Terry and I spent the night at Elbe with some other Timber Tamers on Saturday night. The plan was to meet up Saturday morning, do a little maintenance on our adopted trail and then spend the night in the camping area. We ended up getting a late start as one of the members from our club, Ann, hit black ice soon after she left her house and ended up with her truck, trailer and Jeep in a ditch. Luckily she wasn't hurt and there doesn't seem to be any major damage on the vehicles. Some of the Tamers were able to head up to Monroe and help with the recovery so she was able to limp home. So, instead of meeting at 9:00am, we were a couple hours late.
Terry and I left the house around 8:00 and met up with Mike Jennings for breakfast in Eatonville. By the time we were done, Rudi, Karl, Chad, Penny and Tom were only about 15-30 minutes behind us. We arrived at Elbe first and unloaded while we waited for them. As soon as they arrived, we realized no one had the gate code to get into the camping area. Karl had tried to contact Nancy with the DNR earlier in the week to no avail. Chad and Karl drove into Elbe to see if anyone knew the code. We also tried the "there is only 10,000 options, just start and 0-0-0-0 and work up to 9-9-9-9 and we will find it." After meddling with the lock for an hour or so and putting some calls into the DNR and friends, we decided to hit the trail.
Terry and I haven't really wheeled Elbe before and weren't too sure as to what to expect as there was still some snow on the ground. We started with our adopted trail first, but with the snow on the ground, we couldn't do any work so decided to wheel on. We didn't have too many issues, but did pull out the winch once to pull the Jeep away from a tree to prevent the roof hitting hard against it. Luckily, the winching worked and the Jeep just got a little kiss from the tree and no body damage from it. After a several hours on the trail, we stopped for a quick break around 4:30 or so. From there, Terry and I decided to depart the group and head back to camp and relax for a bit. We realized while on the trail the rear shackles hit the new back bumper and were getting annoyed hearing the clank.
A flexy section
Where we decided to winch and prevent hitting the tree too hard.
To our luck, as soon as we got back to camp, a guy approached us asking if we could help recover his truck. Apparently, a Toyota truck got stuck on the top of one trails (coincidentally our adopted trail) so this guy backed his 2007 1-ton Ford down the trail 100 yards or so to try and recover the Toyota. However, in the process he slid off the trail. So, Terry and I hopped into the Jeep to see what we could do to help. We were able to get the Toyota our of the way first with some winching. Luckily, I was able to get a hold of fellow Tamers on the CB and by the time we got the Toyota out of the way Tom was there in his CJ-5 to help with the Ford. We snatched off a tree and hooked up to the front of the truck while Tom snatched off a winch point and held up the rear. After a few minutes, we were able to get the Ford back on the trail and onto the main road. From there, Rudi drove his Jeep down to the Toyota to help plug some tires and air him up as the rear driver tire on the Toyota was flat.
When we got back to camp, we decided that the locked gate wasn't going to ruin our fun. Rudi headed home, but the rest of us stayed the night. Terry and I had planned on sleeping on the bed of the truck under the camper shell. So, he found a level spot and I got our bed ready. In the meantime, we also carried our firewood into the camping area to the nearest fire pit and got a fire going. We also set up small kitchen area on a nearby picnic table so we could BBQ some T-bones and asparagus for dinner. After we ate, we all sat by the fire and chatted until bed time. Zeus was exhausted after the long day and fell asleep inside my jacket until we headed to bed.
On Sunday. we woke up to a beautiful day. We took our time making breakfast and packing up our gear. I made too much food for breakfast so was able to feed Mike, Tom and Chad (well, Tom and Chad had already eaten, they just had a little of our food as a snack). We had all our gear loaded and the Jeeps on the trailers around noon and headed home. Terry and I stopped for a quick bite to eat in Graham and got home around 2:00. He is now doing some maintenance on the Jeep and cutting where the shackles hit the bumper. We had a great time with our club and can't wait until the next outing in a few weeks!
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