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Doomicon Trip Report
Sunday November 17 2002

In attendance:

John Baron and Mia (Dragonfly and Rock Dazed) - Toyota Land Cruiser
jo-jo (Fleshly welded CJ5)
Chet and Alan (Grouper) - Toyota Rebco Box
Angus and Rob (Mountain Goat and Soundhound) - Toyota pickup
Colin and Jim (Pistol Pete and Jimbo) - YJ with Boggers!
Ibby (Cherokee)

We met at the usual place, Sooke A&W around 9:30-9:45 on a beautifully wet Sunday morning. I was running a few minutes late myself, and we had word that John and Mia were as well. We managed to get on the trail around 10:45.

We made our way to Butler gate, aired down and continued on to the No-Way-Out entrance off Boneyard Main. Pretty uneventful, but we did find a couple of trees blocking our path. John borrowed my chainsaw and made short work of them. Next up was the first hill of No-Way-Out. To this day a lot of hills still freak me out, but this one is one of the worst. I guess it has to do with the angle being quite steep and the dirt being fairly loose. Even with the amount of rain we had, the dirt wasn't terribly muddy, and it was loose enough to cause a little sliding. The tree on the left just after the lip of the hill gets a little foreboding at times too.

Onward down the trail we continued, up the sharp corner on the rocky trail, only to be stopped again by another fallen tree. This time jo-jo and Chet showed off their lumberjack skills and quickly had us on our way.

The first tough obstacle was a little challenging. It was a rocky outcropping with one big rock off centre to the left. The rain and mud made this place very slick. John, Chet and jo-jo made it up without much difficulty. Chet needed to air his MTR's down a little lower, and jo-jo had to make a couple of tries, but all made it up with relative ease. Angus took a line to the left of the rock, along the tree line. He made it quite far, but still needed to be winched due to a bad angle of approach to get back onto the trail. Colin took the same line, and skidded a little too far to the left and had to winch himself back onto the trail. From the cursing and look on his face, it looked like he was worried he was going to roll. There was a bit of air under his right front tire. John turned his Cruiser around and helped my Cherokee up the same left line.

A little further up the steep rocky slope there was a slight bump that was again very slick due to the rain and mud. As I got to it, Colin was trying to find the right line over it. One small stump was holding him back, and after giving another try a little more vitamin G, his rear drive shaft u-joint packed it in. John pulled him up to a flatter spot, and Colin surveyed the damage. The strap bolts on the rear axle pinion yoke had sheared off, and the u-joint caps were gone with them. Luckily I had spare parts in the Cherokee for just such an occasion. I drove up a little bypass that neither of us new about (thanks John!). If you want to bug Colin in the future, just mention to him "I think there might be a bypass..." Colin replaced the caps and straps, and discovered one of the cap retaining tabs on the pinion had broken off. He completed the repairs while the rest of us prayed to the 'wheeling gods that the cap wouldn't come out. We were off again.

The next obstacle was a funny rock face. It didn't favour short wheelbase trucks, but jo-jo made it up on the first try, and after experimenting with a few lines John made it as well. Colin winched just to be on the safe side. After a few tries the Cherokee made it up as well. The rain and mud didn't seem to make this rock as slick as the rest we encountered.

Next up was a little hairpin switchback, which we all seemed to get through trouble free. The section of trail just after this headed back downhill and was quite rocky, with small tree stumps all throughout. Whoever cut them cut them up nice and high; I managed to catch axles on 3 or 4 of them. Colin had the misfortune of pulling one up and having it remove his right front brake line. After crimping, clamping and cursing the brake line, it still dribbled fluid, so we strapped the YJ to the XJ and I rode brakes until we got to a flat spot. It was quite the inhospitable hill. Some large rocks gave the rocker guards a good workout, and Colin managed to tug me into a bad position a couple of times. We made it down to a flat spot, where we performed a trail fix with vice grips, Teflon tape and a screw. It gave Colin enough brake pressure to get to the end of the trail.

We all came out on Butler Main to quickly look things over. Other than some small dings and dents, a tail light lens and license plate frame, the only real carnage was Colin's u-joint/pinion and brakes. I wound up losing my antenna whip early on.

All in all it was a great run. I never thought I'd do Doomicon without a few upgrades first...

Written by Erik Ibsen
(aka Sir Ibby, the Duke of Sooke)

Pictures submitted by John Baron, Ibby, and jo-jo

Editor/web design by jo-jo

Colin trail repairing a U-joint

Ibby and John conspire to squish Colin

There's the happy boy on his D-Day run!

Strictly Monkey Business Ma'am

Jim caught in the act of filming voyeuristic movies

Colin - 3.36 QuickTime movie

Ibby - 1.85 QuickTime movie

Locked and loaded baby!

jo-jo

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