Weekend Camping - Gorman

We were SUPPOSED to go in a cruise, four girls, but somehow everything unraveled and we couldn’t go. So, instead Heather and I planned a girls camping trip at Gorman, California – Hungry Valley.

It was a COLD valley this weekend. We stocked up on some fabulous hats at the local grocery shop. Do you ever wonder WHO BUYS clothes at places like CVS, or Gas Stations?
- Chicks who leave their house to camp in 40’F high weather with no hats. 5.99 ain’t a bad deal to save our ears from falling off. We spotted a neighbor camper getting 3 rolled up blankets at the same shop, so at least we were more prepared than that guy.

Jesse has spoiled me insanely, and took over all the loading/unloading. His truck tailgate is about 4 feet in the air, depending on how you park it, as opposed to my one bike trailer being 6” off the ground, regardless of its parking situation. The point of all this is that I AM SORE. Like, my palms, are sore. And that's considering he did ALL the prep/pack work for me. All I had to do was wake up and start driving.

He has taken over keeping track of where I put stuff. Phone? Camera? I spent half my time frantically looking for my truck key. Flashlight? Forks? I generally just walk around, setting stuff down, and he enables my behavior my constantly making a note of where stuff is, or by picking it up and moving to a reasonable spot. It only hit me during this camping trip, it is SO tiring to run around and constantly look for various objects.

Nonetheless, it was pretty awesome. We pulled up, Heather jumped on the bike, let off the clutch too abruptly, the bike promptly threw her down and landed on her. She was a good sport, got up, and asked how to have that NOT happen again. And then it didn’t. We got her putting around campground, not even stalling, and shifting into 2nd. I was super pleased, especially since she informed me when we got there that she doesn’t know how to drive a stick shift and it was a “nightmare trying to learn”

Then we went introduced ourselves to the campers next to us, and asked them to watch our bikes while we went visit town for ice, hats, gloves, and the antique shop. It was risky, but the bikes were there when we got back, although they admitted considering Craigslisting them. I probably would not recommend doing this on regular basis, if at all. Seems like a stellar way to lose a motorcycle or two.

The antique mall had an ENTIRE SET of shelves of clown figurines. Clowns are generally creepy, and a room full of them is frightening. (But this one was cute.)

It was a really sketchy, small, turn off the main highway to the one street town (Frazier Park?), with small alley-like street shooting off to the sides, all dead- ending within a block or two. There was a yard sale sign, and oddly, all yards in the town looked like a perpetual yard sale. I saw a table in the alley. Or was it a front street? It was next to a rusty boat, a more rusty RV, and a pile of wood. It had stuff on top of it. It had beautiful, although cracked claw-holding ball feet. I imagined Jesse losing his mind, if I brought it home..


Was it trash? I hope so, cause there it was, strapped in the bed of my truck. I walked about the open garage and by windows, but no one seemed interested in coming out. I took a couple branches of firewood, but then stopped, it was too neatly stacked to be assumed garbage. Which made me wonder if I have a freshly stolen table in my truck.

In a related story, I learned Heather and I can never rob banks as a team. Between my tying down the table with straps and prancing around the truck bed, the obnoxious loud idling diesel, and Heather playing on her Iphone in front seat, we screamed amateurs. Never mind the Uturns, and more loud idling, (with table already secured and visible in the back) as I was wondering if we ought take the firewood. We decided not, and regretted it later that night.

Team Log - 1; Team Chick Campers - 0:




We set up a fire using unreasonable amounts of spare gasoline I carry with me, and spent a lot of time trying to split a log. And mourning the alley-possibly-trash-wood we didn't get.



Eventually, we relocated to the big group of campers. They heard our inadequate wood splitting (Heather and I took turns to wear it down), and came rescued the log, and we brought our remaining wood, smore supplies, and our rum drinks to their fire. They were a nice group with the Infamous Motorcycle Club from Long Beach, funny, and with some awesome warm chicken and corn on the grill. (I didn’t have to step away from the fire and make dinner – WIN!)






Climbing into the truck was a little rough. I have camped before on the ground, without a mat even, so my upgrade of a blow up mattress in truck bed is just unbelievably badass and awesome to me. Heather, on the other hand was comparing it to her bed. Not so badass or awesome. I had asked the neighbors if they were chaining up their bikes, and it turned out they camped with “so many guns, its stupid”.

I chained my bikes, just in case.. but unloaded the gun Jesse sent me with. I figured the 6-12 armed gentlemen around us probably had enough ammo to take care of anything that rattled the bikes, so there would be no use for my panicky shooting in the air. The tent roof got to live another camping trip, hole-less.

In the morning, I had a dream about laughing dogs. Turns out, there were coyotes, and Heather slipped out of the sleeping bag (letting in cold, the wench!) and out of the tent, to go take pictures.


I was horrified. I have since been notified that the vicious things in Lion King are hyenas, and not coyotes, so there went my strongest argument against them, but still, the thing looked like it eats people’s faces clean off. A fox, apparently, had also frolicked around camp during the night, and peed by some tents. No doubt, marking them for the next nighttime patrol and “distribute rabies” site. Had I heard something pee around MY tent, the tent roof would have fared much worse. In addition to all this, the coyote was seen around the area I had been the night before, (illegally, as it turns out) picking firewood. Probably eyeballing my face for his dinner.


I went for a ride with the boys. Heather opted out, choosing to putt around camp again, but not before she tried the neighbors’ crf150, and accidentally wheelied it. Oh, to have a picture.. To her credit, she hung on till the front wheel came down.





We took Backbone Trail, and all 3 bikes crashed promptly in the sandy uphill. I crashed the closest to the top, though, so I felt pretty good about it. A couple of guys had only ridden street, and weren’t super comfortable on dirt bikes. For ONCE, I wasn’t the last one in the group, and even among guys! I felt all types of accomplished. Ha. Backbone Trail is sadly completely torn up.

I'm bummed we didn't get any pictures of Heather riding, so we'll have to do it again. It was also her very fist time camping, and she survived and may even do it again. Another city dweller converted. Muahahaha.

To follow: a series of pretty pictures of Southern California Landscape.