we get closer to the weekend, so it was nice to have some down time. A silly little comedy (13 Going on 30) was a nice mindless (but cute) movie to start with. Then, we saw Africa: the Serengeti (an IMAX) movie. Both were enjoyable and just what we needed.

We have a busy weekend coming up with a luau on Friday, a wedding on Saturday, a barbeque and family gathering on Sunday and then, Camp Jeep next week. Oh - we finally got our jeep lifted! It was a mere 2.5 inch lift, but it is amazing how much taller it looks (especially with the same tires on it).

Labels: Daily Life, Movies, Offroading

Cool! I just went off-roading for my first time ever! It was a lot of fun, and Kirk and I are planning to do it more often! After staying at Bill & Sue's late the evening before, and waking up at 5AM in order to arrive in Big Bear by 8AM, we were pretty tired! But we were both glad we went! We arrived in plenty of time, and started to meet some of the others who were also there for the 2nd Annual Big Bear Run. Many people (most, even) had camped overnight and were actually there for the full weekend.

It was an interesting experience - some people asked you what kind of jeep you had (model, year, modifications) before they even asked your name! But they were all very nice. All total, we had 36 jeeps, of which about 26 of them were Libertys (KJs). We were the only vehicle on the run that was completely stock (no modifications). We all took the initial trail, a trail sponsored by another club, together. It was quite a sight to see all of those vehicles caravaning down this rocky (VERY rocky in some spots) road. We eventually hit a sort of staging area, where we split off into sub-groups. Each group went off to hit a different trail. Since we were running with the basics, we decided to stick on the "easy" trail. There were 6 of us travelling together, all KJs. Don (in a black KJ) led off and Garland & Pam brought up the rear in a Cactus green KJ. Roger & Connie (in a steel blue KJ), Nannette & Liz (in a black KJ Freedom edition), Igor & family (in a white KJ) and Kirk & I (in our white KJ Limited) were in the middle. While we were talking an "easy" run, we still had a great time.

We started off on Jacoby's Canyon, headed onto 3N16 and then headed over to 3N08. Some of the stuff we hit was pretty interesting. There were certainly plenty of photo ops! One of my favorites is one where Kirk caught some serious air with the back tire! Pam, Liz and Connie all took turns driving their respective vehicles. We could hear Connie screaming a time or two when she went through some stuff that was a bit scary!
We stopped by the Holcomb Creek Crossing, which is pretty hairy mainly due to the steep uphill on the far side. A couple of people tried it, but without locking differential (we only have limited slip right now), it wasn't possible. Only two of the three jeeps that tried made it up the hill.

From Holcomb Creek Crossing, we drove about 5 miles or so to Bishop Peak. Bishop Peak is home to an old fire watchtower, built in 1936. It was built right on the rocks at the top of the peak, an altitude of 8,535 ft. We hung out up there for a bit and talked with some of the volunteers that staff the lookout. Many of them were HAM Operators and were participating in a contest while we were there (they were trying to contact as many people, from as far away as possible). After hanging out there for a bit and chatting, we finally headed back down the mountain.

One of the members of L.O.S.T. KJ West had invited everyone on the run that day (about 75 people or so) over to his cabin in Big Bear for a barbeque. We originally hadn't planned to go, but were having so much fun, we decided to. Although we had a long drive ahead of us to get home (2 hours), we figured we could always go to a later church service than our normal one if we got in too terribly late. We stopped by a grocery store and picked up some beef for dinner and then headed over. We were right on time. As we pulled into one of the few parking places at his house, a steady stream of KJs turned onto his street and started looking for spots. The barbeque had a great turnout! And enough food to feed a small country! We stayed and chatted with people we had met on our trail as well as the many others who had heard about "the couple who had been around the world" or the "folks in the stock jeep". Near the end of the feed, KJ West had a raffle. A number of prizes were handed out, all Jeep-related, of course. We bought two raffle tickets and won 3 prizes. How did we do that, do you ask? Well, we won one prize with each of the raffle tickets, but in addition to that, they were planning to raffle off a lift kit for a jeep. The only thing was, all the jeeps were already lifted except one...ours. So, rather than raffling it off, they GAVE it to us! Wow! What a blessing! We are VERY grateful! Especially since there is no way we could have afforded to do anything like THAT in the near future. We are now considering heading off to Camp Jeep later in the summer, and a lift kit makes that much more viable.

Shortly afterwards, we had to call it a night and drive home. It was a long two hours with Kirk and I trying to chatter ourselves awake the whole time. We made it in one piece, obviously.

More photos!

Labels: Offroading