Worst Wheeling trip I have ever had.....

BRUISER

BRUISER

silent.. but deadly
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Joined
Mar 17, 2005
Location
Raleigh
Hey all,

Well Dave Andersen, John Herr and myself went to Callentee this weekend for one of the hardest and worst damage
wheeling trips I have ever had..

Lets see if I can recall all that took place…

We left Friday afternoon around 3pm after I sold my Ford f-250….(yippee back yard is getting cleared out)

John and I had my XJ loaded up on trailer and my ’92 Dodge was pulling the beast to Greensboro to meet Dave and his ’67 Bronco…(pulled by his ’05 F-350)

First I must say I now understand why once you go Diesel you will not go back to a gas tow rig.
well we made it to Mountain City with no problems (except for some taillights on dave’s trailer)

We checked in, parked the rigs unloaded clothes walked outside to get some dinner and found most of the city closes at 9pm WOW
well we ate at Pizza Palace and let me just saw – DO NOT eat there.. Yuck..

So onto the Great damage day of Saturday..
We checked in paid our $11 for the day and headed out to the trails about 10am..
we decided heck if it is just our two rig why not hit Armor All 1st and then swing back to welder and other trails
so we got to Armor All and dropped in and I immediately saw a different look at the trail a hug tree had fallen and the roots were
kinda in the trail.. (you will see the pics of dave door) well I got past it with just a little new pin stripping and dents..
so dave came down in and he got a little up and close with it (again see pics)..
so as dave was trying to get around the roots he then got hung up on a rock and we had to use his winch , which then took out his rear driveshaft 
but being where we were there was no easy way to get him to go backwards so I hoped in my Jeep and drove up ahead to see how far the 1st exit would be
and to my surprise there was not much trail left to wheel.. there were trees down all across the trail and there was no way for us to go forward
so we decided we had to turn around and go bck the way we came…

Well this is the fun part..(It is to much to type so you will have to ask in person to here all the details)


Short story.. we started at 10am and got off the trails at 4:30pm.. and we went about 200 yards total 

The damage:

I broke both front u-joints, all the front axle shafts and my winch cable…

Dave broke rear driveshaft.. popped a bead (a few times) got a bunch of body damage…

We learned:

How to use every piece of recovery gear we had with us..
and having to much recovery gear is never a bad thing..
Oh ya and the water was rushing down the trail and we all ended up walking and standing in FREEZing water all day…

Pics are here:
As you can see we did not take many on the trail..(we were a little busy)

http://community.webshots.com/album/548274303LiMFrJ


Ken Carter
 
BRUISER said:
well we ate at Pizza Palace and let me just saw – DO NOT eat there.. Yuck..
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Gonna have to disagree with you there, have eaten at the Pizza Palace several times, super fast service , pretty good pizza.
Hate you hade a bad trip, had a few of those myself.
Sounds like we have a ton of work to do B4 the summer convention.
 
OUCH! Sucks that u had that much damage, were you running upgraded joints and shafts or stock?
 
amcjeepman said:
Gonna have to disagree with you there, have eaten at the Pizza Palace several times, super fast service , pretty good pizza.
Hate you hade a bad trip, had a few of those myself.
Sounds like we have a ton of work to do B4 the summer convention.
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Maybe I wrote wrong name.. but there are 2 Pizza joints in town.. the one that sucked was behind another mom and pop place on the corner you turn off 421 to head to the trails..

We also ate at a Pizza joint next to the mountain empire motel and it was very good..
 
thebluyak said:
OUCH! Sucks that u had that much damage, were you running upgraded joints and shafts or stock?
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One side was upgrade and one was stock to compare strenght.. stock joint was lost on trail and we could never find it.. Upgraded joint still in axle housing but can not tell ya what condition yet..
 
amcjeepman said:
Sounds like we have a ton of work to do B4 the summer convention.
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Honestly I will probably not go back to Callentee anytime soon..

Being this place is 99% for logginf and 1% off roading.. I would rather drive 8 hrs to tellico and ride trails that are maintained and are there for wheeling not wheeling as a second source of income..

and to be honest if they plan to have the summer convention there.. we are gonna have a TON of work before the trails wil be ready..
 
