Moderate
Moderate
Trying to get every last minute of sleep, we arrived in Temecula around 7:10 and gassed up in the remaining few minutes. We met at the Denny's for the 15 minute briefing. This didn't amount to much more than: "everyone have a CB? okay, let's go". Which is all that was necessary because any necessary/interesting information was given on the CB. So we didn't waste any time and were on the road by 7:45.
We first headed to camp in the Los Coyotes Indian reservation. This was another half an hour or so on paved roads. Harry radioed points of interest along the way. Entering the reservation, we stopped to pay the $12 camping fee. There's only one entrance/exit, so check their hours of operation. Pulling into the campground, we picked a good spot, unloaded our gear from the Jeep, and set up camp. With only about 10 minutes to rest, we were off on our morning trip.
The destination of the morning trip was the peak of Hot Spring Mountain. We took a fairly easy route (Harry emphasized a "crawl before you walk, before you run" training). The only tricky parts were places with large ruts, and they were only a problem if you happened to fall in (luckily, no one did). At the top was an old, crickedy lookout tower where I snapped a couple pictures. Everyone was at the bottom of the stairs waiting for someone to go first. That would be me... well, technically Lloyd (Joe and Chris's dog we happened to be sitting that weekend). It held us, and eventually about 10 others. And it was worth the small risk - excellent views. After spending a half hour or so at the top, we headed back to camp for lunch.
Rachel and the dogs stayed back at camp for the afternoon trip. We were going on more "interesting" roads and the soft-core passengers needed a rest. The first stop was just outside the campground. Harry got his truck stuck, on purpose. He pulled in to a large rut to show us diagonal teeter-totter. This is the most common stuck position for 4wd vehicles. With a differential in the front and back, if one front wheel and one back wheel slip at the same time (usually the diagonally opposite wheels), you're not going anywhere. At one point, Harry got out of the truck and showed us the teeter-totter - with one wheel 4 feet in the air, he pushed it down lifting the opposite wheel 4 feet. It was impressive, but still easy to get unstuck (at least for him). The rest of us practiced in turn. I was second to last so I aired down my tires while waiting. When my turn came, it took me a few tries, but I got through.
Finally, we were off for the good stuff. I'm glad we practiced because we immediately hit a tricky spot. I slipped a little but handled it much better. We hit trails named Rough Road, and Dirty Shorts Hill - tricky on the uphill, but I think everyone's shorts stayed clean. Heading back I started to feel a little warm and achy. It was hot, and the roads were bumpy, but that wasn't it. Something was wrong. Back in camp I laid down to rest and had a hard time getting back up. I had the flu. We discussed our options and decided a tent on the hard ground was not a good place to sleep with the flu. I was shaking and the ground was especially hard. So, reluctantly, we packed up and left for home around 7 that night. We missed the second day of the tour, but since I spent the next few days in bed, I was very glad we made that decision.
