A couple weeks ago it became known to us that a fellow member of a certain ACVW forum was coming through here, having bought a bus in Tacoma and needing to get it to the Windy City. He thought that Missoula made a natural first stop on his trip, and we offered to meet up with him for a spell.
He goes by chitwnvw and this is his newly-purchased '75 Westfalia Weekender. We might've said so before, but as I understand it a Weekender is a camper minus the pop-top. White has always been one of my favorite car colors so naturally I was a bit smitten. The blue/green plaid that they put in white Westies is my second favorite also (second only to the plaid that Ludwig and other brilliant orange '74-'75s have).
Note the weird mini-spare (it fits under the sink and inflates with a pump you plug into the mysterious silver socket) and chitwnvw's coral Crocs.
We told him about a couple campgrounds East of town and hope he had a good time wherever he stayed, and that the rest of his trip to the Second City went smoothly as well.
We met the Gypsie Wagon and family at the Deschutes River RendezVW just a few weeks ago. When they mentioned they were going to be vacationing in the Missoula area for the 4th of July, Mitch let them know we'd love to meet up with them while they were in town. And what's better than just meeting up with like-minded ACVW freaks? Camping with like-minded ACVW freaks! We headed out for a one-night trip Quartz Flat, just a jaunt up the road from Missoula.
Even though the Gypsie Wagon looks modern and newfangled compared to Ludwig, it's really only 6 years younger. And it's still air-cooled. (It's a 1980, and Vanagons were air-cooled until 1983 1/2. Mitch commonly says, "It's the biggest mid-year change in automotive history.")
One of my absolute favorite things is seeing how other VW folks camp. I LOVED the awning the Gypsies set up. They have a tarp clipped to the pop-top roof, and then the awning is supported by extending paint poles. Brilliant. The best part is they said it only cost about $12 (since they already had the poles). It's much better than our $10 setup at Maupin, although we'll try to set up ours more like this next time.
It was a pleasure to camp with such nice folks, who even shared some of their delicious fruit salad and fancy micro-brew beer with us. At night, when the daughters were both asleep in their respective vee-dubs, Gypsie played some tunes on his mandolin and we chatted around the campfire in to the wee hours of the morning. It was good times.
Very nice people, these Gypsie Wagon owners.
A surprising discovery on our way home was that the campground was on both sides of the interstate, connected under I-90 via this one lane tunnel.
Note to Gypsie daughter: Scruffy is on her way.
After Colin headed south from Missoula, I kept asking Mitch if the visit was worth the money. I don't know much about keeping Ludwig healthy (although I'm learning), so I was pretty unsure of how much we actually gained from the few hours he and Colin talked and worked as E and I observed from the sidelines. Seeing Colin in action in Maupin completely assuaged all my concerns.
Colin was busy the entire weekend helping buses and their owners. But finally Sunday afternoon rolled around and when everyone but the stragglers left, Colin was ready for Ludwig. Mitch and Colin dove right in. The warm weather clearly was invigorating for him, because even though he had been working on other buses all morning (actually, all weekend) he showed no signs of fatigue.
The first order of business was adjusting the brakes. Then Colin looked over the chassis with Mitch, explaining what we're going to need to do to protect Ludwig's belly from rust.
Here Colin is explaining to Mitch how he should go about fixing the steering when the time comes. I'm pretty sure he also told him how to replace the brake booster too. My favorite part Colin's diagnoses wasn't just what needed repairs, but what part of the work might present challenges.
Like here, when they were removing and adjusting the shifter, Colin told Mitch that a particular spring was in good shape (which was good), but it meant it was going to be a real pain to get everything back together again.
We also learned that Ludwig's engine is several inches further back than it ought to be, although I don't remember why that is. At any rate, it isn't problematic.
One aspect of Colin's teaching that I really liked was how he was always (at least) one step ahead. He instructed Mitch on what to do, frequently offering demos, answering questions and working along side him. And while Mitch dutifully worked away as instructed, Colin would slide under the bus and diagnose the next adjustment. Then when one repair/adjustment was complete Colin would quickly and clearly explain the next needed adjustment and provide the appropriate tutelage. The entire process seemed very efficient and it was informative even from a bystander's point-of-view.
Although I didn't get any pictures of it, my FAVORITE accomplishment was the fuel line repairs. One section of line was replaced and some new line was rigged up to dump smelly fumes directly in to the top of the air filter. Now we can finally ride fume-free in the cabin without having to crank all the windows wide open. Oh, and Colin told us how to replace the windshield wiper motor (with one provided by PJ; thanks Peter!) through the top of the dash. Thank goodness, because we thought we'd have to remove the parcel tray and access the motor from underneath.
Then Ludwig was taken for the obligatory end-of-visit test drive. You can see him happily barreling down the highway (up and to the right of Colin's (no-named (he's not even sure of the gender) bus) in this photo. I just hope we can get everything that he advised done before his next visit.
(Did I remember to mention that Colin whistles as well as any Disney character while he works? But not in the snow/rain.)
There's this guy, see. And every Summer for the past five (?) years, he's driven around the country in his 1973 passenger bus keeping appointments with mostly bus owners, showing them the ins and the outs of their beasts.
