The Year That Was 2010

January - We took Gertie on the first of many trips along the Pintler Scenic Byway (MT Hwy 1).

February - Replaced her manifold pressure sensor.

March - New tires and powdered-coated wheels for Gertrude, broken engine for Ludwig.

April - Installed "new" seats in Gertie.

May - Overhauled Ludwig's gas tank.

June - Colin stopped by and we modeled the season's fashions.

July - We moved from Missoula to Anaconda and Ludwig's new engine got built. 

August - Gertie topped Skalkaho Pass.

September - Ludwig's engine arrived.

October - Gertrude gets her fuel pump rebuilt and replaced.

November - Took a long roadtrip around Georgetown Lake.

December - Defoliated part of Beaverhead-Deer Lodge National Forest.

Yellow Beetle in Butte

This attractive little gal was waiting at the entrance to Three Bears in Butte so you know we had to take a look.

That's a Empi four-tip exhaust lurking under there, which isn't a good sign. Cheap Chinese crap.

So it's a '65, has a "recently rebuilt" engine (also a bad sign), and an asking price of three grand. Unfortunately, the interior was kind of shot, and whoever sprayed that nice shiny paint only went to the trouble of painting the outside; she's actually a red girl in yellow clothing. Still a handsome car though.

Xmas Loot

I'm not sure I've had a Christmas or birthday since the early 1990s where I escaped getting some sort of VW stuff. Xmas 2010 was no exception.

Melissa found these awesome manuals on Ravelry and got them for the price of postage. The Clymer manual is worth it for the cover if nothing else--you and your gal towing a racer with your Squareback, and the only other car on the road is a Fastback? Awesome. The Elfrink fuel injection manual is apparently a respected resource and will certainly get some use.

Thanks, Melissa.

Xmas Tree Hunt '10

Gertie obliged to take us to the woods to saw down a tree so we could put it in our house and hang a bunch of stuff on it for some reason.

I was just guessing that this location would have decent trees.

It wasn't snowing when we left home but it sure was by the time I was dragging the tree back to Gertrude.

I absentmindedly tied the tree to the car in such a way that it rendered the driver's side door useless.

Heading back over Flint Creek Pass and on home.

Flint Creek

(miles 7190-7234 ←click for map)

grade=100(rise/run)

We went to Butte the other day and had to climb and descend this decently steep hill on West Park Street.

Denizens of the City by the Bay (home, incidentally, to only the ninth and tenth steepest of this country's ten steepest streets (stretches of 22nd and Filbert, for the interested)) aren't likely to find this street very impressive but keep in mind that at this time of year it's a sheet of ice. And probably a quarter to a third of the drivers in Butte are drunk at any given time.

As always, down was more nerve-racking than up, but Gertie did fine. The ridge on the horizon is the Great Divide.


Unfortunately we don't have any pictures, but a few days before Thanksgiving we went to scout a forest service cabin with the idea of renting it for the weekend. Melissa was driving on the unserviced (viz., unplowed) forest road and as it got worse, asked me when she should turn around. I recited my boilerplate for such situations: don't drive up anything you don't think you can drive down (of course, the converse (or would it be the obverse?) also applies). About a mile from the cabin she bravely charged up a steep ice-covered hill--about a 12% grade, I later determined--making it about three-quarters the way up before it was clear Gertie wasn't gonna make it. There was no way to perform a safe y-turn, so we c.a.r.e.f.u.l.l.y backed down the hill in the fading light, and made a note to get Gertie some chains.

View Almost to the High Rye Cabin in a larger map

Lost & Found

In Missoula a couple weeks ago I stumbled quite by accident upon a trove of VWs I'd stumbled upon years before, but had never been able to find again; I wasn't familiar with that part of town at the time and in the intervening years never became more familiar with it.

That Beetle at far right is the Oval Window I'd initially spotted years ago. The earlier picture is below.

Strangely enough, it looks to be the straightest of the bunch. 
When I first saw this Oval it was just a curiosity, but now (again, thanks to Big Blue's Drivers' corruptive influence) I wonder if it isn't worth a third, more serious look. Assuming I can find it again.

Missoulaneous VWs

Another old Beetle (a '66 I think) being driven in the snow, living life.

46=Granite County, so this one is a neighbor. I don't claim to understand the Flintstone bumpers.

One of Missoula's 750,000 Syncros.