The cross-country voyage of the Hawaiian 2002

[Jim_75Sahara]

Epilog: Kevin drove up to Yellow Springs, OH for our GTG @ John Bryan State Park today. I guess he didn't get enough driving over the past 10 days or so!! Anyhow, his daring and tenacity for driving from San Francisco to SE Ohio in a 30 yr. old car were applauded by the OH/IN contingent of '02 owners. He won the a couple of door prizes, so his drive to Y.S. was not in vain. Besides, he has picked up some new friends.

[PAULTJENE]

Jim,

Will you be posting or emailing pics from today....

Paul

[KFunk]

Yes, it was good to see everyone and all the shiny 2002s. I got door prizes for the distance traveled, and 'patina.'

A few guys were trying to get pics of the stickers under my hood, since they're the originals.

Right now I'm on dial-up, so its not easy to upload the pics (plus I forgot to take camera to Yellow Springs).

I've bolted the shifter back in there, so now its far easier to drive than when I arrived. I just used a hex bolt instead of the nice allen bolt, but it works. Those bolts are a real pain to access, which is probably why I never got them tight enough before. They're the horizontal bolts going from the shifter platform to the transmission. They're above the driveshaft, you need like a 12" extension to get to them, and still its not easy getting a straight shot at them. One was completely gone and the other was almost ready to fall out. This time I used threadlocker, so they shouldn't come out.

I took the muffler off and my dad welded it back together.

Its been soundling like I've had an exhaust leak up front too. Today I checked the nuts holding the header on there, and many of them were kind of loose. I tightened them up, but on the #3 cylinder there wasn't a nut there to tighten on the bottom. I think at some point the stud and nut sheared off. I think I'll need to take the whole header off and pull that stud out sometime. While its out, I'll prep the surface and put a better coat of high-temp paint on the header.

Oh, and for some weird reason my ignition switch doesn't seem to want to spin the starter anymore. I've just been popping the hood and jamming a screwdriver in it. I'll figure out the real problem later.

For now, I've been busy trying to get a job here. As soon as I got home, I saw an ad for a teaching job at a local college that might be perfect, so I've got to get stuff in order to get in there. This job is based more on teaching genetics and molecular biology (not my expertise), but I could do a good job of it, and worth a try. In Hawaii my problem was the lack of connections, but since I've arrived here, a cavalry of connections has already been called upon to help get me a job here.

So thanks again everyone, and I'll post some more pics and stuff later.

Kevin

[DarcyB]

thanks for your well written travel log! It has been fun to read!

[jgmgti]

Kevin,

Great travel story,most enjoyable.If you are still heading east,we have a vintage BMW gathering at Carpool in Herndon Va. on Sat.Sept 30th.

It would be great to have a 2002 from the great state of Hi.

Jonathan

[TMK-001]

Glad to hear you arrived safely at your destination.

What a wonderful adventure, from cruising the highways to Auto-X and 2002 get togethers, it sounds like a really great way of enjoying your 2002.

Good luck with finding work! All the best.

Todd

[Biscuit3]

That is the cutest picture ever!

[culpy]

hey,Im moving to Hawaii and looking to buy a 2002.Would there be anybody there in Hawaii that could help me out,Finding one? thanks and aloha, Chris

p.s. it was nice reading your trip.Ive drove it a few times.Back and forth.

oh yeah,if you go to Va Beach VA, throw my name around(might get ya a few free drinks)Chris"the culprit" Culpen. I was 1 of the best surfers to come out of there,ask about the back country roads to. Va NC border going down to the Outer Banks. Early mornings you can run them back roads at over 100mph.No cops!!Thats how us rednecks learnt how to drive so dang good.Dont miss the Gravediggers Factory right before you get on the Island.YOU WILL GO to OBX its south Va.s serenity down there.thanks again , Chris

[TMK-001]

You know an Aussie that hung in the Outer Banks of NC for a few years surfing and selling stuff by the name of Raco? He hung with the locals a fair bit from all the stories.

[KFunk]

I'm long overdue for an update..... sorry. Been doing a lot of work on both cars, and being lazy.

But I just wanted to help out Chris from VA.

