President Bob Dunlap and Otto

            

Fellow PCA’ers

 

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It started off like any other tour—10 smiling faces gathered at Oasis Auto Repair to coordinate last-minute plans for our overnight trip to the coast.  Little did we suspect that this would be recorded as one of the most “interesting” trips we would ever take!  Not too many photos were taken, but that’s probably just fine for some of us.

To protect the identity of our members, I’ll just stick to first names.  That won’t protect my identity (and I need it the most), but you can’t say I didn’t try.  Making the journey were: Russ & Ruth, Will & Kathy, Mike & Sharon, Joe & Bobbie, and Pam and myself.

We departed Oasis right on time—20 minutes late.  Temperatures climbed almost as quickly as our speedometers on the I-5 acceleration lane.  By the time we made the transition from Bowman Road to Highway 36 West, we were into the high 90’s.  (Not the speed—the temperatures).  Radio chatter was pretty sparse.  We had 4 radios for the 5 cars, but we were probably all thinking of the 65 degree high temperature in Eureka, and not talking much.  Then the mirage vanished.  Brake lights came on.  Porsches right, Porsches left, deer left, deer right oh dear!  Russ & Ruth maneuvered around the little guy, a fawn who wasn’t sure whether to go left or right and decided to try a little of both!  Mike and Sharon chose the opposite direction, and Pam and I made it around the little guy, but I don’t remember how.   About three minutes later, “whop, whop, whop,” came the sound from under our hood.  I first thought the bra had come loose and was flapping against the body, but one glance at the instrument panel told me a different story.   Every warning light possible was illuminated—that’s bad news!  It didn’t take more than 10 seconds for Russ to respond to my mayday signal and locate a suitable wide spot for ascertaining the problem.  I opened the hood expecting to find a small deer munching away at the wiring, but I found no deer.  I also found only 2 of the 4 pulley belts required by the 928.  The alternator sat motionless as did the right air pump.  Bits of belt were lodged in every crevice imaginable.  It didn’t take but a few seconds and a couple of nods of agreement to know that we should make a beeline home before we lost so much battery power that the fuel injection would stop functioning—really bad news!  We agreed to part company and meet at one of our three destinations on our Saturday itinerary.  We limped down the road on whatever battery power existed because we certainly weren’t making any more!  No lights, no turn signals, no music, and…..no AIR CONDITIONING!  So this is what it must have been like