Gordons Well - the 1st Trip

Turkey Day Weekend
Forget the turkey! Grab a few of your favorite 30 packs, a couple dump cans of high-test, and hit the road. It’s time for the holiest of duner holidays, Thanksgiving weekend. Pretend you don’t give a rat’s ass about football (unless you’re lucky enough to have a working TV in your rig) because we’re going for a ride.

Undoubtedly there will be many who sit around on their couches scratching themselves and stuffing their faces over the upcoming holiday. But what happens after that? The ones that aren’t quite hardcore but still have their priorities straight will go outside, fire up the rig, and start the trek out to the dunes. The slackers will wait until Friday morning, by which time they’ll pull into a dusty, crowded mess we lovingly call Dune Buggy Flats and search out their buddies in vain for hours. I’ll be sitting on top of a dune, drinking a brew, ripping a bowl, and laughing at you.

That we as Americans have a holiday dedicated to the mass consumption of food never ceases to amaze me. I’m a fatass naturally, and I’m a fatass the other 364 days of the year, too. Thanksgiving to me is about a different form of gluttony. It’s one of the few times working stiffs like me can actually pull off four full, uninterrupted days of duning in a row. It must be because all of my coworkers are too busy sitting around still trying to stuff two-day-old turkey between their jaws. Or they’re out riding with me.
Quit reading this. Plan, shop, pack, ditch out of another one of those lame ass family gatherings, whatever you gotta do. It’s almost time to go…

- DAVe

Gordons Well - the 1st Trip
A first day in the desert. 10/31/04

I‚d say it was about 6:15 Friday evening, when we crossed over. You could feel the electricity. There wasn‚t a line, which was surprising, considering we were arriving at the peak of travel. You could smell it instantly; the smell of alcohol burning Banshees, super bikes, Quadzillas and tricked out buggies, tasting the sand (for many of them) for the first time in 6 long months. That was what it took to make me laugh as if I were seeing joy. I'd just completed a year and a half long project. My Old School sand buggy. I was anxious to try it out for the first time on my beloved dunes. I had spoken with a friend of mine, Joe, who says „we got a few friends coming out with us, as I ask for the directions to the campsite. He comes up to the pay booth and leads my brood (my girl, our 4 daughters and two old Chevy trucks, toting five quads and a buggy) to the place we‚ll be spending the weekend.

You could sense the excitement of everyone around us, music, fireworks, bright lights and flashy powertoys built for one purpose to haul bunns in the sand! The spot he took us to surprised me. I‚m a modest desert go-er. I build what my girls affectionately call, a tent city and stick to the basics; food, fire, shelter and fuel. This was not the case with the rest of our incredibly cool and fun new group. I pulled into and around a half acre circle, adorned with nine gorgeous shiny diesel pushers, all of them trolleying good sized toyboxes. How cool is that! Interspersed with the coaches were six or seven travel trailers and double and triple axle fifth-wheels, all looking very regal, holding a prominent spot for me and my family. It was all very shiny and new looking from my perspective, and truly an impressive assortment of vehicles stored within the ad-perfect scene. I thought to myself∑ "This should be a fun trip."

Friday night pretty much went without a hitch, as far as setting up went. After upgrading and perfecting the procedure Baby, I got it Doowwwn. :-p All the girls set up their tents while I constructed a screen-house kitchen to begin the very manly task of Outdoor Cooking,,,ing,,,ing,,,ing! with which I somehow managed to please my voracious family each and every time. It‚s also a cool place for the adults to hang out and catch up and chat while cooking the Friday feast. I like a healthy camp fire. Fire is one of those „Must Have‰s that you need to accommodate for. Personally, I subscribe to the belief that when you ‚re in the desert, more is better! So we get the quads off the truck and the buggy off the trailer. Now it‚s time to dump the cord of wood I brought with me (did I mention it was a flat bed dump truck?) next to the proposed fire hole. Now we're ready. The first night ride was ripe with fun and ntertainment. Not only was the new hand built buggy‚s first run flawless, but there seemed to be a newfound long lost feeling of utter peace on the sand. It totally sounds corny as hell, but it‚s the truth. I swear! We went a little farther into the dunes than I wanted to, but being with the rest of the buggies and quads, I was a little more secure about should something go wrong with the little old school sand car. It DIDN‚T! Abso-freakin‚-lutely flawless. This little car goes GOOD! Chock one up to patience and perseverance I guess I was now ready for Saturday!

