Thanksgiving Weekend, 2006
Friday November 24

Steve was tenacious and gave it many tries.  He even tried going up backwards!  Steve then aired down his beadlocked 37" MTR's to less than 5 lbs of pressure and tried again.  It was an awesome display of driving skill in an outstanding rig; not just because he stuck to the wall, but because he kept the unsuccessful attempts under control, recovered, backed down and tried again! 

Finally, after about 15 tries he "perched" on the flatter area above the first step.

Once "perched" Steve calmly stopped, shifted into low/low and crawled the rest of the waterfall!  As far as we know he is only the 2nd person to drive Ballerina Rock without winching!

But Steve wasn't done...  next he positioned himself to drive straight down the face at the top of the wall (an amazing display of driving skill in itself) and drove down the waterfall!

Click here for a video of the decent (on YouTube) by Vince.

After Steve drove down Ballerina Rock some guys on Dirt Bikes also drove down it!  This was thrilling to watch.  They went straight down the face in low gear and then hit the gas at the bottom to bring up the front tire!  They said they have also driven up the waterfall...  they go up the right side.  I would like to see that!

Fred, who was just out for the day, said his good-byes and we headed back to camp.

Back at camp I went to work on trying to come up with a way to fix my drive shaft.  I had lots of help from Steve Bennett, Steve Parker, and Bob.  Thanks guys, I learned a lot, even though we didn't get it fixed.

Steve Parker and Bob headed for home but not before calling a friend, Mike, in Yucca Valley.  Mike was at a Parts store and would pick up the proper u-joint for the CV and meet us later at Hwy 247 and Boone Road.  What great guys!

Vince, Roger, and Danielle headed over to Means to visit with Troy and his friends.  They came back about dark with a present for me...  A Toyota front drive shaft!  Troy's friend Joey had given up his spare for me!  Thanks so much Joey!  Unfortunately this drive shaft was for a truck with dual transfer cases (which I do not have) and was too long...

Friday night we had a great fire.  Roger had some nice fireworks and entertained us by launching sky rockets from his bare hands!  It must be that "Welder's Skin".  One sky rocket went off too soon and Roger had to drop it.  It shot all around the campfire and exploded under Danielle's chair!  I haven't laughed that hard in a long time!

Roger had one more surprise for us...  I won't say what it was or how he did it (to protect the guilty) but it was the loudest thing I have ever heard.  It had almost no flash but sent a huge THUD/WHOMP across the lakebed.  The echoes off of the mountains rang 6 times and car alarms went off a half mile away!  Don't try this at home, or probably anywhere else!  If you are ever in camp with Roger, ask him to set one off!

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