Well, before Day 2 could begin, Jackie had to decide how the heck she could make a ride out of the day with the trail up the mountain buried in snow.... that was out of the question.... and the road between Ballarat and Indian Ranch was an inland lake. Then there was the fact that the rigs would probably get stuck in the desert mire at Indian Ranch, so one of the biggest changes right off the bat was that we would not be moving camp to Indian Ranch at the end of Day 1. Instead we’d all remain at Trona overnight, pack up and be on the highway to Ballarat by 6:30 am the next day, then in the saddle for an 8am start. That was kinda sucky to think about as there was a good chance we’d be packing our gear up in the dark, in the rain, freezing in the wind, early the next morning. That just really sounded awful...Bob and I had the added ordeal of loading our corral panels on top of our LQ, which majorly sucked...! Well despite all these hitches, we all persevered and got it done. We even had time to pull our neighbor’s rig out of the bottom of a small riverbed they’d become a part of the night before. We all caravanned behind the Duck’s trailer through the darkness, north up the highway, passing a rather large boulder that was sitting in the southbound lane (thank goodness we weren’t headed that way). We arrived at Ballarat and proceeded to park off the side of the road - giant parallel parking situation for our rigs. Katie Alton was just behind us with her parents, and looked just as beamy and happy as ever, and just as anxious to head down that nasty but exciting trail as we were! Overnight, the "inland lake" on the road between Ballarat and Indian Ranch had reduced itself to "inland lakelets" that we were able to negotiate just fine with our puddle-sloshing ponies! There was no rain this day, but there was plenty of wind to make up for it - especially after the Indian Ranch vet check when we turned and headed into the wind and back to our temporary parking station along the road. We unsaddled, loaded our dry horses into the rig and headed out to Panamint Springs...a day earlier than we would usually arrive.
Day 3 was real easy and the weather was GREAT, sunny all day.....we rode back down the highway we’d driven in on, turned right, and then did the jeep road back toward Indian Wells that we would usually do on the 3rd day, in the opposite direction.... to a vet check out off the road -the same one we got "buzzed at" by a jet fighter last year (some of you may so colorfully remember!).... no jets this year though! We LDers turned around and went back the same way...the 50’s continued up the hill and did a loop out beyond, we believe it was the usual trail with the deep sand washes, and then returned back to camp the same way we did. We were lucky on the LD ride.....we heard stories of the 50 milers hanging onto their saddles - getting lifted out of them and blown sideways during some nasty gale force winds that developed in the afternoon. Back at camp, the afternoon went from balmy nice to nasty cold winds just before dark. The sky remained blue that day and we were able to get the last bit of moisture out of our soggy stuff from Day 1.
That night at the ride meeting, there was much discussion of what the heck we’d be doing for the next day. Jackie was busily reorganizing trails and volunteers with the talk of 6" of snow in Darwin and the even deeper snow out at the corrals that was the usual lunch stop for the 50’s. Then there was the tragic news of the helicopter crash on the highway just beyond Panamint Springs which had it completely closed to traffic so the FAA could get in and do their investigation. They weren’t sure they would have highway access to the vet check for an ambulance trailer and crews. It was decided they’d make a decision and let the 50’s know what they’d be doing in the morning, but it didn’t look so good to do the usual loop out to the corrals.
