Saturday, April 18, 2009

Mudbathing in the middle of the woods, you should try it sometime

Today we took the go-kart and 4-wheeler to the old Anniston Army Depot property in Talladega. I've only been there once, but Brad and David went a few weekends ago with Ray and they discovered a lot of great trails and a river to explore. It's been a while since I've been able to ride, so I was really looking forward to our day.

It started off really well - we climbed a bunch of pretty good hill climbs and went through LOTS of mud. Most of the mud holes were pretty hard packed so there wasn't much concern for either of us to get stuck. We spent the afternoon trying to find the river. Brad had told me that it would be good for taking our shoes off and relaxing for a bit. We got pretty close to it, but about 10 other ATV's were on the trail hanging out (IN THE WAY) so we turned around to try and find another trail to get to the river.

We met up with a guy on a 4-wheeler and he showed us which trail to go down to get to the river...however, he did NOT warn us of the huge mud puddle between that point and the river. We came up to this puddle (which turned out to be more of a lake) and Brad stuck towards the right hand side of it. Since all day I had been able to go straight down the middle of each puddle I thought nothing of it and did the same on this one. That was one - big - mistake. I immediately sunk. David was with me in the kart and he flipped out. The left side of the kart (my side) fell in a hole that was probably 2 1/2 feet deep, the mud splashed all over us and then settled up over my waist. David was mostly out of the mud, but still got splashed pretty good and was just genuinely scared. Brad waded to the kart and got David out. He was a trooper once we got him calmed down and just watched the next 30 minutes unfold on the sidelines.

I cut off the kart to make sure I didn't mess up the engine any more, but when Brad hooked the tow rope up to it I started it back up and hit reverse. This did NOTHING other than COVER me with mud even more. Up to this point I only had the mud from my feet to above my waist. Once I tried to go in reverse the mud was being flung up all over the kart and in turn all over me, the only thing keeping it out of my eyes was my helmet (my brand NEW helmet, which is not so brand new anymore). The strap broke, so plan B was to get out and push. Brad went to the drivers side and fell into the hole (by the way, the mud was VERY cold). Between the two of us we were able to get it pushed out of the hole. I guess that working out I've been doing paid off a bit today. From there we got it turned around and retied the tow rope to it and Brad towed us out.

Right after he got me fully out of the hole and just before he towed us out of the trail a big group of ATV's passed by us and they all individually stopped to say something like "Oh, yeah, there's a really big hole there". Oh - yeah - thanks for telling me, but I just went for a swim. I guess they didn't notice that I was covered head to toe (literally) in mud.

I think Brad was kind ticked at first because I went straight through the mud when I should have followed his lead and gone to the right...but oh well. I seriously laughed the entire time...I tried to be quiet about the laughing, but sometimes it was just so funny I couldn't help it. I just hope that the mud bath the kart (and David and I) took didn't compeltely ruin the engine.

When we got back to the truck we cleaned the air filter and a couple of screens as best we could and the kart still wouldn't start up. We'll check it tomorrow and hope for the best.

Unfortunately, we did not have our camera with us today, but Brad did snap one picture on his iphone of David and me in front of the kart. You'll have to see it on facebook though. We both look pretty rough.

When we got home tonight and I took a shower I had to wash my hair three times to get all the mud out. I promise I have never felt more disgusting in my entire life. But it was oh....so....fun!

1 comment:

Rachel said...

Wow!! That is quite a weekend adventure!! Sounds fun, albeit a bit messy. :)