The Official Publication of the Toyota Land Cruiser Association. Since 1976 and Still Going Strong.

March/April 2007

Cooking Up Some Fun At The Coal Mine Cruiser Classic 2006

by Kris and Wendy Holt

The following feature is an excerpt from Toyota Trails, the official publication of TLCA. To read the entire article, join TLCA now!

My wife Wendy and I finished packing the 80  Wednesday afternoon after a last minute  decision to camp-it and headed west toward Hazleton, PA. The camping decision was made so we could fully immerse ourselves in our first TLCA sanctioned event, the Coal Mine Cruiser Classic, hosted by the Gotham City Land Cruisers. Because of the bad weather expected for Wednesday evening and the late hour of our arrival in the area, we decided to crash at a hotel rather than set up camp in the pouring rain. As many will agree, when trying to get our wives into our hobby, starting off with miserable weather on our first trip was not ideal.

After we slept in on Thursday morning, we got cleaned up and headed out to forage for breakfast and pick up a few things from the grocery store. With our bellies full we headed to the campground with the hopes of setting up camp and maybe getting in a half day of easy “Green” trails. But by the time we arrived at Red Ridge, signed in at the office and set up, we decided to skip wheeling for the first day and just relax and meet some of the folks around our site. It wasn’t long after getting set up that we met our neighbors—Joe and his kids, and Brian, the President of the GCLC. While we were getting acquainted, folks were starting to make their way back from their first day out wheeling at Paragon.

Because I was set on the idea of cooking over an open fire, we got one going and started to flame broil our burgers. What I didn’t realize was how much hungrier you get while waiting for food to cook over the fire. At that moment, up walked Jon Held with the introduction of, “Hello, I’m Jon—would you like a sausage nugget?” There were a few other words to the effect that cooking with an open fire would take all night and that I shouldn’t risk starving to death in the meantime. As a pure matter of self-preservation, I took him up on the sausage nugget offer and introduced myself. As we sat down at the picnic table, Mark Woytovich came over for his survival nugget and brought along some Greek olives and cheese.

Now keep in mind that this was my first TLCA event and I had heard of how nice the people were, but since GCLC is based in the New York metro area, I was a little skeptical—“You talkin’ to me…?” Well these guys were great! We BS’d about where we were from… yadda, yadda, and ate sausage nuggets. After a shower, Wendy joined us and with the aid of the nuggets, olives and cheese, these guys helped set her mind at ease that we might actually eat a meal tonight and that camping really wasn’t all that bad after all. After a while our burgers were done—we ate, and they were quite good. Despite this success, I vowed not to cook over an open fire again unless absolutely necessary.

We cleaned up and started work on a little campfire to relax away the rest of the night. I went and signed in for the weekend with Brian at the pavilion to get our stickers, shirts and the all important BBQ dinner wrist bands and raffle tickets. So far this camping thing was going over pretty well with Wendy (open fire cooking notwithstanding) and I kept my hopes up that I wouldn’t hear about it in the morning. Little did I know that it would get a little chilly during the night. I was pretty comfortable but Wendy didn’t know that mummy bags can be cinched down to cover ones head more thoroughly, not to mention it was two feet longer than she is tall. Even with the chilly sleeping weather we were still doing pretty well with the camping thing.

Friday morning, we got dressed, made coffee, egg and cheese bagels and packed our lunches for the day. Before long it was time to head over to Paragon for a fun filled day of wheeling. We broke up into groups based on the Cruiser and driver’s ability. We chose to go “Blue” for the day. Our group was led by Onur Azur in his modified 80. I cannot recall all of the guys, but along for the ride were Riad and his family in a modified 80, Dan with his silly-slow 4Runner and Don with his modified 80. There were a few more 80s and a 60 but alas, my memory isn’t that good.

We started off heading towards the Turtle Rocks trail. We weren’t on the trail but 20 minutes and we had our first casualty—one of the 80s cut a sidewall. After much contemplation, the small hole was plugged and we moved on. We turned off on Turtle’s Tail to get into more Blue trails. We weren’t moving fast but making slow steady progress with a long line of rigs. After a few more Blues and re-plugging the earlier-punctured tire, we headed down the steep hill of Turtle Trail towards inner Spare Tire and the creek crossing. After a brief lunch, several of us wanted to check out Whompum.

Once we arrived and a few guys walked the entrance it was decided that it was best not to attempt it so late in the day with the number of trucks in our group. Instead we made our way through the Play Area and down the Coal Road to give Chicken Run a try. Chicken Run was a little more difficult than some had anticipated but it gave a couple of us a chance to play on a small rock ledge. After three attempts, I gave in after bending a rear control arm. The lone 60 also gave it a try but after a couple attempts conceded defeat. It was late in the afternoon, very warm and everyone was getting tired—best to stop now before we really did some damage to one of the vehicles. We made our way out of the park and back to camp for a much needed cold beverage and a shower.

Once everyone was back at camp and cleaned up, we all told tall tales of the day’s adventures for a while and then turned the discussion to dinner. It was decided that several of us were going to the all-you-can eat surf & turf buffet a few miles from camp (so much for the full-immersion camping experience). There were ten of us that chose to go and I’m proud to report that we put a hurting on that restaurant. Dinner was a great time with a great bunch of guys. One observation that was made that begs an answer is how is it that the thinnest guy in the group (Dan) managed to consume the most food? I can agree with him on the pacing of such an endeavor but man, can he pack the food away! After inflicting said damages on the dining establishment, we all headed back to camp to claim our spot around the campfire for good conversation. The evenings festivities broke up late but all had a good time…