Friday, July 17, 2009

Added my Twitter posts

Just wanted to say that I've added my Twitter posts to my blog page. The "tweets" are much more up to date and sometimes, up to the minute!

Thanks for following me!
Lonnie

Sunday, July 5, 2009

Vaction Post part 2


So I left off with Amy a bit shaky because of the ride in the sand dunes. Well... the next day Caleb and Joel got to go out. Caleb started with two thumbs up and came back with two thumbs down! No surprise there. Joel left with a scowl on his face and returned with a smile a mile wide. Not surprised about him enjoying that either. However on the way back the sand rail was stalling... so my brother-in-law, Joe, went to try and figure out what was wrong. With about half the day gone he was able to get it started and running again. So I went out with him. Man what a rush! I only wish the vehicle was bigger. I said before I left, "Big boys in a little toy!" And that's the truth. Joe tried his best to really shake me up, but I played it cool. Got a feel for how he liked to drive. Got air borne a few times. Not bad, but I know that it isn't the thing I'd do every time I visit. After I got off Amy's mom got in. We thought from how she described the whole trip that she'd been on it before. Nope. First time. I said, "Linda, better strap on your depends for this one!" She came back none worse for wear. Got to hand it to her, she stepped up and took her medicine! Then Amy got back in and went out with Joe. It was about 30 minutes later that Joe came back to camp. The sand rail had died and the oil cap gone off... oil spewing out. Not good. So Amy was left to sit with the sand rail. Meanwhile, Joe tries to get his Chevy 4 x4 truck to start. It wouldn't. He tried and tried for about another 30 minutes. Finally he gave up on it and decided to take his two wheel Dodge truck through the sand dunes to try and tow his sand rail back. So being the helpful guy I am, I tagged along. We went flying back into the dunes. I kept thinking, "Ya know God, this isn't how I expected to go." We went up and over and down... straight down a dune. Bent the front bumper and lost what I thought was the bumper. Instead of throwing it back into the vehicle we kept going. Up and down and around and then trying to get up one hill on the sand highway we got to mile marker 16 and were stuck. I mean there was no amount of "try" that we had that would allow us to even go in reverse. After a few tries some riders came up to see if we needed help. Then a 4 x 4 t ruck with a guy and two girls in it came and helped tow us back far enough that we had a down hill to get momentum and head the truck back to the beach camp. The guy and girls headed out to check on Amy and we went back to the camp. Once there Joe hopped onto his 4 wheeler and took a tow strap to get Amy and the sand rail. 15 minutes later they made it back. Amy was so cold she was shaking. The sun was going down and the marine layer was cooling things down quickly. She honestly wasn't sure what was going to happen! The whole time she was out there waiting she kept thinking she might have to pull out some moves to kick butt if someone were to try something, but thankfully nothing happened. And she did have they guy and two girls find her and offer to help. Amazing. That was it for the sand rail rides. The next day we had to pack up to go.
Thankfully a guy helped tow the truck and camper to a place where AAA could tow the truck. He then towed the camper for us to the dealer where they fixed the vehicle. God was good to us. Even through the "stuff" things turned out pretty good!

I did learn a lesson through all of this. If you buy something on the cheap because you believe you can fix it, you may be just adding to your troubles and subtracting from your pocket book...