Corvair road trip: The smell of pine, how to roll-start your car, and Bend on a budget

Somewhere in the desert of Oregon, at some point before the Lakeview Incident, our odometer turned 14,000 miles. It turned 15,000 as we puttered out of Bandon on Hwy 42, and I cannot think of a better way to put miles on a car than a drive up to Crater Lake. Except for maybe a drive through Yellowstone, but that is a story for a different time.

Camping at Diamond Lake c. 1995

Smell is a strong trigger of memory. I have a candle that reminds me of my college dorm, some lotion that reminds me of living in Beijing, a fishy backpack that will always and forever bring back that bus ride in Cambodia (talk about a story for a different time!). I tell you, though, that there is nothing in the world quite like the smell of a Northwest pine forest. Except for maybe a sagebrush plain… I might be slightly biased having grown up camping in the forests of Oregon and Idaho, but the smell of pine always transports me to a better place.

I was transported to just such a place as we entered the Umpqua National Forest on Hwy 138. Oh, what glorious air, so fresh and clean, dry and fragrant—all the things I love from my past, and all the things air in Southeast Asia is not.

Not much could have spoiled my piney ecstasy. However, there was a constant niggling in the back of our minds that the increasing inland heat along with the steady climb up to Crater Lake would cause our little car to balk. 

Diamond Lake

Mt. Thielsen

Sure enough, at a rest stop near Diamond Lake and Mt. Thielsen, we almost did not get it started again. But then it did start. So we drove straight through to the first viewpoint at Crater Lake.

Drive to the rim

I think it is difficult not to be impressed by Crater Lake.  It still impresses me, though I am probably not the best barometer for such things. MHH, on the other hand, is more difficult to impress, but I knew he would love it, which he did. I even thought I had better warn him not to wreck the car as he pulled up to the rim, which he did not.

MHH takes in the beauty

I just had to add this one of my
grandparents at Crater Lake 

After the requisite exclaiming and excessive snapping of photos, we decided to make a move for the visitor center, but the Corvair would have none of it and continued having none of it until I really felt quite awkward for all the people looking and snickering at the silly couple with the old car that would not start.

MHH poked around under the hood. Passing men offered their observations (vapor lock, huh?) and random bits of advice. The people parked next to us offered a jump.

The Corvair can't tear itself away from the crater

But the Yellow Bomb simply refused to start. It had a premium view of Crater Lake, and it wanted to stay. Lovely though it was, we did not want to stay, so our final and fairly brilliant plan was to ditch the visitor center, get the car rolling back down the road toward the north entrance, achieve a speed of 20-25mph, and hope that the owner’s manual was right about being able to push-start at speeds of 20-25mph.

I would like to talk momentarily about the expectation I had on first reading the term ‘push-start’ in the context of starting the Corvair. My expectation was that a reasonable number of average people on an average road would be able to push a Corvair to the eventual end of a started car. As you might recall from the Lakeview Incident, in which two people pushing a Corvair on a flat road were most definitely not able to achieve a ‘push-start’, my reasonable and average expectation turned out to be very inaccurate. I dearly hoped that a ‘roll-start down an 8,000 foot mountain’ would be more successful.

If you are the people who very graciously attempted jump-starting a yellow Corvair, helped get that Corvair rolling down Mount Mazama, and then followed in your own car that very same Covair as it coasted in neutral until the occupants joyously waved and honked and gave you enthusiastic thumbs up, to you we are ever so thankful—the plan worked!

Then, not wanting to risk any more funny business, we drove straight to Bend where we ate burgers and used a monstrosity called a phone book to find a room for the night.

Turns out that trying to find mid-range lodgings at late notice on a summer evening in Bend is very difficult, so when we found one remaining room at Budget Inn for $27.50, we hesitated only slightly to consider what we might get for that price before we took it. I will not be writing a five star review about it anytime soon, but we left in good health with our car intact, so I consider it money well spent, or maybe money well saved.

Our road trip came full circle when we hit Burns again on Hwy 20. The Corvair had been running perfectly for a full day. We were happily exhausted. Nampa was only a few more miles down the road, and all I could think was, ‘When is the next road trip?’

