The Destruction of Miss Caroline!

Tracker · 10-25-2007, 09:24 PM

This is a story I wrote about a trip to Baja a few years ago! I have more stories at my website if you like this story.

justkeepfishing.com/adventure

Little is known in the outside world of the terrible events of that week. It is hard even now to dredge up the memories and put them forth on paper for all to see and read. I hope that in doing so though, I will again be able to get a good nights sleep without the memory of Miss Caroline and the events of that week, coming forth and tugging me into a deep dark caldron of destruction and despair. Accordingly, I hope all that read these words will be able go away with the knowledge that their life is not as bad as it might seem and not be burdened with their own trip to the caldron. The Doc and I met in the belly of a deep and narrow crevasse in the earth. We each had dragged members of different scout troops, kicking and screaming to the bottom. The noise made by the scouts and their leaders allowed each of us to know that we were not alone in this narrow crack in the earth. Now don't get me wrong, there was ample reason for the kicking and screaming, and it was not the unwillingness of the scouts to follow. Rather it seemed that long tubular members of the reptilian family also populated this crevasse with us and kicking and screaming was an effective method of launching ones self into the air thus avoiding the tubular fanged sacks. It also was useful in the notification to others that the slithering ones were along the trail. Our groups met being that there really was few places to camp and all of those were in the same spot. The two groups got along very well for the next two days and all had a good time. The small trickle that passed for a stream yielded a few trout in the flyweight class and some even approaching pennyweight. One small finned specimen I caught nearly drowned from the weight of the fly and the hook concealed there in. Luckily for us we had not staked our survival on the procurement of edible calories from the surrounding environment. Doc and I found out that we had similar interests in the study of animal life and planned to make another trip in the near future. During the time that we were trying to decide on a location for our next trip, Doc came into possession of a book about fishing in Baja California. It was well written, with maps and descriptions of the roads we would encounter. It also described the type of fishing in the area. The author would give each area a color-coding that would further enlighten the new explorer as to the best areas to fish. The stories found in the book describing the catches made, would build the reader to a frenzy that only a trip to Baja could relieve. Thus began our great Baja exploration. We began preparing all of the tackle the book suggested for our first chosen location. The author was very specific about types and colors and so on. We would be taking small car top boats to explore the lagoons and estuaries we would be visiting. We had six children and four adults to fill out the roster of that first expedition. (It seems I always refer to these trips of mine as expeditions. I guess because so many times they turn out that way.) Doc would be taking his wife's old station wagon and pulling a trailer behind that, and my friend, the Wired Man, brought along his luxury camper set up. Of which I was privileged to ride along in. Of this first trip, the fishing was as it had been advertised. The seventy miles of dirt road to get to the spot was also as it had been advertised. Bone jarring! What had not been advertised, but had been in the glossary in the back of the book under "normal driving", is what nearly stopped the trip before it had gotten started. Fifty to sixty miles below the border, at about midnight, a two-ton truck left his side of the road. Doc in the lead, narrowly escaped being hit by this truck. The Wired Man, having just witnessed this near collision, was prepared and was able to dart the camper special off the road as the wayward truck took over the rest of the road in front of us. I think I should take just a minute here and speak about what the shoulders of the road in Baja look like. Simply speaking and without a lot of superfluous words as is my normal form of writing, I will just state that there are no shoulders on the side the roads in Baja. Just desert, full of cactus and rocks. As we left Highway1, going at approximately 60 miles an hour, I was glad that we would not be having a head on collision with that truck. On the other hand, I was wondering what it was going to be like, being ground to an unrecognizable mass, under the camper as we tipped over and began sliding along. As visions of some local authority trying to identify some part or another of mine in some shack along the roadway crept into my mind, the Wired Man jerked the wheel back to the left and back onto Highway 1. Boy what a relief it was not to have to worry about being ground to death under the camper. The two ton truck that had caused the problem was now safely on down the road, but the driver of the one following had his mouth wide open. I was sure he must have been born with a birth defect, because of how wide he had his eyes open as he gazed in amazement at the camper we were in, launching up over the embankment, traveling though the air like a guided camper missile, straight at his door. It was sort of like watching one of those videos where the smart bomb's camera shows what it sees just before the big bang. How and why we did not perform a metal meld with that truck is just another