What a perfect morning. It was SO time to ride! We ate a quick breakfast, fueled and started the toys and broke out the gear. Now for today kids, Daddy‚s going to teach you to climb a hill. Patton! The 12 year old we call„ Bug squeals with excitement, blurts out I will be the QUEEN of the hill! and sparked a feud with her 14 year old sister who had to, ride in the buggy. Bug got a little more than 1/2 way up that big ol‚ hill on the spiderbike (a Suzuki 230, jetted piped, with a spider web seat) a couple of times. I think next trip to Gordons, she just may get to be the princess of the hill after all. Home for lunch. Rats! Two of the six buggies total, are down. I hate it when that happens. Not mine! I gotta go shoot me some bowls! People say that there are better dunes to ride on. Where?!! It's a spot where I can bring my girls, ride on the buttery soft sand dunes, play and be a kid again, all with the confidence that at least today my kids will remember this day. They'll remember the fun. I think to myself, as I turn around and see them all racing through the same path, cut by a cool little old school sandhopper, sensei-ing my little troop of desert divas through the ever flowing, ever-changing, ever alive Gordon's Well sand dunes, Does it get any better than this? Let's go girls Let's go ride to Test!

By the way anyone got a can of carb. cleaner?

- J

The 1st Trip...
Walking into the garage, you awake an old friend from its summer sleep. The smell of 2 stroke oil and exhaust permeate the room in a last minute, late night tuning session, as greasy hands fumble with carburetor jets and new plugs. Used gear oil spatters the floor from the previous season as the slight singing of air hisses from your compressor in the background. Sockets and air tools litter the ground in an almost chaotic order as you wash free the desert from your K&N. It seems it was just the other day that you stood in camp with nothing but the fire to illuminate you as the art of premixing your overpriced C-12 and Yamalube was performed. Nervousness and excitement coupled with extreme exhaustion fill you as you sit on your bike and rev the engine with the anticipation of your next mission to the dunes, hoping once again to evade the evil ‘Witcheye’ and near death collision with a drunken idiot pulling wheelies sideways up Test at night in his 8 cylinder, nitrous oxide powered, Northstar engine with twenty four inches of travel and about $5,000 worth of chrome. Yes kiddies, its here!! The best part of the year is about to begin as thousands of desert enthusiasts flock to the infamous Imperial Valley. Long days and late nights of cheap beer, Nathan’s hotdogs, wrestling matches, making gas bombs out of used beer bottles, an occasional seized top end here and new clutch basket there, some idiot that flies by your camp at full throttle dusting everyone (ya, you know who you are), climbing into a gritty, smelly sleeping bag and waking up with a splitting hangover just so you can crack another beer at 10:00 to kill the pain, the only shower you’ll probably get in 4 days other than sweat – the canal, the afternoon ride to Patton’s with some new guy in the group that talks a big game at camp only to lag behind and hold up everybody, flying through whoops as you race the Hill and your leg cramps up from throwing so many leg kicks at the competition, the Coors Light break atop some nameless peak as you make fun of your buddy that did it with the ‘fat chick’, the classic mid 40’s fella complete with mullet and cheesy T-shirt who’s stuck in the 70’s blastin ‘Schools out for Summer’ all while cruising in his rusted out buggy with VW engine and bad suspension, guys launching the burm at the drags, and, well, some guys just launching (off their bikes that is), big surgically altered perfect boobs bouncing in golf carts that are fast enough to drive on the freeway, ridiculous $200,000 trucks with neon and custom paint jobs, the flicker of about 100,000 lights dancing in about 1,000,000 different colors in the distance (hey I thought the blinking red light was our camp), some idiot that decides to take 30 palettes doused in 10 gallons of old race gas and call it his campfire, breathing pure dust and smoke as you try no to get hit by the small freeway at Test, more boobs (and maybe a brass strip pole on the back of a Chevy with two blonds), about 50 million Park Rangers, guys digging trenches and lighting them on fire as you hope to not get stuck and be buried in sand, the long ride back to camp where you fight off your buddies for that last burger or maybe a serving of grannies famous baked beans, more beer, falling asleep in the chair by the fire only to be tackled to the ground by a stinky sweaty buddy as the other guys stand around and laugh, and last but not least… that familiar crusty sleeping bag that you’ll be calling bed for the next three days as you proceed to get four hours of sleep cause the kid next to your camp decides he wants to take about 150 laps in the burm track right outside your truck… ahhh, its desert time!
  -Short story by Orion

