Thanks to Bernie’s shortcut, we blew through Bakersfield, avoiding the endless line of traffic on the normal Hwy 58 jog thru this area. From there we were headed to the high desert area south of Barstow and our final destination. As we passed through a few of the small towns, if you can call them that, we were in awe and wonder as to why and what would inspire someone stake out their ground there. It’s like you were driving along, towing your house across the desert, and said ‘yea, that’s the spot, over there, by the cacti. Park your house, pull out a few weeds to define the driveway, put up a mail box, and call it home. The only thing you need now is to call the local wrecking yard to have them deliver four or five wrecked vehicles to plant in the front yard. Apparently the more dead vehicles, the higher your social status. Burnt out refrigerators are just window dressing. Old furniture, bed frames, and camper shells are for amateurs. The elite homeowner, has at least on tractor with no wheels. The guy with the Mercedes could probably get top dollar for his car in this Mecca. Then we passed through the bustling metropolis of Apple Valley. Now this place is a town. It even has a bowling alley. Sure it has only one lane, and everyone in town uses the same ball and shoes, but they were on the map. Keith and I were noticing the from block to block, the businesses would alternate between bars and animal hospitals. That must be convenient though. If you and your dog went to town and got drunk, and were sick, you could both go to the same Doc/Vet. Did I tell you this was a big town, or what? It even has its own airport. Sure you have to call at least 45 minutes ahead for landing. How long do you think it takes for a Ford Pinto to pull all the mobile living (trailers) structures off the runway. It even has a gas station, with mini mart, run by whom else but Habeeb? We were getting close now, twenty five or thirty miles to the Boone Road turnoff, and our Johnson Valley destination. As we pulled onto the flats, we looked for the flashing red light that marks the motor home of Jerry Sparkman. Tow rigs, motor home, chairs, fire pit, everything was there except Jerry and Steve. We had correctly guessed that they got there and decided to venture out to the trails and look around. Well, Jerry could not just look, and not play. He played, perhaps a little too hard. Returning to camp with a broken left front stub axle. It was not until the front end was pulled apart that he discovered that none of the extra parts he had on hand would work. Jerry searched the local camps, but could not find the items that he needed, this was a real disappointment. All this way, all this anticipation, and come up dry. In an instant, he was reduced to being a passenger. Next on the injured list was Bernie. Like Jerry, as soon as we arrived, he unloaded his 4Runner, and headed out for some innocent play. Shortly thereafter, Bernie returned to camp, limping because of a broken left rear axle. Now, breaking a rear axle on a Toyota is not typical, and is about as likely as Mouth being without words. It is not going to happen very often. After beginning the teardown, it was noted that the axle had also taken out the star adjuster for the carrier bearings. Finding an axle was no longer the only problem. The parts list was growing. Dark and getting cold, this repair would have to wait until morning. As the sun set, we made sure that the campfire was blazing. Thanks to Bernie’s full truckload of wood, plus a few donations by other, we had the weekend covered. Keith donated several large stumps, one of them we affectionalty name Eve. That is a whole different story. It was getting very cold, very fast. Carl and Keith had made prior reservations for bed space in Preble's motor home. I was going to sleep in the back of Keith’s truck with a tarp over the bed. This should work, I would be off the ground, and I even had two sleeping bags. At about 7:00 PM, I left the fire, and walked over to the truck for a drink. This is when I noticed that my sleeping bags and tarp were already wet and coated with ice. Maybe two sleeping bags would not be enough. I made my way back to the warmth of the fire to deice the sleeping bags. Preble to the rescue, he offered me floor space in the motor home. I jumped right on that offer, thanks Bret. The truck bed was not looking like a very promising idea at this point.

