The journey began with the usual group of people meeting at IHOP in Dublin. After a nice lunch we set out down 680 and then hopped on 101. We passed by the Rt. 25 turnoff to Hollister, which would be our destination the following weekend. Dave was towing a trailer with his Yamaha Banshee and JB's YZ125. Bill had one of his Yamaha Warriors in the bed of his Z-71. Marty's Toyota had as much wood as we could jam into it and it was sagging a couple of inches. The 22R was working overtime but it always seems to make it go in whatever direction it's pointed. I was just hauling a lot of gear and coolers and stuff everyone else couldn't fit into their trucks. We had our sights set on making it down there in less time than last year's trek down. I don't even remember how long it took, but it was a good 6 hrs+ after all the stops and stuff. This year we were making great progress. After all the 'safety corridors' were behind us and we started going through Steinbeck country, we were cruising right along. The weather was a perfect 75 degrees and there wasn't a cloud in the sky. Bill was leading the pack with Marty behind him, then it was Dave with me bringing up the rear. About an hour out of King City the driver's side tread on Dave's trailer completely separated and flew straight at me. Fortunately it broke apart into small pieces and landed in time for me to run it over. We pulled over and found that the tire was still holding air, but it sucked his license plate up into the wheel well and broke the brake light as well. While Dave and JB changed the tire I found the license plate on the shoulder about a 1/4 mile back and it was crumpled up like a piece of paper. With lots of hammering and some zip ties, I got it good as new and the tire was in place and we were on our way. Thankfully Dave has a spare on the trailer so it was just a small problem. 

After getting through King City we stopped at the Crazy Horse truck stop that had a bathroom straight out of the movie Maximum Overdrive. After tanking up we made it to the beach without any other complications. We went down to the boundary set aside for the endangered Snowy Plover bird and set up camp.

This year I aired down to 10 PSI and it was like the difference between 4wheel and 2wheel drive. I also found out that lockers and limited slip's help out a great deal. A few times I dug myself into ruts about hub deep and turned to the left and got myself out without a problem. Bill was running his Boggers for the first time in the sand and found he had to be careful with them as they dug him down in a hurry.

 With camp setup I did some exploring in the dunes behind the camp site. Dave, Bill, and JB were on their sand toys. Later that day, the Banshee and YZ developed problems and were spewing fuel and just not running at all. When night came around, we headed into the dunes to see if anyone was out and about. Bill is a Pismo regular so Dave jumped in his passenger seat and I followed him into the dark. We headed out towards Comp Hill to see if anyone was out there since it is usually a good show. Just getting out there was hard and Bill's wheelbase got him stuck at the crest of one dune with the front and rear tires hanging in the air. I gave him a tug and we were back on track. After we got to the next dune, Bill was having trouble with it so he backed up and got a running start. He ended up catching air over the dune's crest and his brush guard ended up in the park's boundary wire fence. Luckily he called me on the CB when he did because I was coming up the hill right after him. I went into the steepest bowl instead of going over the hill. This thing was a good 70 degrees+ and at the bottom my prerunner bar skimmed the sand. The fact that we were doing it in the pitch dark made it even harder. I clawed my way out of the bowl after a few tries. After the excitement, we made it out to Comp Hill and it was deserted. We headed over to Tabletop/Truckhill after and found about 10 beat up stock mini trucks out there just blasting up and down the hill. They were racing up it three trucks wide and were slamming into each other as they went up.  

The next day Dave and I went out in the dunes for some morning fun. The weather today was the usual overcast. By today, Saturday, there were a lot more people out and about running around in the dunes.

Dave doing some low-speed side hilling	Dave and Marty trying to make it over a crest in 2WD	Me coming up the hill we were playing on near table top
Dave going down a steep dune	Following Dave down	The Trucks: Dave, John, Marty

 Sunday we just packed up camp and headed out. After getting on the pavement, we pulled over and fired up our industrial air compressor with 10 gallons of air storage. We aired all three trucks from 8 psi to 30 psi in under 10 minutes. Since it was made for powering air tools at construction sites, its fast!

 Pismo was a fun trip that more than fulfilled our expectations. Although the Banshee and YZ weren't up to snuff, playing in the dunes more than made up for it. We also got to see a sweet dirtbike crash that will be up soon.