Van of Constant Sorrow '19: Day Three

Wake up in the back of the Adventure Wagon.  Coffee.  Walk past the horses to the bathroom.

I wonder what horses think about all day?

The van burbles to life, and like that, we're off... sorta.  We drive to the front of the park to pay for our campsite, but the building is vacant.  We have to drive a mile down the road to pay... or not?  No one would know if we didn't.

We go anyways.  What follows is a transaction that should have lasted five seconds but takes more like seven minutes.  I almost regret paying, but we did so enjoy our stay.

Watts had consulted his sextant and weather rock and also mood ring and decided we would head to Syllamo.

I am vibrate with excite, as I've been wanting to go there for as long as I can remember, always halted in my progress when I realized how far away from Charlotte it is (and always was and always will be).  I send a quick message to Andrea from the JRA podcast asking for possible routes, knowing full well that she has haunted this place in her previous life before moving wester than here.  She replies with some color coded sequence of trails from such-and-such parking lot which I'm sure will make all the sense when we get there.

On the way to Syllamo, we joke about how the front window wings are like bug harvesters... which is a funny joke until a bee gets unknowingly harvested, ends up on the floor in front of me, and stings me in the ball of my left foot.

Hilarious.

Hold a cold beer against my foot for the next half an hour to ease the pain.

Pull into the lot, crack a beer, suit up... put bike parts together to make bikes.

Watts having a "chicken or the egg"  moment with his Industry Nine wheel and Matchstick skewer-ma-thing,

Ride.  So.  Much.  Down.

"We're going to have to pay for this later, you know?"

Down and over and pop out into a parking lot with a big sign saying USER FEE AREA.

"Do you remember a big sign in the lot we parked in?  Are we gonna get towed?  Arrested?"

"We'll be fine."

Everything is "fine" with Watts.

Up and into the hurty parts of the ride, exposed to the hot sun, rocky and lumpy and then more up until I'm sure it's all downhill until we get back to the van and it's totally not and it's still incredibly lumpy.

There's still some sunlight, and while we've been out for quite some time, we're not even close to twenty miles.  I look into ways to add some distance, we go out, Watts gets tired of hearing his bike be all creaky, and might have lost a water bottle in the ensuing frustration.  As the sun continues to sink in the western sky, I remember that I have a bike light... back in the van... that would have made complete sense to bring with us.  We get back to the parking lot in the waning sunlight.

Down gear, go to start the van...  whir, whir, whir, but no chugga chugga... again.  And again.  And again.

"It's okay.  Just gonna give it some time.  We'll be fine."

More whirs and no chuggas.

"We'll be fine."

We roll the van back to a flatter spot.  No success.

I'm worried but not really.  We have plenty of time to get to Bentonville.  Our not-running van is still a house on wheels.  We have beer and food.  Bikes and cell phones.  Air in our lungs and electrical current in our brains.  We're not gonna die.

Somehow, mebbe forty five minutes after the first try, Watts gives the van one more go, and it just starts like nothing wrong was ever happening.

We're off.

Then the rain starts.  Watts is sad.  We're headed to another too-late-for-check-in campsite and the rain is coming down.  Watts hates rain.  He hates that we're not gonna get a "real food" or a novelty-sized Dos Equis.  He hates the coming forecast in the direction we need to go.

I'm casually terrified.  To me, it seems like Watts is driving with a flashlight bungee corded to his bumper.  I can't see anything on the winding roads ahead... aside from fog and oncoming cars.  He just forges ahead, occasionally making pouty noises followed by another "It will be fine."

Of course, we get to the campgrounds to find a closed office... although it says open til 10:00 PM and it's only 9:20 PM.  We s-l-o-w-l-y drive around, looking at all the RESERVED signs on every site, full or empty, doesn't matter.

RESERVED.

Sigh.

We find a park ranger that may or may not be "talking to" a guest and wait our turn.  He directs us to an open site after asking so many questions and handing us a piece of paper, telling us to settle up in the morning.  Park, pull down the bed, Watts takes a sad, soap-free shower, bourbon for him, beer for me, sleep for both of us.

I realize that I haven't even gotten around to blerhging about the actual OZ Trails Off Road "race," but I'm racing tomorrow (mebbe?) at the Fonta Flora Barnburner, so there's that.