We rolled out of the comfort of our sleeping bags at about 7:00 AM. Greeted by the same penetrating cold that had put us to bed the night before. While waiting for the raising sun to warm it up, most of us tried a warm beverage of our choice, to start the warming process from the inside out. Bernie, with a broken rig, had to figure out how to get his rig back on the trail. Luckily, Anthony knew someone in the area who could help out. While the rest of us left on the warm up run, Bernie would head to town for parts. Jerry had pretty much given up on his repairs. There were several combinations of parts that could repair his rig, but none of them were coming together. Sadly, it looked like he would be seeing these trails from the passenger seat. The buggy pilot, Mikey G, was supposed to lead us to ‘Big Johnson’. Perhaps a missed turn or two, and we were at the ‘Claw Hammer’ trail head in error. Being completely new to Johnson Valley, we did not know exactly where we were, when we were there. While I do not think there are any ‘easy’ trails at ‘The Hammers’, this one should give us an introduction to the area, no matter what it is called. With a pucker factor of six, this was a good choice. One would think that a rock is a rock, but these were not like the ones we were accustomed to. This was a river wash, and as such, the rocks had a polished surface that we found different that what we usually experience. Although tough and different, everyone in our group did an admiral job of negotiating the trail and we finished without incident. Perhaps I need to clarify that statement, without ‘vehicle’ incident. We cannot forget the part about Tin Man’s attempt to amputate the end of his thumb using the squash and peel method. Working with dangerously sharp metals, one would think that Bret would have a better sense of extremities preservation. Yet he seized almost the earliest opportunity to drop a large boulder on his thumb. Cracking the nail and trying to squeeze off the end of his thumb. On second thought, later, back at camp, this would give him an excuse to drink some pain killer (do we need an excuse?). From here, we would return to camp for some food before taking on our second run of the day. As we arrived, Bernie was still wrestling with getting his Runner back on the road. Food, drink, tighten a few bolts, and we would head off to tackle the next trail on our plan. This time we would head out for a night run of ‘Sledgehammer’. According to rumor, this was going to be a step up from what we had just done, and perhaps our first real challenge. As we headed out across the flats, which were not really flat, it became apparent that Keith had picked the correct Christmas present for me. He got me a pair of helmets to wear while wheeling. Oh, I don’t really think he did it to be nice. He just knew that I was only one more head injury away from him having to visit me in ‘the Home’ and spoon feed me oatmeal. On our trip out to the trail head, I cracked by head on his roll bar, hard, multiple times. There is only so much abuse that even a cucumber can take before all of the seeds leak out. I had lent the extra helmet to Keith, although he did not put it to the test like I did. Luckily, he sits in the Jeep like he is about four feet tall, had lots of head room, and did not suffer the abuse that I did. I was trying to navigate using the GPS that I gave him for a Christmas present. It worked really well, except for the fact that I was reading it upside down and did an amazing job at sending us in the wrong direction. Looking at the doted lines that portrayed our path, was like looking at a fishing pole backlash and trying to figure out where the lines go. Hey, he knows about my head injuries, it was his fault for giving me so much responsibility. After driving for six miles to get to the trail head that was only 2 miles away, we were ready to go.
This trail started out in a very traditional sandy bottom river wash. Keith remembers it as non stop wheeling from one obstacle to the next. That is the way I remember most of the Johnson Valley experience. On one of the first tougher sections, Tim busted one of his extra strong one ton Birfields on his Rover. Not knowing what was ahead of us, and being fairly close to the bottom, we decided the best option at this point was to somehow turn him around and walk him out. This was not an impossible task, but not exactly an easy one either. Once turned around, we all walked him out and too the bottom of the wash, probably about ¼ mile. We turned him loose, and told him that we would meet him back in camp. We all made the long uphill walk, in the dark, back to the rigs to continue our journey. Sledgehammer was a good run. Harder than Claw? So far, both of these trails were different than anything that we had been experienced before. Hard, harder, hardest, who’s to say? After some very good sections, we came to what appeared to be the top. A sign post with mileage to other areas; no doubt these were GPS mileage figures. Mileage to Rubicon, Hollister, etc. According to the sign, Hell was only two feet down. There was a mail box with various items, beside the traditional log book; there was a host of broken parts. Heading up and out the trail we were greeted by one more 300 foot section of boulders. Then a fairly long, but stable, hill climb. Or, one could take the trail that rode the ridge to the top. Indeed still steep. Derek, in his automatic buggy, played at the hill climb easily making several runs up and down. As Derek crested the hill for the final time, Keith thought that he would also give it a shot. The little V6 cranked up, the exhaust sung, and we made it up and over without skipping a beat. The only thing remaining was to wind and weave our way along the trails and back to camp. We were greeted by several poachers sitting around our fire pit. But these were not ordinary poachers, these were experienced, and undeniably the most accomplished rig pilots in the northern hemisphere. If you had a doubt, just ask them. If there mouth were a toilet, they were long overdue for flushing cause nothing but shit came out of them. According to them, sure we did Sledgehammer, but we had no bragging rights until we at least ran Jackhammer. And even that would not elevate us to their status. They rated Jackhammer as only a seven out of fourteen. Apparently their own special rating system. Who would have thought of a rating system of 1 thru14, what a concept? The traditional 1 thru 10 was not good enough for these guys. Within minutes, they had cleared the fire pit of others. No one could tolerate this mind set, and left. Sunday Morning, today’s plan included an assault of the number seven rated Jackhammer trail. The heck with the poachers, we had read that Jackhammer was a Johnson Valley experience that had to be part of any stay there. Bernie was putting the final touches on his rig. Axle and differential repaired, bolted back together, and almost ready to go. The trail, in Hammers tradition, did not take long to throw up a challenge. A very steep, ten foot climb, up and over a large outcropping. Then, throw in a deep gap down the middle just to make it interesting. Point and shoot. Crawl a little, hammer a little. This was a great start to one of the better trails. Kris decided that with his longer wheelbase Yota that he would try the smoother, but steeper line to the right. There was a ledge at the bottom that would not allow his rear wheels to pass. He ended up motionless, except for his spinning his wheels, while getting a great view of outer space through his windshield. Denied, he ended up taking the left hand path splitting the gap. As we poked, plodded, and maneuvered our way up the hill, we could see several other small groups of vehicles gathering at the bottom. However, they did not stay long, and thought better of the idea and left. The boulders temporarily ended, and the trail took a steep uphill route that leveled off on a plateau. A place to contemplate the very steep path up ‘Death Ridge’, and along the crest of the hill, and over the top. With hundreds of feet drop off on both sides, very loose boulders and dirt, this would be a thrill ride for most. Everyone made it to the top, but not without small suction marks on the seats. Wonder what those were from? Wind down the hill, and we t’d into the road at the sign post we had passed at the top of Sledgehammer. The path from here out we had done the night before. Only a short section of boulders remained.

