On Friday morning I arrived at the rendezvous location in Pleasanton at about 7:30 AM, and met Arline in the Safeway. She was wearing an Ed4 club shirt so I introduced myself. It turns out that both of us can't stand to be late, which means we're usually too early. It gave me time to purchase a couple of last minute items, like ice. We met up with our guides just prior to the official meeting time.
Originally there were nine cars signed up for this trip, but one was unable to come and others were traveling on their own. Eventually we lined up and our little caravan of four cars headed north. It didn't take long for me to discover that my new CB antenna was not cooperating with my primary radio, so I switched to my hand held CB unit.
We made a comfort stop just after reaching I-5, and after a gas stop just south of Redding we left I-5 and headed north east on Hwy 299. We topped up with gas again at the Chimney Rock gas station, where we met up with two more cars.
One of the cars was coming to Plumb Valley camp ground with us and one was staying in a nearby motel, and another couple was rumored to be at the motel already. The camp ground was deserted when we arrived, and because it was almost dark everyone quickly set up camp. We must have been hungry too since we all focused on eating dinner.
After dark we all gathered at one of the fire pits and talked for a couple of hours. It was cold, and the fire was not producing enough heat, so we headed to our tents fairly early. Later, Peter showed up and found a spot with the group, and sometime after he arrived another car came into the camp ground. They were not with our group.
I didn't sleep well for some reason, but I did get eight hours of sleep even though I was awake and restless part of the time. I got up about 7:00 AM, packed everything back into my car and ate a hot breakfast. I also met a big dog which was not part of our group, that came in with the late night arrivals.
On Saturday morning we all gathered at the Davis Creek church, at 8:30 AM, for photos and a drivers meeting. It was decided to use FRS radios for communication and Detlef loaned me one of his spares with a fresh set of batteries. I've been interested in purchasing a pair of FRS radios, so it was an opportunity to learn something about them.
The day was spent following the lead car, which alternated between Detlef and Vidas, and locating the Applegate Trail markers. Not being as hardy as the immigrants, we spent the day with the transfer case in high range, although mine was locked to split the power 50/50 front and rear. It was interesting to get a hint of what the immigrants experienced as they traveled west into Oregon.
We had some fun in the afternoon. Detlef was leading with me behind him, and the route passed through a wet meadow. He decided to give it a try and I said "I'll wait here to see how this turns out". Even though it was pretty marshy he made it almost half way across, but when he fell into a soft hole it was all over. I used the radio to notify everyone that we "were going to need a jeep and lots of tow straps".
Team work, five tow straps, and two jeeps made short work of recovering the sunk FJ Cruizer. Once back on dry land Detlef surveyed his car while the rest of us tried to clean up ourselves and our gear. I used a lot of hand sanitizer but my straps may never be the same, which is Ok. We kidded Detlef about the apperance of his car since it looked like something from a swamp monster movie, but it was a great opportunity to practice recovery tasks.
We back tracked a bit and took a longer route to the next trail marker. Late in the afternoon we desended past Mud Lake which is dry, towards Clear Lake where we chose a camping area that seemed flat enough to accomodate eight cars and plenty of camping equipment. It was fairly open though, and a cold wind was blowing so setting up the tents etc was a bit tricky. After dark we gathered without a camp fire, covered in blankets and comforters, to hear some stories related to Peter's recent volunteer stretch with the Red Cross in Florida.
On Sunday morning we broke camp and got underway at 9:00 AM, after another drivers meeting. Everyone was in good spirits, even though this was an improvised camp site: Possibly the best example of primitive camping at its worst. Not everyone enjoys this kind of camping and some tolerated it more than others. We were all glad to be back on the trail in our dusty and dirty but warm and comfy cars. It was another opportunity to "experience" the kind of travel wagon trains provided.
Throughout the trip I was constantly amazed that the immigrants kept moving, thinking to myself, "This looks wonderful. It has water and game and plenty of wide open space". I often wondered what kept people from just dropping out of the trip and settling right there? The trip could not have been fun, or comfortable, or even safe at times. Everyone must have been tired of rough trails, broken equipment, tired animals, poor food, crabby travel companions, cold, hot, wind, long days, going up using multi-teams and then having to go down with locked wheels and rope drags. Everyday was hard and advancing eight to ten miles was a good day.
I was tired just thinking about it, so I was pleased when Sunday evening morphed into a spa night. We were down to three cars with five people and we decided to stay in a motel at Klamath Falls, take a hot shower, and eat at a restaurant. It was nice ... I'm not sure that I would have made it to Oregon by wagon train ...
On Monday morning we met in the parking lot at 8:00 AM, intending to get an early start on another day hunting for trail markers. The cars were covered in ice and as we started to leave the parking lot we discovered that Vidas' car had a low tire. Detlef pumped it up and we drove to a nearby Les Schwab Tire center to have it fixed. It was done in a jiffy, at no charge, and as we were preparing to leave Vidas double-checked their work. Evidently it was written up as the front left (drivers side) tire and it should have been the front right (passenger) tire. So it had to be done again.
At this point I decided to leave the group and head home instead of spending another day on the trail. It was hard for me to leave them as I knew what I would be missing, but I had promised to visit my Mom and I was already a day late. I left Klamath Falls at about 9:15 AM and headed south, where I was constanly impressed by how beautiful this part of California is.
I was super glad I could go on this trip and happy to meet some new people. It wasn't a difficult trip, and except for a couple of spots where we used low range for finess and control it was a simple trail ride. It was slightly rough do to the small-ish sized rocks, and we probably should have aired down earlier as a couple of us ended up with minor sidewall cuts. I believe the most difficult part was matching GPS coordinates to routes, to get us where we needed to be, and I would like to thank our guides for an excellent, safe, and fun trip.
Neale Wade
P.S. I forgot to return the FRS radio to Detlef, so I'll bring it to the next Ed4 club meeting.