President's day weekend. `04
Is it just me or was it crowded out there this last weekend? Wow! Let me just say Gordons is starting to rival our big motha' to the North. Don't get me wrong I'm not complaining. I just sat at the drags looking down on the buggy flats to see all the motorhomes, trailers, trucks, cars and buggies. It's almost mind boggling to think how much money is sitting out there.

Give it up to our fore fathers. Without their magnificent foresight and the will to struggle through the hardships of the time we all wouldn't be enjoying ourselves as much as we do. We all enjoy the freedom of speech, the freedom of our own personal opinions and have the right to enjoy everything that this great country offers. That means we have part ownership in the dunes, we all share the responsibilty of helping someone when they are in trouble and the effort to keep it clean.

Thank all these great men when you get to enjoy the times we have together out in the desert with family and friends.


2004 is Just Around the Corner...
A new year is almost upon us and things have definitely changed. But as people gripe and complain about change, other things have stayed relatively the same. People who have been going to the desert for years now have seen the fads come and go. They have seen the activity level increase as well as the law enforcement. We have all seen the introduction of the beloved "Adventure Pass" and have already seen the fees triple for that. We've seen technology change the way our "toys" perform while bringing our sport to new levels. We've seen how a little bit of effort cleaning up after yourself can make up for years of neglect. While change affects us all, both in ways that are good and bad, there will always be the things we can't change or have no reason too.

What makes us all go to the this barren wasteland? What drives thousands of people to an area of where most people seem to find no use for? Why do we spend countless hours wrenching, tweaking, polishing and finalizing a piece of motorized equipment just so we can beat it up and do the whole process over again? We do it, because anyone who has ever kicked over a bike, quad or started an offroad vehicle knows that tearing around a dune with the throttle wide open has no equal. Just as surfers crave that perfect wave or a skiier waits for those fresh tracks, a dune rider burns inside to ride his steel steade around that huge bowl.

With a subtle blow the winds, the dunes reset themselves for another wild and crazy weekend. Have fun this coming New Years, be safe and we'll see you out there!!!!

Remember the dunes are waiting...


Get Ready for Thanksgiving 2003!!!!

Thanksgiving is upon us and if you stand there long enough you can almost smell the VP vapors in the air. As I drive around town, you can feel the energy and excitement as people get ready for the annual trip to the desert. People rushing to buy beer, food, gather wood, load the trailer, buy that last minute part to get your bike running or atleast JB welding that crack because the moto shop didn't get your part in on time. Whatever you're doing, it's always last minute and there's always that mad dash to get it done before the stores close early.

If there is ever a time to rig that bike, or patch that flat, this is the time to do it. Thanksgiving weekend is probably the biggest weekend to be at the desert. You'll see everything from the gnarliest banshees attacking the hill to the most detailed airbrush job on a long-travel, Cadillac NorthStar buggy. You want eyecandy? You better be out here!

The GordonsWell.com crew remind you to have fun but be safe! We'll be posting photos of this weekend in our "Media" section. Look for that soon.

Remember the dunes are waiting...

 

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