9-19-06 Ride Report - Crazy Eights Jailbreak In The Clouds

After considerable hemming and hawing my mind was made up, arrangements were made for an overnight stop-over at Beavers Bend State Park, OK. on the way the eighth annual Jailbreak In the Clouds at Queen Wilhemena State Park, AK.
Email verifications and phonecalls made to firm up plans with my riding buddies, Firefucker, Thumper, and Brewer and all that remained was for me to do was pack my grip and hit the trail.

As usual I packed Jed Clampitt style.

No last minute wrenching or tinkering needed to be done so we just chilled at Chez Thumptek, and got to bed at a decent hour. Thumper hooked me up with the green rack of torture to crash on Wednesday evening. He guarateed me that the "cot" aka the rack would be much comfier that sleeping on a pocket of air. Well it seems that he wanted me to feel like I had been hit by a Taurus too. Sounds fair to me, everyone on equal standing. In the morning well before darkthirty, FF met up and we were ready to hit the road out of Texas into Oklahoma.

Firefucker seemed to having a little trouble as his tankbag was mounted in reverse fashion, all the while he assured us that this was the way it works best for him. "Riding is easier while standing with the Wolfman in reverse position because of my unfeasably large testicles".

We took off from Thumpatek and our fearless leader was fully kitted out with his $600 map in a box. He led us on a forty five minute tour or East Austin, and let me just say that is one pretty piece of the country as dawn is breaking and cagers are scurrying to their 8x8 gray cubes while drinking Starbucks and cramming down Krispy Kremes. Talk about a stimulating wake up ride. What we were doing back only ten minutes away from his house you will have to ask him. I was just enjoying the near death experiences.

Mr. Sunshine was well up over the eastern horizon as we made it out on to 79 heading into his bright shiny smile, and glad to be moving along. It was a little humid but still crisp enough to warrant some extra layers that we would be peeling off closer to lunchtime.

We paused for a morning repast at a Pitt Grill Restaurant along the trail somewhere on the west side of Palestine. FF is a man with an off or on switch when it comes to imbibing, whether it be food, drink or other substances he certainly goes for the gusto. For instance his waffle came with an ice cream scoop sized lump of whipped butter, he smeared it all in and then drowned the Belgian flapjack in a good twelve ounces of syrup and left it to soak. I was completely amazed, I think he even drank the rest of the syrup.
Pitt Grill serves breakfast all the time, and the chow is decent as long as you are good and hungry. Rating is just an average five out of ten.

Gearing up and heading northwest I was only able to make it about an hour. Too many glasses of tea at breakfast.

Nature Break!

West North West over to 259 and then up into Broken Bow Oklahoma was pretty flat but at least there were some good high speed sweeper going through the fields just south of town.

Immediately after we pulled in to the liquor store, two rollers pulled in and I was confused because I only remember obeying all the road laws since with reached the outskirts of town. Sgt. Purdy then relieved my angst by stating that he only wanted to check out our killer badass'd BMW mo'sickles. The Sarge went on to speak in general about his KLR and how much he loves the dual sport stuff. He paused for a breath and Thumper blurts, "Yeah, you shoulda seen Joisee George on his pals borrowed KLR down in Big Bend, man parts where flying off of that piece of shit all the time!!" HAHAHA!. Needless to say I was concerned and trying not to let the sarge know that I was scrutinizing him carefully to try and read his thoughts about this string bean Texas redneck that just called his bike a pile of crap. So with my usual couth I asked, "Did you just hear what I heard Sergant Purdy?" He replied in the affirmative. So asked Thumper, WTF are you thinkin' about? We are in this mans town and state and you are callin' his Kawasaki, Jap Crap right to his face. Obviously you have heatstroke and we need to get you to the cabin straight away." So we bought a six pack of Sam Adams (regurgatated and filtered larks vomit) and a six pack of warm Lone Star (simply delicious), a fifth of Hornitos, and a pint of Lord Calvert. The Native Indian lady told us to take as much free ice as we needed. Cool! Anyway the coolest thing about the whole police encounter was the fact that his lady deputy who was riding shotgun had a pair of pink handcuffs, and even though I held out my hands and pleaded, she would not cuff me up.

The road into the park (7.9 miles from town) was twistee and had a lovely fresh pine scent

I am not certain what kind of proposition Thumper made to the nice lady but just check out the look on her face!

We got all settled in, nice but old cabin with central air and heat for $80 bucks per night.
The park seems like a great place and we should go back to explore further

Just about that time Brewer pulls in from Austin with his PIAA's blaring, those are set on 35 watts, just imagine how those cagers feel when he is coming down the road!

Dunno what Thumper is taking a photo of with his imaginary camera??

Darkness came upon the forest and the piney trees began to sway from the strong winds. The lightning flashed non stop but no rain fell. We drank a few beers. Thumper and Firefucker were told more than once, "You might be a redneck if you drink Crown Royal and diet Dr. Pepper."