As for 02s in Hawaii, there are very few options there. There are lots of very nice 02s over there, but very few ever come up for sale. I actually don't know very many of the 02 drivers over there. They must be all older guys that still love their cars, and rarely use the internet. But there are many around.... Luckily though, there are very few younger people interested in them, so there isn't that much competition in pricing.

Your best bet is to hang out in the 'Hawaii and other islands' section of Bimmerforums.com. They're mostly guys with newer BMWs, but they keep track of most of the old BMWs on the islands, and watch out for those up for sale. Make friends with Bryan aka Beastmaster aka BMWDriver, who is a moderator on Bimmerforums and Forumshawaii.net. He knows everyone on the island, and all 02s.

Also, check with Dennis Tolosa at Bavarian Motor Experts to see if he knows of any for sale. He recently sold his, but he'd know of any good ones.

For parts, go to the Koko Marina 76 service station, on Lunalilo Home Road in Hawaii Kai, and talk to Jon. He has two squaretail parts cars sitting next to the gas station. I've also heard of someone having a stockpile of parts cars in Kailua, but never found it.

Oh, and I know someone that will sell a whole 320iS for a couple hundred bucks, if you need a fresh M10, LSD, or 5-speed. I didn't have time to swap them over before I left, so I didn't get it....

[culpy]

Thanks alot man,

Have fun on the VA/NC back country roads!!!getter dun. aloha Culp

[KFunk]

well... the car is broke. It shall soon live again, better than before. Before I tell how..... I'm gonna go back through a few forgotten stories from the beginning.

First, I should've mentioned the time I got really lost. So lost that it actually had me a bit worried. Where in this great big land you ask? uhhhh, Berkeley.... while on foot.... yeah, Berkeley, before I even got the car.

I took the train up to Berkeley for the day just to hang out and see what campus looked like. I hear about it a lot thru the academic world. It was easy to find, and the campus was really beautiful. I found Rasputin Records, and loved it because there were so many used CDs, and they actually had them alphabetized (as opposed to other used record stores where you have to flip thru them all day). I bought some Ani Difranco and Iron & Wine to help me out for the trip. Then I got a triple fudge chocolate cake mix blizzard type thing at an ice cream shop, and relaxed on a campus bench and used some wireless net access.

Here's a nice big tree that was nearby:

From the tree I set out walking west along campus, back towards the train station. I didn't really pay much attention to where I was going. For some reason I got into more of the houses and less of campus. I wasn't sure where the main campus area was at, but I figured I'd be able to see over the next hill. So I climbed uphill, only to find nothing, and downhill to another hill. I was in a mess of twisty residential streets with no sign of bus stops or businesses. At that point I had been walking all over SF for the last several days, with a ~15 lb. backpack on my back, and with my extremely high arches my feet were hurting. But I kept on walking, and only found more and more houses. I tried one trail leading up a hill, and went thru some backyards, but on top the hill there was nothing new.

I eventually came upon some really fancy rose garden, so I took a break and got out the laptop, hoping for a wireless signal so i could Mapquest the area.

But nope, no wireless signal.

I did find a bus stop, but after waiting for like a half hour, I gave up on a bus. I tried calling the phone number for the bus system, but it wouldn't let me call from my phone, and I had no idea what the area code for Berkeley was... and I didn't know who else to call and sound like an idiot to say I was lost in Berkeley.

So, I kept walking. It had been 2 to 3 hours already wandering those streets, to proud to ask someone how to get back to town. I decided I'd change my tactic, and start heading downhill every opportunity. Seemed like a decent plan, and found a nice straight road downhill that looked like it would go somewhere. Then suddenly I heard something growling at me. I looked, and it was a raccoon. But this wasn't an ordinary raccoon, since he was out in daylight, and didn't run away. Then I remembered a new story I had read about urban raccoons that were no longer afraid of people, and roam the streets and have killed lots of cats and attacked people and dogs.

Yeah, this raccoon was still standing there in the intersection growling at me. So I charged at him and growled back. He darted down into a sewer grate, and sat there still staring at me. So I got my camera out and took a picture of the little punk:

He wasn't the only one, there was atleast one more down in that sewer with him. I stared at him a while, and laughed about it and IMed my friends from my cell phone to tell them I was just attacked my urban raccoons in Berkeley.