small circumstance in a string of such circumstances, forming a swirling mass………Whoa! That is a different story! Anyway at the last minute, the Wired Man again jerked the wheel back the other way and safely brought the truck to a standstill, there in the middle of the road. That is until…….No nothing too serious happened for the rest of the trip. It was a bit disturbing though, when over the CB radio the Doc inquired as to how we were. He was informed that we were not sure and would be back with him when we had changed clothes. We got out of the truck and began walking back down the road picking up pieces of the small trailer we had been towing. All of the contents it had been carrying were now strewn about the desert and Highway 1. Tackle boxes, toolboxes, food boxes and so on, were in varying states of destruction. I had a brand new tool set I bought for the trip in case of problems. Ha! What was I thinking? The case was no where to be found, only the sockets and wrenches making up the kit were visible. I picked up what I could find of the tools and put them in a bucket along with many other things. We decided to not let a little thing like almost dying stop the trip so we load up what we could find and headed on down the road. On the way back a few days later we stopped at the scene of the accident to see what it looked like during the daytime. In looking around the area to see if there might be something we had not seen that night, I found one socket to the tool kit previously mentioned. As it turned out that completed the set. Nothing of that set had been lost. A month or two later we found ourselves in the throws of another planning session to the same spot we had visited on that first trip. Others had heard of the great fishing we had enjoyed and wanted to give it a try. As leaders we had suffered mild amnesia concerning the first trip, and agreed to go along. To their credit, others on the previous trip declined participation feigning various excuses. In fact, there being so few participants, it was decided to just take Doc's old station wagon. Miss Caroline was an older model station wagon that had seen the better half of her years some time ago. She still performed her job adequately, and still had the power to pull the heavily loaded trailer needed for the trip to Baja. Five souls entered her cavernous interior that fateful day at the beginning of the trip. I am sure that it would have been a different story had any fortunetellers been present, but with an excited farewell to the onlookers present, we were off. Even with the previous experience, we planned to drive through the night, arriving just as the sun would be coming up. I cannot tell you much of the trip down because of memory loss due to the traumatic events that followed. I would have to say it was uneventful, being that nothing stuck to the folds of my brain strong enough to withstand the cleansing such horrific events can cause. It is only after therapy that I am able to relate these events to you now. The turn to the dirt road off Baja Highway 1 is marked only by a small restaurant and tire store occupying the same small shack. I think the same oil is used to cook the meals as is used to lubricate the vehicles at this isolated outpost in the Mexican desert. Either way the food is tasty, just do not look in the kitchen. We were a bit behind schedule as we began the 70 miles of dirt road ahead of us. The sun already had made its presence known with an amber glow on the eastern horizon. This road is graded about once a year and it seemed that it was about due as we headed west. Soon though we passed a grader stuck in the mud alongside the road. We did not let this slow us down. On roads such as this, where the washboard texture is very noticeable, it is sometimes better to get up some speed so as to get to the point that we liked to call, "Floating." Floating can be described as going fast enough to fly over most of the bumps thus giving the illusion of a smoother surface. At one point the road crossed a "dry" lake bed. Only this time a hurricane had passed over the Baja a week before and had dumped an adequate amount of moisture so as to fill the lake and inundate the road in several spots. The first of these spots seemed quite deep so the driver of Miss Caroline (Not to be identified here, He knows who he is) decided to go around the side of the puddle instead of through it. Experienced mud hoppers such as I knew this was not a good idea and voiced that opinion just as Miss Caroline sunk down to the floorboards in the mud. Now this was bad! It was determined that the only way out of this mess was to travel forward because we could not go back due to the trailer. In fact we had to leave the trailer attached having no way to come back for it if we were lucky enough to get out of this mess. We were able to build a road of local rocks. Most of which were gathered from more than a half mile away, and affect an escape from the mud. It only took four hours too! The fact that we were leaving only the muffler and most of the exhaust system behind seemed like a victory at that point. Besides it made Miss Caroline sound like all the other local modes of transportation we encountered. We were able to get in a small amount of fishing that day after our arrival at the selected camping spot. It had taken longer than normal to set up camp because everything had to be freed from the mud that encased it. Nothing had escaped the grip of the flying mud. That night brought the pleasure of sleep and the anticipation of a better day for all of us. The next morning we loaded up the trailer with