ANZA-BORREGO DESERT STATE PARK (PART 1)

Anza-Borrego Desert State Park (Part 1)

Feb 13th - 16th 

We left Hesperia and took a route that took us thru Hemet, CA. When we headed south out of town on Sage road we found that it was a narrow snaky road. Vern and Ruthie, I’m sure you’ve been on this road a few times with the motorcycle.

The horses around here seem to be so old they are rusty although frisky.

In the background behind the hills you can see a strip of light blue in the left half of the picture, that’s the Salton Sea. It was a resort area in the late 50’s and early 60’s and was abandoned in the floods of 76 and 77. http://www.messynessychic.com/2012/10/03/the-apocalypse-came-early-for-the-salton-riviera-california/

As we were driving into the town of Borrego Springs, Sandy said she could hear an odd noise behind us. As I slowed down I felt a bump/jerk and looked in the mirror and said “I think we have a problem” as I could see half of the car in my side mirror. The pin holding the tow bar to the car on the drivers’ side had come out. I used to use the pins that use a cross-pin but had changed to a pin that lock on the end of the pin. I’m going back to the cross-pin method. We are sure glad this did not happen coming down through the mountains.

Things were so bound up on the other connection I could not get the car unhooked until I unpinned the hitch receiver and backed the car up and pulled the tow bar out of the RV receiver.

Here is my take on what may have happened. I always put the lock to the inside, center of the car, and have noticed that most of the time when I go to unlock the pin that I cannot unlock it until I knock the other end of the pin towards the inside. I think I know why but I’m not going to go into that discussion. If you use locking pins, check every time you stop to see if yours act the same. If they do, try putting the locking end to the outside and see if that takes care of the problem. For me, I’m going back to the cross-pin method and will just have to check every time I stop to make sure no one has tampered with them before we leave again.

There are two types of locking pins, one you can lock the nut then slip it onto the shaft to the locking position, this is what I had. The other you have to put the lock on the shaft, then lock it on, maybe this is better.

There are two of these lugs, inside the nut, that go into the groove on the shaft. Now, either the pressure sheared them off or I did not get the lock on properly. We drove 150 miles that day before the incident.

We had several mornings where the sunrise was just gorgeous with the red shinning on the mountains.

Until next time,

Dave and Sandy