Towards the top, Bernie with passenger Sean, bounced and bounded up the left hand route. As forward motion stopped, Bernie being Bernie, saw no need to take his foot off the throttle. That prompted the Jack Rabbit on speed imitation. Being on the high side of a boulder hill, the bouncing took him sideways down the hill, interrupted only by small burst of traction that propelled him forward a few feet before going sideways again. What a ride. All that you had to do to confirm this was to look at Sean’s face. Actually, very little of his face was visible, when your eyes are open that wide there is not much face left. Bernie came very close to testing his new roll cage, only luck and that extra burrito for lunch kept him from going over. Bernie tried the left, and we had all done the center route last night. This time in daylight, several people decided to try the right hand, absolute vertical path. Anthony in his well prepared buggy, successfully walked this section. Bernie made it up and ended up balanced on his skid plate as he crested the climb and turned left to drop off the other side. Without assistance, he managed to back up a little to free himself. A little more throttle this time, and he was over. Keith was next and absolutely stood his Jeep on its butt. The carb was doing good now, and the engine still managed to run. Keith only shut it off because he noticed that he had no oil pressure. Once a plan of attack was established, he cranked it over, and it fired up. He backed up a little, and made another run using a different line. He also made it up and over, but not before attaching a spotter’s strap for spectators to hold on to. When your vehicle is standing on it tailgate, any assurance at all is better than nothing. The next attempt was by Chris Brown. In his also capable rig, he walked past Keith’s balancing point, and preformed his own high wire act. This time it was his turn for the spotters strap. With a glint in his eye, he carefully followed Bernie’s spotting direction and pulled forward. Trust was the word of the day here. As he pulled forward, his Jeep first leaned to the left, giving Chris an excellent view of his landing area if this failed to work and he rolled of this boulder. As his rear wheels cleared, the Jeep leveled, and then rolled to the right as he drove off this section. I am not saying that this was tense, but you could hear Chris’s butt release suction as he completed this maneuver. Preble’s longer and wider fat piggy made child’s play of this section, and had no problem at all walking up and over. The only thing left now was the hill climb up and out of this valley, then the trail back to camp. Our last trail, and another night run, would be ‘Outer Limits’. So named, because the trail head is all the way around the back side of the mountain. Armed with a topographical map and the GPS coordinates, we set off to see what this trial would have in store for us. As the crow flies, it was only about 3.5 miles from base camp. Since no one in our group was a crow, we had to stick to a surface route that was probably closer to 5 miles. Traveling this far, inspired drivers to throw a little caution to the wind and crank up the RPM and vehicle speed. The ground being a high percentage of sand, was very soft. Soft ground, beaten paths, and vehicles, are the formula for whoop de do’s extreme. Speed and Whoop’s produce the product testing equivalent of using your head as a speed bag while sitting in a car being dropped off a roof, 100 times. Helmets rule. According to the GPS, the trail head was approaching but there seemed to be no beaten paths that exited in the correct direction. Who needs a path? We headed off across the sage brush. After zigging and zagging with no luck in getting the cross hairs lined up, as a secondary method, the topo was put to use. Between the two, we had a launch. This trial was definitely different than the previous three we had run. More of a river wash, the base was pure sand with highly polished rocks and boulders everywhere. Within the first on