the boats, so as to haul them to another area not far away. Less than a mile away the trailer became detached from the hitch. It simply came off the ball. The chains were still holding the trailer and so when the driver, yes the same one, was informed of this situation and hit the brakes, the tongue of the trailer came forward and punched a hole through the tailgate of Miss Caroline. It was quite a large hole and Doc wondered aloud as to the possibility of whether or not his wife would notice it. I had to yell my response, that before she noticed the hole she would wonder why Miss Caroline was so noisy. Remember the muffler? It is not easy to extricate a trailer tongue from twisted metal, and this took us some time to perform. All was not lost though because it was now not necessary to open the tailgate to get something from the back area of Miss Caroline. Many fish were caught that day but it seemed, in camp that night, that a black mood had descended upon our party. The next morning we awoke early to begin the last day of fishing. As with the day before we loaded the trailer with the boats and headed off in a new direction, and hopefully to a full day of fishing. Spirits rose as we got further from camp and had had no mishaps. Then as the day before the trailer became detached and the chains jerked the trailer back towards the car and the tongue of the trailer came smashing through the back window. It is an astonishing sight to watch this all happen in slow motion. As the window broke and individual pieces of glass exploded inward it felt as though I were trapped in a time warp that kept repeating and repeating. This time the ball hitch had broken. It had just sheared off! This was really bad! After some debate and heated discussion, it was decided that three members of the party, including me, would volunteer to stay with the trailer while the other two members of the party departed for a small settlement in the hopes of finding a new ball hitch. Personally I think my cohorts had volunteered to stay behind not wanting to be
anywhere near Miss Caroline when she exploded as we were all sure she was about to do. In my case though, I had stayed behind to make sure the other two did not sell all of our stuff in the trailer and try to buy their way home from a passing donkey or other means of transportation safer than Miss Caroline. Some people panic easily! I am not sure that you could call it luck, but whatever it was it smiled on the two as they entered the village. They did not find a new ball hitch but were able to find a villager to weld the old one back together. It is amazing what you can find in the middle of nowhere, and for only a small fortune. Back on the road again we finally got in a last day, no, an afternoon of fishing. We did manage to partially fill the coolers with fish and make it back to camp with no trouble. We quickly packed up and departed for home. Due to the damage suffered by Miss Caroline over the last few days it was difficult to get a good breath of air within the confines there of. It seemed that the exhaust would travel backwards along the frame of Miss Caroline and boil in through the gaping hole in the tailgate, not to mention the missing rear window. The only way to alleviate this situation was to open all of the windows in the car. This by no means was a satisfactory solution, but it did lower the parts per million of carbon monoxide to a survivable level. We tried covering the offending holes but it seemed to only make things worse. It was then that we discovered the hole in the floorboards! Apparently this damage had been caused sometime time during the mud incident as the muffler had been torn from the bowels of Miss Caroline. Nighttime in the desert is not as warm as one would think and this new development was cause for some concern. We had about 600 miles to go to get home and there were some dark clouds in the sky threatening rain. There was nothing we could do but continue on and hope that we would somehow make it back across the border. Tension was high as we gained speed to again float the dirt road ahead of us. The "dry" lake bed was soon to be challenged and none within Miss Caroline was optimistic about our chances. Either from a sense of self-preservation or the sheer exhaustion of the previous few days, I fell asleep before we got to the lake. In fact, when I did awaken, we were nearly to the little restaurant/tire store along Baja Highway 1. It was with joy that we approached the relative smoothness of that highway. Believing momentum was in our favor, the driver elected to continue on and not impede our progress with a stop at the store. It was growing dark at this point so the driver reached down and turned on the lights. There was little indication that the head lights had come on so he tried cycling the light switch on and off a few times. This did not help so we stopped to have a look and see if the fuse was blown. Upon inspection, it was determined that the fuses were in working order. That old nagging fear of the previous few days began to erupt to the surface. What was wrong now we all wondered? When the headlights themselves were checked, it was learned that the beating over the last few days had shaken and broke the mountings that held the lights in place. The lights now pointed down and back. The only light that was shinning forth was that that reflected off of the muddy radiator. And that was not much. Some duct tape was retrieved from the back of Miss Caroline and the lights were taped into a position that would allow some forward vision and movement down the road at night. Whit that we