Hello everyone:
Just a (quick?) summary of the California Meet that took place last
Saturday. Altogether we had 16 people there, 8/9 Dakotas, 1 Durango, and 1
LHS... LHS???!!! Yup, Jon Hambleton gave his Dakota to his wife and kids to
use in the Mountains. He (like the great DML'er he is) came anyway and he
wins the "Dedication" Award for the trip!
We all met at Hearst Castle. The group got a few stares with all these
Dakotas lined up in the parking lot. After meeting each other and introducing
our Dakotas we did the tour of the Castle. First things: this guy had WAY
more money than I'd ever see in 100 lifetimes. After 2 enormous pools, rooms
with 22k gold ceilings, and what looked like a guy who did all of his shopping
at church "going out of business sales", we found ourselves amazed at the
estate. We then watched the movie on the making of the Castle on a 3 story
"IMAX" style screen.
For there we went down to a little Cafe in Cambria called "The Main Street
Grille", and with food like fresh Calamari Sandwiches, Tri-Tip Sandwiches,
Roasted BBQ chicken, Foot Long Hot Dogs: we stuffed our faces and yakked Dak
talk.
It was then across the street to Moonstone Beach. Driftwood piled high on
the rocky gravel beach, with blinding sunlight coming off the waves made for
an incredible sight. We monopolized the one end of the parking lot. Being
true DML'ers Tony modded Sam's Dak on the spot with a cool custom air intake
setup that just bolted on in less than 15 minutes. Bruce showed us one of the
Stage 1 prototype Throttle Bodies on his Dakota. It was very clean looking.
Down to SLO we went and stopped for gas in a Chevron station. It looked
like it had been invaded. There was no room for anything but DML'ers in the
place. After the pit stop, we trekked through Downtown Pismo Beach and to
Pismo State Park: Oceano Beach. There we lined up for a quick sunset pose
with our Daks and then ran down the beach. Flooring the pedal generated nice
rooster tails of sand and of course: 'donuts' were the treat of the moment.
Those of us with LSD's and 4WD didn't have a problem, but we almost got one of
the 4x2's stuck that didn't have an LSD, but in true form it made it through
with some minor assistance.
From there many DML'ers called it a night, but 11 of us went to
F.McLintocks steak house. It was an hour and a half wait but it was worth it.
There was enough food to satisfy all. One of the best Steaks I've ever had
was on my plate (only for a few minutes ^_^) and we yakked until about 10 PM.
Everyone parted ways to whatever adventures awaited them on the drives
home. Personally, I had a blast and in looking back, I realize what a great
bunch of people are on this list. I'm sure you'll see many web pages and
pictures for everyone to ohh and ahh at, but that'll be a future time.
Happy Dak'ing!
Shaun H.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Jun 20 2003 - 12:12:04 EDT