Jeep Adventures

9:30 am we had another Best Western breakfast, stopped for gas and we are back on the road headed for the coast. It is 60F and very windy so even at red lights it feels like we are going 35 mph.

10:05 am ... Mile 1,308
We came up to some road construction which forced us to stop and as we were slowly rolling we could once again hear the "noise" from the rear end (of the Jeep!) that we were hearing last night. It sounds like the left rear drivers side wheel bearing is slowly crapping out. All we can do at this point is carry on and see what happens. We will try to keep in under 72 mph which should be pretty easy on this narrow and twisted road.

10:35 ... Mile 1,328. Wow. What a scenic drive. If you ever have the opportunity to take hwy 36 West from Red Bluff you should take it. We are amazed how quick and often the landscape changes as you go. It is a fairly curvy road, which in itself makes for great scenery.

Is there no such thing as 75F anymore. The more we climb, the colder it's getting. We see snow on top of the distant mountains and hope that we don't go that high. Oh well, at least it is giving us something to whine about and we are only at 2,500 feet too.

Lots of wildlife. We've seen a few deer and a coyote so far.

11:05 am ... Mile 1,341 @ 3,500 feet elevation we finally had to stop and put on our winter driving gear. It is now in the mid forties and too chilly for shorts, and we are still climbing so its going to get much colder before it starts to warm up. We haven't resorted to socks and sandals yet but I suspect that it is in the near future.

Our oil leak is starting to pick up speed. We stopped for a quick phone call and left behind our trademark oil patch.

12:15 pm ... We've gone about 70 miles in 3 hours. We're just flying over this mountain range. At this rate we hope that we hit Canada before winter sets in. We don't have a block heater in the Willys.

12:20 pm ... Mile 1,361
Our mileage may be off a bit because we have been in and out of satellite range all morning and I'm not sure if it re-calibrates itself or not. I think we are finally going down. Hopefully its all downhill from here. Considering the fact that there are no shoulders, guard rails or straight stretches I don't think we will take advantage of gravity and try to make up some lost time by trying to wrap the speedometer.

12:30 pm ... Forget it, we are on our way back UP!

Over the past 3,600 miles or so we have learned our own version of sign language (between the noise of the Jeep and wind it is not a great situation for conversation). We have official signs for the following:
- what's that smell?
- what's that sound?
- we're screwed now.
- holy shit it's hot.
- holy shit it's cold.
- I'm hungry. Stop at the next Mexican restaurant.
- I'm tired. Stop at the next Best Western.
- turn up the i-pod.
- quit tailgating or pass this guy the next chance you get (just kidding ... We haven't needed that one yet).

1:05 pm ... Mile 1,374
I think we're officially screwed. It kicked out of gear and we got nothing. Of course we were going down a steep hill when it kicked out of gear. We managed to get her to stop at a pull-out but it was a struggle...that sure got the adrenaline pumping. After screwing around a bit we discovered that the t-case kicked out of gear and into neutral. We managed to get it into gear and we are back on the road but it is making some funky new noises. Oh well, at least we're not in the remote mountains 50 miles from the nearest town. Oh wait a minute, we are!

1:15 pm the noises are getting louder and more frequent. She's gonna blow her t-case any time now. To make things even more exciting we are now going down the mountain and we need to rely on the engine to slow us down because the brakes alone probably won't be able to stop us. If we lose our ability to stay in gear it's gonna be quite a ride to the bottom. Good thing it's a wide road with beefy guard rails to keep us from careening down a mountain. Oh, wait a minute. There are none!

1:20 pm ... Mile 1,378 We now have a new smell. Kinda like baked oil.

Our plan is to carry on with our fingers crossed and hope that we can make it to the next town, and hope that they have a shop. We will have to go slow and stop to let everything cool down when needed which will reduce our overall mileage today.

Oh well, at least the heat coming from the t-case has prevented us from needing socks and sandals so far.

2:00 pm ... Mile 1,395 I hope I'm not typing too soon, but things seem to be going ok. The smell and noise has subsided but there is definitely something going on beneath our feet and we highly doubt that it will fix itself, as much as we wish it would.

2:08 pm ... Mile 1,398
We have been going down a long, steep 10% grade so we have pulled over for a bit to give the brakes a rest before they melt on us.

2:45 pm ... Mile 1,407
We made it to the Redwoods! Our 3rd "wonder of the west". With any luck we will make it to the 4th which is the Pacific Coast Highway which is only another 30 miles or so.

We must be getting close to the coast, it is getting cooler and we see low hanging clouds ahead.

3:15 pm ... Mile 1,426
It's been a long haul today and we are tired, sore, cold and hungry so when we pulled into Fortuna, CA we decided to stop at Denny's for a late lunch.

My lord this booth is comfortable, and we've got the warm sun shining on us. We may stay here for dinner as well. As for not having Mexican, If it's any consolation, we had nacho's. They sucked!

4:00 pm ... As difficult as it is, we are climbing back in the Jeep to push on forward and see if we can make it to Crescent City, which is about 30 miles north.

I couldn't take it anymore...Socks-and-sandals...

4:33 pm ... Mile 1,440
We see the Pacific Ocean and we are on the Pacific Coast Highway...Wonder #4. We have officially driven our old Willys coast-to-coast. If it weren't for the smell of burning oil we'd probably be able to enjoy the distinct salty smell of the ocean.

5:05 pm ... mile 1,446
We just pulled into the Best Western in Eureka, after we stopped at Napa to see if they had a gasket for the inspection plate so that we can see what's going on inside there. They didn't have one in stock but they did offer to let us use their shop tomorrow morning. Our plan is to carefully take off the inspection plate and re-use the original gasket along with a few pounds of gasket seal.

We finally had a chance to get some of our video's uploaded to the site.

TOTAL MILES TRAVELED TODAY: 157

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