We were happy to get him (let's call him "Colin" because that's his name) to Missoula on 11 June. He was less so. It wasn't anything we did, but it turns out that Colin has more of an affinity for warm weather. We can't blame him (or anyone) for expecting decent weather in early June, but this is the Northern Rockies and Missoula has recorded snowfall in every month of the year. So naturally it snowed the morning of his visit and was cold (ca. 34F) and rainy the rest of the day.
To his infinite credit, Colin was willing to work with us in our impromptu $10 WalMart garage, complete with cardboard flooring. After some time in the apartment going over all sorts of things, we took it outside. The first order of business was a valve adjustment. I did the work and Colin audited.
Colin generally hydrates himself solely with Diet Coke, but on this day we had to supply him with coffee (black) to keep his blood from congealing. Above we are timing the engine.
I believe that Colin in this picture is either scolding me for making some unwarranted and dangerous assumption about Type IV engine operation, or expressing his disbelief that seemingly rational people would voluntarily live in such a climate.
Normally Colin wears little more than a tank top and oh-so-short shorts. I was secretly glad that, at least, the weather forced him to don a more civilized outfit.
With the engine tuned and running (as well as it can with its two mortal flaws: a 009 and a Weber carburetor; Colin made us promise Ludwig that we'd rectify these errors as soon as money allows) we took the bus for the mandatory drive. He tries to get a real feel for the vehicle, as most of us owner/operators don't have a standard benchmark with which to compare as Colin does--his immaculately running '73. I also got a lesson on how to (properly) double-clutch for downshifts.
There was a scary moment during the drive when this young lady in a Ford Taurus nearly (and I mean nearly) smacked us in the rear passenger corner. It was an unregulated intersection, and Colin got out to talk with her about what had almost happened. He wasn't mean or anything; he's not like that. We were both impressed by Colin's quick wits and with Ludwig's Teutonic sportscar-like response. Whew.
Late in the afternoon, Colin told us he'd had it with the weather and that he was calling the day short (they normally go from 9am-7pm). But it wasn't like he abandoned us in disgust. He knew we were going to Maupin the next day, and pledged to give us the balance of our time there that weekend. So we saw him off ("South!" was his only indication of where he was headed next) into the dank Western Montana evening.
The weather was 70F and sunny the next day.
As people were leaving the RendezVW under North-central Oregon's sunny skies, Colin (about whom more is forthcoming) and I finished some unfinished business on Ludwig.
Ludwig's front brakes are self-adjusting, but the rears need periodic adjusting. We gave them a few twists and went over several other undercarriage-related things. Most important for our olfactory and mental health though was (finally!) the taming of the gasoline fumes inside Ludwig's cabin. We'll worry less about little E back there now. Late in the afternoon we bid Colin and some stragglers farewell and headed back up US 197.
I really like volcanoes for some reason. I think it's because I so vividly remember the May 18, 1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens when I was in kiddie-garten and was very impressed by my dad's explanation of it. To my delight (as I hadn't thought about it before the trip), we got some nice long vistas of several of Cascadia's stratovolcanoes: Mt. Hood, of course, but also Mt. Jefferson (not pictured), Mt. Adams (above, at left), and, waaay off, that self-destructive old lady St. Helens (no pictures turned out). It's weird how the landscape out there is kind of a roughly rolling table occasionally punctuated by these menacing giants, compared to around here where mountains come in nicely ordered ranges.
The sun was starting to fail as we took this family portrait along the Columbia just South of the Oregon/Washington border. We drove through Walla Walla and environs in the dark, so no pictures of wineries or the Palouse; sorry!
One of Melissa's high school chums is a current resident of Orofino Idaho, so we planned to break camp (okay, to park) at her house for the night. The next day she showed us around, and our tour included a stroll along the Clearwater River's North Fork. This unassuming locale is the home of Dworshak Dam (above center), the third highest dam in the U.S., 22nd highest in the world, and the highest straight-axis dam in the Western Hemisphere. If we'd had more time, I'd've taken us to the visitor center to get a closer look at the dam itself (I'm a big fan of dams too). Next time.
East of Orofino, US 12 plunges into the rocky heart of Idaho along the constant churn of the Lochsa River. A lot of kayaking/whitewater rafting/lunacy occurs in this ice-cold rill.
Melissa remarked that the whitewater seemed to continue pretty much unabated. The winding road had no shortage of cars with kayaks strapped to their roofs either.
We stopped along the Lochsa ("LOCK-saw") for another family portrait. We really count ourselves lucky that Esmé is so tolerant of our hauling her all around Creation in noisy old Ludwig.
Eventually the winding wound us up to the top of the road and the Lolo Pass visitor's center, a familiar sight to regular readers of this blog. We stopped to take the nature hike, but were once again stymied by snow.
All in all it was as trouble-free and pleasant an adventure as we could've hoped for. Hopefully we can make it again next year.
(miles 217,371-218,409)
He goes by chitwnvw and this is his newly-purchased '75 Westfalia Weekender. We might've said so before, but as I understand it a Weekender is a camper minus the pop-top. White has always been one of my favorite car colors so naturally I was a bit smitten. The blue/green plaid that they put in white Westies is my second favorite also (second only to the plaid that Ludwig and other brilliant orange '74-'75s have).
Note the weird mini-spare (it fits under the sink and inflates with a pump you plug into the mysterious silver socket) and chitwnvw's coral Crocs.
