Steve Gets A Life

yes, i have sand

that is just my response to those stupid "got sand?" stickers that are on every bumper from Paso to Santa Maria. of course, they are referring to the Oceano Dunes, which Andria and i visited on sunday for our first real experience with these Sand People.

for my birthday, andria took me out to the dunes to go Sand Railing. we rented a Sand Rail, which is essentially a car frame made of metal tubes with an engine on the back and big ol' tires.

man, it was a blast. first of all, apparently sand dunes are incredibly steep on their far slope. the guy warned us, but i had no idea until we started heading over a dune and i felt like i was on a roller coaster, except i had a steering wheel. and as "the guy" said, the last thing you want to do when you're going down the back of a dune is turn, even if its your first instinct (cause you will flip and lose your $500 deposit).

fortunately we never flipped, although we did bottom out a couple of times and get stuck, requiring us to dig our way out and guide the car backwards down a dune to the bottom where we could get it going again.

i would go again in an instant. andria, however, might not. she was a bit freaked out by the possibility of getting stuck on the far side of a dune and some motorcycles flying over our heads. i guess i just didn't think that far ahead, as i was so overwhelmed with the torque under my right foot and sand in my eyes.

as for the community of "sand people," they were very much like lake folks. in most respects, the entire feel was much like going to a lake. everybody is camping, it looks like most people are full of cheap beer, and there are basically no rules governing safety besides the motto "try not to run into each other" .. so ya, it was pretty cool.