Where my fun begins.



Freak Monkey, Orion, Spiffy
7/6/2


After having my GL totalled by my cow-orker I decided I needed another Subie. Freak Monkey drove me up north to Novato, CA to pick up a '92 Loyale. It was an automatic, but it was the only thing I could find with power windows and locks. Now I know to go to Washington and Oregon to hunt for Subies. Oh well, lesson learned.

So anyway, we decided we need to have a quick test of the car's ability. We set out to find something to drive over. Being in the San Francisco bay area it's hard to find a public road to drive on. We took the back way out of town (Livermore, CA) on Mines Road, passed Del Valle Lake, stopped at the Junction Bar and Grill at the intersection of Mines road, San Antonio Valley Road, and Del Puerto Canyon Road. It was a hole-in-the-wall diner/bar/library that was the only business for 2 miles in any direction. Then we continued almost to Patterson before we found anything.

What we found at first was a dry creek bed with some cows in it. I chased them upstream until the rocks got too large. I then drive a few circles around the river bank and got high-centered on the shoulder of the road coming back up out of the river at too much of an angle. Freak jumped on my bumper and I backed off and found an easier way out.

Then a few miles later I spotted a road on the side of the hill up to some high-power towers. I decided to give it a try. Being my first hill climb it was pretty scary, but I made it to the top without event. This of course prompted Freak to follow in my tire tracks and climb up behind me. His reaction was the same. It was a little scary in the middle because there was a hump in the trail. It was a piece of cake. We took the REAL access road down the back and hit the highways to home.

pre-trip camera check.	Orion decides this isn't a good place to drive off the road while Freak supervises.	subie line-up, mine on the left, Freak's on the right.	here I am approaching the hump.
going...	going...	hey look at me, I made it!

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