Hmm...this may not be for the skeamish...you folks who think a sports car
should be treated like a delicate wine glass...
Faced with the three day weekend, my best friend and I did our best to
act like a couple of footloose college students...pool, local bands, good
brew, baseball game...then came Sunday.
We worked on Biscuit the Midget. Michelle was so happy...Biscuit's back
on the road! She d
must have driven it around the block 20 times!! With that
grin (*you* know what I'm talking about!)...well, I'd been promising her
for the 2 years 7 months that we've been together that we'd go camping.
So, Sunday afternoon we loaded up my 1975 MGB, black, with rollbar and Pirelli
P300's, with our camping gear and headed out for the national forest. With
an interesting third passenger. When we picked up Biscuit's car cover to
put the little beastie to sleep, what did we see but a copperhead! Suburbia
in Arkansas is still in Arkansas...we caught it and decided to release it
when we got into the national forest.
It was dark by the time we got into the woods. Let the snake go, and click
the headlamps over to high beam. This particular road I'd driven before in
a Baja Bug. The MG handles much better, except that the suspension is so
stiff the really rough spots shake the living fool out of ya. I drove for
a couple of hours, slipping around corners and just enjoying myself. We
were getting tired: she was actually asleep, the way only a true adventurer
can--in a loud sports car, with the wind blowing around you, with the clank
of rocks thrown up against the underside of the car and the shaking of the
rutted road.
I finally found a dead-end logging road and we set up camp. (What the forest
service calls primitive camping)...
The car looked pretty good in the morning. Fluids okay. We took the
obligatory pictues of an MG in the woods, fired her up and went back to the
dirt roads. We crossed a river on an old truss bridge. More great pictures
there! Some tarmac driving, then back into the forest. We did the usual
stop and enjoy the scenery thing, then headed back to Little Rock. We
were in the dirt, and decided to hop on the tarmac to quickly go back to
the cool bridge, then return the way we went, when the engine started
knocking, the temp needle shot up...I pulled her over...somehow we had
holed the radiator.
And...blew the headgasket...not bad, no oil/water mixes, or water in the
exhaust...just blowing water on the passenger side, between (you guessed it)
cylinders two and three. The rad had lost a lot of water...why we hadn't
noticed anything I don't know. It happened so suddenly. Into the rad
goes what's left of our water supply, plus some ditch water...I knew of
a gas station a little way down the road. The rad was leaking from
somewhere about halfway up the core. The gas station had some stop leak,
plenty of water, and a couple of cold Dr. Peppers!
She limped back to Little Rock, running a little hot...but not as hot as
before! I figured any damage had been done.
I've got the old B clean now, and will pull the head tomorrow. I may
have damaged the engine...but you can replace those things...I know,
very cavalier of me.
Our two day trip covered about 300 miles, with over 100 of them being
on dirt. It was fun driving a car like that in such an enviroment!
(Maybe I'm just a Pro Rallyist at hear?) I think, however, that next
time I decide to go forest cruising in a sports car, I'll get a Fiat 124.
it's not British, so I wouldn't feel guilty...a nice red and black Abarth...
Michelle and I talked about planning a rally like this for any other
like minded (or mindless) lunatics...we will recce the roads *very* well...
any Scions interested? I'd love to run a rally/adventure tour with a bunch
of cars that most folks think shouldn't be out there...you should've seen
some of the looks we got from the pick-up truck crowd!
Safety Fast!
Keith
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