Corvair road trip: Les Schwab continues to fix my flats and I get up early for golf

Washing Walter c. 1999

Did you know that Les Schwab offers free flat-repair for users of their tires? I did. In high school, I experienced their free flat-repair service first hand following the decision to take my 1979 Oldsmobile Delta 88 called Walter mud bogging on the flooded dirt road between our llama pasture and the onion field. 

What I did not know is that our Corvair has Les Schwab tires. 

Okay, so I lied ever so slightly in my last post when I said we had no car trouble. We had the most minor of troubles keeping air in one of the rear tires, but admitting as much would have ruined my title. Never mind though, it was just a matter of topping up the air now and then and ultimately getting a nail puncture repaired at the Crescent City Les Schwab--for free. Who knows where we picked up the nail, but I can assure you there were no flooded roads involved.

Having completed our redwoods checklist, fixed the flat, and given the car a bath, the M & M road trip turned back to Oregon, this time continuing up the 101 along the coast. The Corvair was running like a champ on full tires, and the weather couldn't have been better.

Port Orford

If you are ever driving through Port Orford around lunchtime and aren't sure where to eat, just take my advice and go to The Crazy Norwegian's Fish & Chips. We went on advice of the man in the information center are were not disappointed. We got seats even though the small dining room was packed, and the lone waitress busted out order after order of tasty fish in an amazing display of fast and friendly service.

Now I love the Oregon coast, but I would be hard-pressed to say that I love golf. Combine the two, however, and you get something that is not altogether unpleasant. Add a cozy room at the Lighthouse Bed & Breakfast in Bandon where the quirky and vivacious owner makes a mean breakfast, and you have something downright splendid.

MHH painstakingly researched courses and chose the highly ranked Bandon Dunes, one of its big draws being the incredible location on the windy bluffs just outside charming Bandon. He had to book his tee time several months in advance to ensure himself a slot.

Of course he had booked an early tee time, but aversion to morning activities aside, I chose to walk the front nine with him.  The sky was an amazing shade of blue, but the coastal winds were frigid, so even with the windbreaker MHH's tee-mate loaned me, I was numb by the ninth hole. I did see some deer and a few pelicans, however, and the clubhouse made great hot chocolate.

A post-golf stroll around the Bandon downtown followed by dinner at Edgewaters was a great way to end our time on the coast.

If you overlook the incident in which I very confidently reversed into a parking space at the golf course and ran the tailpipe into a grass bank causing the muffler to droop threateningly, this stretch of trip was also car trouble-free.

Cape Blanco Lighthouse and Hughes House just north of Port
Orford turned out to be closed, but it was a scenic little detour

Hughes House

The sign says it all--how could we resist?

Lighthouse Bed & Breakfast

Coquille River Lighthouse

Bandon Dunes

Downtown Bandon

Next: M & M go to Crater Lake and learn more life lessons. 

1969 Corvair Monza: The Testing of the Patience

MHH bonds with the Yellow Bomb

At nearly midnight in the parking lot of the Boise Airport, after more than ten hours of delays in Singapore, Hong Kong, and San Francisco, MHH finally got his first look at the Corvair. He circled it excitedly, poked around inside, and exclaimed repeatedly how fantastisk it was. 

Now, driving an old car draws a lot of attention, a reality that had never crossed my mind. Around the time of the Orchard incident, I entered a parking lot which had two sets of very stiff speed bumps over which I crept at a snail’s pace, causing a pileup of cars behind me. I cleared the bumps, parked in a remote and deserted section of the lot, and then looked over to see the mini van from behind me on the speed bumps pull up right next to me. I tensed as the window slowly slid down. Was I going to get yelled at? Or shot? ‘What year is your Corvair?’ The sweet voice of a middle aged woman drifted from the van. I started laughing.

So when a guy in a large truck paused next to us in the airport car park, I didn’t panic. ‘’68 or ’69?’ He yelled.

‘’69,’ I called back.

‘Ha! I told you!’ He slapped his buddy on the shoulder, pleased to have won their little bet.