were again off and attempting an escape back to the U.S. Ker-thump…..ker-thump….ker-thump……ker-thump. "What is that?" I inquired of the driver. The sound seemed to be coming from the trailer and had caused all to duck down believing the trailer was coming to finish what it had begun and demolish Miss Caroline completely. We stopped right there in the middle of the road and made a quick check of the condition of things. At least this time Miss Caroline did not receive any further damage. No it was the trailer! The axle had departed company with the rest of the trailer and was only being held in place by the weight of its contents. This was bad! We gingerly maneuvered the whole mess off into the desert and held another discussion as to what if any action should be taken. There was the faction that thought it would be wise to dump the trailer and hightail it to the border before any other bad luck could catch up with us. Another faction did not want to leave the only means we had of survival when Miss Caroline exploded as we were certain she was about to do. And there was the last faction that thought it would be best to abandon everything and just hitch-hike home. The decision was made to go into the next town and see what we might find to repair the trailer. This would require leaving three occupants to watch over the trailer. There seemed no real argument about who was to go and who was to stay. Death by slowly succumbing to the harsh environment of the desert or the sudden and violent dismemberment associated with explosions seemed not to concern the members of the party. It was decided by shear speed of action. Really a game of musical chairs I would say. The Doc and I were sitting in the two front seats and would not open our doors. The other three ran around the car trying to make an entrance but were blocked at every try. I was sure glad the electric door locks still worked. Thus the decision was made as to who would go and who would stay. and by the fact that the drivers door nor mine would open.. Soon, Doc and I were waving good-bye to those we left behind. It was nighttime and we would have to wait in the next town for morning to look for some help. A fitful nights sleep was had as we waited for the mornings sun to liven up the local residents. We began inquiring with any people we saw about any mechanics in town. Soon we approached a likely looking suspect and explained our situation and asked him if he thought he could help. He said he could and for the next half hour we followed him around in his car as he picked up some help and visited several junkyards. When he had decided he had all the materials and help he would need, it was time to purchase the agreed upon payment for his services. A case of beer and a full tank of gas. When at last we again saw our survivors of the desert, alongside of the trailer, the whole case of beer had been drunk. It had been easy to follow the progress through the case of beer by our rescuers because as each bottle was consumed it was thrown out the window, causing us to have to perform evasive maneuvers not to be hit by the empty bottle. Our rescuers were completely drunk at this time. None of our party had much faith that this group would be able to fix the trailer. We were wrong! With a few two by fours and some duct tape and wire and rope, our rescuers soon had us back on the road. It was an amazing fix and it lasted all the way home. In fact the trailer was used this way for many months before it was finally retired. The doom and gloom of the previous day had been lightened some by the antics of our drunk rescuers. We said our good-byes and began again to drive home. It was not a surprise when the alternator light and corresponding alarm sound suddenly came on as we approached the last gas station we would need to get gas from. There were no mechanics at this station. We checked all that we could and since it was a few hours before it got dark again we decided to just go on and hope that the battery would last until home. We were within sight of the border when Miss Caroline overheated. We were so close to the border that we could taste it and added some water to the radiator and continued on. Shortly though the view of the border was again obscured by steam escaping from under the hood. It was soon evident that the thermostat was not working and so it was removed. Normally is a great relief when one crosses back into the States but that relief did not come until Miss Caroline was parked alongside of Doc's house. The trailer was relieved of its contents in record time and everyone seemed anxious to go. That is when it happened! "Doc, what happened to my car!"…………………………………I was not sure I would ever see Doc again, and had been feeling kind of guilty running out on him the way I had when his wife had come out the door, but a few weeks later he called and asked when we were going to go again. It seems he had bought his wife a new van and so she had taken him off of restriction. "Sure I would like to go again!" I said. "Can we take the new van?"

Possum · 10-25-2007, 10:08 PM

I like the writing style, good work, and good story.

Reaux · 10-26-2007, 01:54 PM

I liked it. So you've got more.

Glad someone else has stories.

Bill

Tracker · 11-13-2007, 01:47 AM

Yea I guess I should post up another one! I will see what I can do!

demonfish · 03-23-2008, 11:31 AM

Excellent writing. Would like to read more. Perhaps you would consider typing in paragraphs though. Blog style is hard to read. Double space between the paragraphs makes it real easy on the eyes.

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