Your right I was thinking of the one in front the Hotel, however I've had really good food at both.
The Summer convention is at Mt. City June 9-11. Everytime I go there or hear about a trip I get more worried. I sure miss Crackers Neck.
 
Well to make this trip even worse....

While standing on the trail I branch snapped back and hit me directly in my right eye.. OUCH ....

Well the worst part is I just had lasik done 2 months back.. so I was a little scared..

and now to make it worse I just got back from eye dr and they told me the flap on my eye has moved due to impact and now I have to go back in and get surgery to fix this..

All I can say is I must have done some bad things recently
 
bigwaylon said:
on a positive note, that F-250 made it to Charlotte just fine...:D
Greg
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Good to hear.. I was gonna PM ya and ask.. but I guess you just aswered that
 
This is what Callalante is becoming...Some easy stuff and some stupid hard stuff with a good chance of breakage. There is no management there. Minnie only wants our money for trails and camping, Paul Brown only wants the money from logging, and the Loggers want us (4x4's) out... So Minnie won't tell you what the trails are like, PB lets the loggers do as they please, and the loggers keep blocking trials. We saw several trails that had many trees laying across entrances, and several that had breaks bulldozed to make passage impossible or very difficult and risky at best.

Don't know how long all this will last...When PB dies (he is in his mid 80's) his kids will sell the property for as much as they can get for it (they want the $$, not the land). And I just don't see much change ever happening with the loggers...unless they just get more agressive.

Sorry you had such a crappy trip.

Glad you all are doing summer convention early in June...The American Jeepster Commando Club is doing our East Coast Jam the end of June...hopefully the trails don't get closed down again in between our trips...I'm planning a couple of trips up in May and June to try and map and mark trails. Looks like I'll be spending quite a bit of time behind a chainsaw. I also have to find some trails that are mall rated for the 40 year old, stock Jeepsters that'll be up there...
 
As Galen stated, the "new rule" when riding there is to include at least one chainsaw in the group! We were warned about this beforehand and we still pulled off a "knucklehead"! (NOBODY *brought* a chainsaw despite 3 of us in a group of 4 owning them! :rolleyes: )... needless to say we had to blaze a new trail (entire 3/4 mile? trail with downed trees every 10') just to keep from having to backtrack over the mountain & back down Welder with broken rigs... equally miserable trip with the temps & snow

Honestly, I'd probably be disgusted after that much damage too, but I'll take "un-maintained" trail over constantly dozed/dynamited trails any day! After all, you didn't go up there searching for the "ultimate dirtroad", right? :beer:
 
Ken that is why I parked the j10 for serious wheeling I hope to have the cherokee running by end of summer.
 
Well as for the XJ..
I do not care about body damage or even rolling it over.. That does not bother me...and breaking parts comes with the territory..

BUt just looking around at trails you can tell this is a Logging area not a 4 wheeling area.
 
GSW said:
I think we're gonna try it out this Friday. We'll be sure to bring a chainsaw. :mad:
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a few of us from NCK are headed up there over St. Patrick's Day weekend. Sucks that you had a bad trip Ken, but thanks for the update on the place..
 
Last time we went I felt like I was playing in a construction site. Breaking sux, I used to not care at all..now I ask least think about it for a split second before laying down the throttle.
 
BIGWOODY said:
Last time we went I flet like I was playing in a construction site. .
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BINGO that was exactly what it felt like....
 
Callalante

Grass roots wheeling- logging roads that change every trip. bitchin'!!!


One more note, and I may be wrong, but I thought that for numerous reasons we were not to ride in the creek trails. I am just happy that its open.
 
Seems to me I remember a trip to Dayton, TN a few years back that got me a front shaft, tie rod and right TRE, a tire, ARB line, brake line, E-brake cable, tranny shift rail, etc., not to mention it rained the whole damn time and all the trails were slick as Amsoil and snot. In addition, the new MS meds I was on at the time whupped a "sick" on me. And did I mention that once I got it back together enough to drive home, a rear wheel bearing went out in the middle of Radar Alley east of Statesville? Yeah, that was a fun weekend. I can wholeheartedly sympathize with the "worst trip" syndrome.

But I did have a chain saw with me.:D
 
Wow. Looks like Harlan is just as close to most of us as Callalantee...give or take 300 miles...:D
 
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