Morning came a little soon, we packed up and returned to the Stephens Gap Cafe near the park for another cholesterol brimming breakfast of eggs, sausages, bacon, biscuits and gravy, pancakes, coffee, and iced tea. The previous evenings meal was also tasty and hearty. This is a plain jane cafe with friendly staff, big portions and inexpensive prices. My rating is a 7 out of 10 for good ol' fried food and good service.

Brewer had been working with his GPS software and had a 90 mile route plotted, 60 miles of dirt through the Ouchita National Forest over to the rally site on the Talimena Parkway. We had to run a few miles up 259 and stopped for gas. The lady attendant informed us that there was a possibility of rain and that FEMA were just up the road as a tornado had destroyed a few homes the night before. We had a lot of lightning at the park but not even a drop of rain and we were just a few mile south as we slept through the storm.

The dirt roads led into exhilirating two track trails through the forest. If Brewer decided to take off it may have taken most of our full tanks of fuel to find our way out.

The first obstacles were a couple of downed trees, perhaps from the storm the night before?

Look down the hill, a 30 yard stream crossing. Wanna go for it?Swampfoot!

We talked back and forth about the merits and pitfalls of doing a water crossing with a full load of gear on efsicfiddy's that IMO, are not truly suited to any type of serious offroading. At least I am not really big and strong enough to muscle them around.

One positive aspect is gaining a sense of pride at having accomplished something that is a daunting task on these heavy bikes, even unladen. Another plus is that if you do go for it, your pals won't call you a pussy for the rest of your living days. On the negative slant, you could crash, drown your electrics, break some bones, or even worse, a turn signal could get snapped off. Myself, I just didn't want to spend the rest of the weekend with stanky wet boots, so I voted for turn around. I was mostly concerned about Thumper reinjuring his already weakened shoulder, that's my story and I am sticking to it.

Thumper was taking his time and he landed on a boulder

You can see the culprit there by his right foot

Trying to keep my feets dry, cos I don't want to wind up with pussyfoot like the rider formerly known as Dakarl

Almost lost it on the way out

Brewer was the quickest pass, and he almost took me out, so I saved this for posterity

The rocks and boulders in the bottom of this creek were mostly human head sized and I feel confident speaking for the group when saying, "PHEW WE MADE IT" On we go from the crossing and by now we are all soaked to the skin from the tropical humidity in the forest from the rains last night.

The uphill slope is very rocky then smooths out as I take off first. Even though there have been numerous large puddles and muddy parts they all seemed to have had good traction, up until this patch of red clay that me and Betty were approaching. I stood up on the pegs and got ready, the front wiggled in the mud. Rolling on the gas the rear let loose as the front tire gripped with tiger claws into the slop. The front end climbed a three foot wall as the the rear end began to head rapidly in the direction I was moving along just a split second earlier. Simply stepping off of the machine I sat down on her haunching and waited for the cameras to get pulled out.

Thumper almost lost his cookies laughing so hard
On the road again, what would Willie do?

Brewer insisted that we only had another few miles to go, and that was very encouraging...... As long as they were no more rocky creeks to navigate.

The trails remained technical, and we were all pretty tired. Brewer dropped his bike a couple more times by his own admission. No cameras to prove this claim unfortunately. Things were going very well until we came across a locked gate with more than one no trespassing sign. Being the Brewer was the only one packing heat our democratic vote was to turn around and go back the way we came. Even though we tried a couple of alternate tracks we did have to back track and cross the creek one more time. My feet remained dry and we got back to the main gravel roads before too long.

On the way to Mena we lost Firefucker and Thumper. Brewer and I turned back for about 14 miles without any Dakar siteings, so we settled on picking up some 18 packs of beer and heading to campgrounds to get set up. They both showed up and we commenced to meeting and greeting.

Evening sets up on the hill

The evening turned into night and we broke out the Hornitos and Ken brought some shine that he passed around. Mighty fine times indeed. Although the wind was whipping to 30 plus mph and there were a few showers I slumbered soundly until after dawn.

The weather channel indicated that we were in a tornado warning and the rains came. My riding gear got wet and so I spent the rest of the morning dozing, reading and watching the walking sticks fight each for space on the roof of my tent. As the weather broke I made my way to the lodge to find Las Vegas Bill heading into town to do some laundry. He was kind enough to dry out my riding jacket for me while I spent some precious time drinking Fort Collins Chocolate Covered Farkleberries and other delicious malted beverages with the Denizen of Doom. Flash was in need of a catnap so I meandered back down the hill and spent the remainder of my day drying out the camp.

It was good as always to see old friends and to meet the newcomers. It was but two years previous when Bill Mallin and I shared came as Jailbreak virgins (in separate tents). The warmth and generosity of this band of travelers constantly warms the cockles of my soul. So until next year, or sometime sooner keep the shiny side up and the deer out of your way.

DAM