Another blog got me thinking about my adventures with trucks. I never had a problem while towing horses, thankfully. But we had our interesting moments.
I have had two full size trucks. The first was a 1972 Ford 3/4 ton that I got in 1983. It now lives with one of my handymen. That truck hauled a lot of hay when I was buying hay from a farmer. 23 bales would be loaded up and up the hill we would go. Every once in a while, I would get careless and go too fast on my dirt roads & have a top bale come rolling over the cab onto the hood & to the ground. One time, it stayed on the hood so I just left it there & drove home. Then there was the time I heard a loud "whump" and looked back to see my spare tire in the road. The tire holder had died of old age & rust. So now I had a big heavy tire & a fully loaded truck. I dropped the tail gate, got the tire up on the gate & used my handy pocket knife to cut off some bailing strings & tie the tire in place.
My other truck was a 1980 Chevy 3/4 ton that I got from my parents in 1995. That truck had pulled their 5th wheel RV across the country and back and all over the west. That truck was made to tow. It got 10 mpg hauling a big load or cruising empty and was happiest doing work. Big Blue pulled my heavy big stock trailer easily as well as pallet loads of bagged concrete, gravel, concrete block and what ever we threw at her.
Like The Ford, Big Blue was made to do a job, not be a decorative truck, and had a solid truck bed that could take a beating. The huge engine needed a big battery to crank over and ate a few hang-on parts but that engine just kept going. While my dad had her, she developed an exhaust system leak that no one could ever fix--not the dealer nor any of the mechanics who tried. All agreed it was the exhaust manifold and it gave a her a deep, sexy rumble. You could hear that truck coming up the road for some distance. My other handyman now has her and she still has that sexy rumble.
The Chevys of that time did have one flaw and it was the electrical system. My parents found out the hard way that the "Black Box", the module mounted on the inside wall of the distributor would just die at 20,000 miles. The first time it happened, they were in the mountains and suddenly had no engine, no brakes, no power steering, no anything electrical, and barely any shoulder to pull off onto. No one ever figured out why that happened, but it was easy to prevent. One of the times Big Blue had to be towed was when she would not start at a gas station. I called for a tow and sat there and waited, receiving angry glares from others who were mad that I was blocking a pump. I did make the offer to one young man that he could try pushing my truck out of the way; he declined. Once the tow truck finally showed up, he declared it was a dead battery and would jump it for me, despite my assurances it was something else. But he knew more them me! He hooked up the cables & told me to turn the key. I did & flames shot out from the back of the engine compartment. Yep, that was a dead battery problem, alright. Without a word, he hooked us up to tow. On another occasion, another electrical problem stopped us at another gas station. And the third tow was yet another electrical problem, which happened at home so a tow truck had to come in and out the 2 miles of dirt roads.
Big Blue had to be moved by a tractor once, but that was my fault. I was at a horse clinic and it had snowed the night before. I got there in the morning & parked my truck to the side of their driveway. Later that day, I wanted to leave. I had parked on a slight slope and the snow had melted, creating a slushy slippery layer on top of non-slushy not as wet ground. Big Blue did not actually slip on the mud but moved the entire top layer around and never could find purchase to get going. It was a good thing the clinic sponsor's husband had tractors.
My trucks were old, somewhat beat-up and obviously working trucks, but I got a lot of offers to buy them where ever I went. Those old trucks were hard working and tough and the engines went forever. And they both are still out there working for my handymen.
This is at the south end of State St. San Jacinto Mtns. to right.
This area used to be all farms. Here is what is left now.
Almost in Hemet now.
In Hemet, driving east on Stetson Ave, looking at Mt. San Jacinto
On Sage Rd., looking north.
Still on Sage Rd., still heading north.
Yep, Sage Rd. north again.
Out of St. John's Grade, on the lower part of Sage Rd. This is where I get my hay & feed. Now called Diamond Valley Market, it is better known to us old-timers by its original name, Big Pete's.
I took these this morning, driving down to Hemet from home. This top photo was taken on Red Mtn. Rd. looking west. The flat mesa, below the skyline mesa is where the Nature Conservancy has a preserve. Lake Skinner is to the right. The road on the right hand side is more of Red Mtn. Rd.
This one was taken a bit further down Red Mtn Rd. The mountain way off to the west is part of the Santa Ana Mountains, know as Saddleback. I grew up in Orange County, on the other side of those mountains.
Another view from Red Mtn. Rd, looking north west.
Now on Sage Rd, a view north to the San Gorgonio Mtns., nearly 12,000 feet tall and snow capped.
Here is my senior handyman with my brand new Swisher String Mower. They are having a fine time taking down the weeds.
This started Thursday July 15 with a lightning strike in the middle of a non-inhabited area of about 20 acres of brush. Then it jumped the paved road & burned a bunch more. This was right near where my dirt roads meet the paved road. It is 2 miles by road and about 1 1/2 mile away straight line. The road there is Empty Saddle Trail, so the firefighters named this fire, Saddle Fire. One neighbor was right up near there on his cell phone because the entire area was down due to a major equipment failure of Verizon's. He didn't see the strike but sure heard the thunder right behind him.
Here the fire is finishing up on my side but has hit a thick patch of brush on the other side of Red Mtn Rd. on the right where the huge upwelling of dark smoke is.
The brown smoke on the left is coming from the saddle fire on the other side of Red Mtn. Rd. The big upwelling of white smoke on the right is from the Cactus Fire which is about 3 to 4 miles away in a straight line. At this point, the wind was out of the SW which was pushing the fire away from us, mostly. That one burned hundreds of acres before it was over.
The fire ended up at about 80 acres with most of it on the other side of Red Mountain Rd. This is the 20 acres or so on my side.
Here is some of the orange fire-retardant chemical the plane dropped.
And here is how the fire crew stays hydrated! They must buy it by the pallet. I hope they recycle all those bottles.
Choice of Photo Captions--
I got her from a county shelter the end of October 2008. We had a little over a year together which was very good. She was a loving and happy cat, sleeping on me at night and in my lap during the day.
This is the view from the vantage point where the dirt roads meet the paved road where I was waiting for the electrician to arrive. This is looking east.
From the same vantage point, looking southwest.
And this is the dirt road heading out, dipping down to Willow Culvert.
This photo was taken in Feb. after a storm put some snow on the Palomar Mtns. It may soon be looking like that again as a late spring cold storm is coming through. We got about 1/3 inch of rain last night with more in the forecast for tonight & tomorrow. Snow levels are to be down to 4,000 feet which will just miss us at 3,000 feet. It is cold--40 when I left home this morning at 9:30--and very windy. The horses, who are all shedding, are wondering what happened to the nice warm weather. I'm glad I have this nice barn to stash them in for the night so they can get out of the wind and wet. They'll be going in tonight. We do need the rain and it is very good to get such late rain.
The cats own the house and can go where ever they please. He likes the kitchen table.
This was my arena after the last big rain. And probably what it will look like again after the storm coming in this Friday/Saturday.
This is Sky Dancer, who gets up onto the bathroom counter & then opens the cupboard and makes himself a nice cave. He sometimes stays in there all day long. I don't use the towels on this shelf as they are now his bed. MY towels are on the next shelf up.