Posing at Lake Abert

Thirty-two hours later, we were cruising across arid eastern Oregon on Hwy 20. Coming from the tropical confines of Singapore, the dry, open desert and rock formations of the West seemed gloriously vast and foreign even though I had driven this route many times.  

I introduced MHH to my favorite places from family road trips of the past such as the Burns Safeway; the Hwy 20-395 junction at Riley; Wagontire, where Oma had spent nights on her way to visit us; and Lake Abert, a large and bleakly beautiful alkali lake I only recently learned was called Lake Abert.

After lunch at Tall Town Burger and Bakery in Lakeview, the Corvair refused to start. You’ve got to be kidding.

‘You know, MHH, even though it’s an automatic, I read something in the manual about being able to push-start if you can get it going 20-25 mph…’

‘You read the manual?’

‘Why, yes, I did.’

‘You really are strange sometimes, Potato Woman. Well, don't just stand there, start pushing.’

If you happened to be driving out of Lakeview on Hwy 140 in the early afternoon of July 3^rd, you just might have seen us attempting and failing enormously at this exercise. Sigh.

MHH then peered into the engine cavity, decided that the battery cable connectors should be replaced as they were very old and corroded, and set off on foot to check the nearby Chevron for some tools.

If you drove past at this time, you might have seen a forlorn girl baking in the sun next to a Corvair with a raised hood. You might have even waved. At what point do you decide to wave at someone having car trouble? I wondered. The rear engine must be confusing.

MHH trudged back 45 minutes later armed with a pile of tools and parts from True Value, and in a showing of skills I didn’t know he possessed, changed out the cable connectors. We crossed our fingers—

The car still wouldn’t start. ‘Let’s ask for a jump,’ I said, just wanting to get out of there, to be anywhere but that spot on the road in Lakeview where people continued to wave at us as if we had simply been gazing into our trunk and digging through our luggage for over an hour.

We flagged down a likely fella driving an old rig that looked bound to contain jumper cables. Sure enough, he had cables and was willing to give us a jump. A good ol’ boy of few words, he smiled in quiet amusement as he set the cables, then motioned for MHH to start the Corvair. It turned over, and over, and over, and over—and finally, like a child being forced to wake from a deep sleep, came to life with great resistance.

Elated, we thanked the quiet man and quickly put Lakeview in the rearview mirror, driving straight through to Klamath Falls, which is where I was born and where both of my parents are from. 

Visiting Oma

I wanted to visit our old house as well as my Oma’s old house, but as our 5pm deadline to reach Jacksonville had been tightened by the Lakeview incident, I settled for a drive-by of Oma’s house. If you saw two people with a yellow Corvair skulking around outside your house in the late afternoon of July 3^rd, it was only MHH and I, and I lived in your house in 1985. You’ve kept it up nicely, and your 4^th of July decorations looked great.

We arrived in Jacksonville with no further incidents. Though we were already late for the 5pm family reunion dinner, a change of clothes was essential after eight hours without air-con in vinyl seats. My mom, dad, and sister, who were all sitting in the same room together, kept calling and texting me independently of each other, wondering where we were, if we were coming, and how long we would be. And now how long? How about now?

Feeling refreshed but slightly harried, we hopped back into the car, pulled onto the main drag, and promptly died. You've got to be kidding.

My patience for the Yellow Bomb was very slim at this point, so I walked to the restaurant and let MHH sort out the car. The dinner with my mom’s whole family was very nice, and MHH showed up shortly, having stashed the car somewhere off the road.

Everyone smiling and looking at the camera with eyes open--amazing!

MHH and John retrieved the car after dinner. More peering into the engine compartment revealed some loose pipes that MHH secured with a zip-tie so they would stop interfering with this other thing that needed to move. That may or may not have been a problem, but the car started, so I was happy though still somewhat distrustful. 

We didn’t have to drive much the next two days, so we were able to concentrate on having a good time hanging out with the fam.

Later, MHH and I talked about how driving a car like ours is really driving. You have to have your foot on the gas and both hands on the wheel. You don't drive to adventure, you drive for adventure. You really get to know a car like ours.

Yes, we were getting to know the Yellow Bomb, but it was not without the testing of the patience.