Bottle your own wine

I got up there Friday (early evening) ’cause I don’t move fast enough in the morining to get my ass on the road in time like others did on Saturday moring. Ira & Lorie, and Mike & Navi arrived Sat morning. We spent Saturday afternoon exploring local caverns - lots of fun. On the way home I, once again, had a lucky break (i.e. it didn’t happen on the trail). Going around a normal corner at normal speed, the bracket that holds the rear track bar to the axle decided to become completely unhinged from the axel.

Everyone headed for the barn to pick up Ron’s trailer while I stayed behind to watch over the dogs and the disabled ZJ. Ron, returned with his trailer, followed by Ira and Mike in Mike’s car.

The real excitement started when we started to load the ZJ onto the trailer. A short ways up the ramps, the trailer front end goes flying up in the air. The downward momentum of the ZJ takes out one of the ramps. Come to find out Ira had forgotton to close the latch that secures the trailer tongue to the hitch ball (do I smell Cowbell here).

Several attempts at straightening and then reusing the bent ramp failed. Finally were able to position the rear of the trailer up against a small hill and drive the ZJ onto the trailer without ramps. The trip back to the barn was uneventful.

Back at Ron & Carol’s we had pizza for dinner then watched a very entertaining movie. So much for Saturday’s fun.

Sunday we had a delightful breakfast in town then headed out for some wine tasting, bottle-your-own (or not), and wine purchasing. At the first winery Ron & Carol and Mike & Navi bottled a bunch of there own wine. Ira took a liking to the Port (unfortunately not available for bottle-your-own). He and Lorrie joined a wine club and got a whole bunch of discounts and free-bees.

As we were leaving, we crossed paths with Joe and Amy. We decided to meet up with them later at some other winerery, or, barring that, at least back at Ron & Carol’s. Mike & Navi had reservations in Reno for the night, so they headed on down the road after the first winery.

We hit 3 more wineries and filled the back of Carol’s Grand Cerokee with our purchases. We then head back to Ron & Carol’s where we met up with Joe and Amy.

Everyone except me headed into town for burgers, but I wanted to get on the road so I could drop my Jeep off at the shop Sunday night.

I hit the bay area just about dusk. Great timing - I got to see some great fireworks all the way from the Altamont pass to home.

The Jeep is in the shop now, and, thanks to Overkill Fabrication, it looks like I might actually be able to make Ira’s run next weekend.

All in all, a very fun weekend (lucky break included), albeit a tad on the warm side. One more thing - we did get to see quite a lot of Carol’s pet deer, Lucy. Lucy wasn’t even spooked by the dogs (Kaiser, Dixie, and Tessa).