But I eventually started continuing downhill. It took a mile or two more, but I ended up in some something resembling a city, which was pretty far from campus accoriding to the map. I managed to find a city bus that took me right to the train station.

Once I got back to Redwood City, it was almost midnight. I was really happy though, because I found out the taqueria was open till 1am, so I got a huge burrito.

So yep, next time I go to Berkeley I should take a map.

[Jim_75Sahara]

Nice story about being lost in Berkeley. What's wrong with the unstoppable Riviera? Next episode, please, Mr. Kfunk.

[KFunk]

next episode you want? ok, heh.

So I wanted to tell about going down to Monterey. It was a pretty long haul from SF, so the first decent trip with the 02 after getting it off the dock. I wanted to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and yep it was beautiful:

Most pictures were blurry though, due to the glass.

I managed to get all through the aquarium pretty quick, so I had time to explore. I looked on the map, and saw Pebble Beach was just around the corner, so hey, I'll go to Pebble Beach.

I headed toward '15-mile road' I think was the name, since it looked like a nice coastal road. But, there was a frickin toll, $8! I had to think about it, but figured it must be nice if its $8, so I finally coughed up the money and went on in. It was a pretty nice rocky coastal road thru the golf course.

Here's the 'Lone Cypress Tree,' which is the symbol for Pebble Beach's logo:

They had a sign that said the lone cypress was a copyrighted image, and you weren't allowed to profit from images or representations of the tree.

So, if anyone wants a higher resolution copy of that picture, please send me $5 and I'll give you a better copy.

Well, next I came upon the Pebble Beach pro shop and inn, so I figured I might as well stop.

There was a 'pro shop' that was ultra high class, and the regular golf shop that had more touristy stuff. I walked thru the 'pro shop' and saw one guy with a couple of assistants following him. All I overheard was him asking for a price, and he said, " With all my championships, you'd think they'd give it to me for free." I still have no idea who that guy was, since I'm not a big golf fan.

I went thru the regular golf shop, and then remembered that my friends from Ohio might want a souvenir. They're two brothers, Chris and Jason, and they own/run a golf course back in Ohio thats on my favorite twisty road. They're both really into cars as well, and Chris actually beat me with my own miata at his first autocross and won CSP (!!). I used to make pit stops there all the time while testing the miata, and often helped out with tending to the course.

I tried to find something cheap for them, but it was like $18 for a mug or $30 for a hat. Then I remembered, hey I have the phone number for the golf course on my cell phone! I just started to call them, and then remembered that I had never told them I was leaving Hawaii.

So I called, and Chris answered the phone, and I said "Hey man I'm in Pebble Beach, you want anything?" He was a bit confused....

But I proceeded to walk around the shop, and make an idiot of myself loudly reading off prices and saying how the stuff was so damn expensive. Chris said don't worry about it, as I'll be gone in 5 minutes anyways. So I proceeded. Jason's birthday was coming up, so he told me to get a hat and mug for him, and he'd pay me back. I ended up with 70 bucks worth of stuff.

So fast forward to a couple weeks ago, and I come flying into their golf course in the 2002 with Hawaii plates, and Jason is there. No, Chris never mentioned anything to him about me calling him from Pebble Beach, or ever leaving Hawaii. I gave him the hat and mug, and it sure made his day, hahah. He really liked the car and I filled him in on the details...

[Otis]

Ah, you went on the infamous 17-Mile Drive, where the average Pacific-front/Pac-view home goes for around $25 million (or so, and up - but in that range, who is counting?). As you round the bend on one of the turns, you come upon Cypress Point, which is one of the most exclusive golf clubs in the universe. If The Almighty himself showed up on their doorstep, they still would require that He be invited by a member, in order to play. Also, hopefully you caught a glimpse of the house at the bend (it borders the second hole at Cypress) -- in addition to an ocean-front setting, the guy has a 3-hole pitch-and-put golf course set up on his front lawn. One of my favorite homes, anywhere.

You also stood upon what, for "us golfers," is Sacred Ground -- the 18th at Pebble Beach. To put things in perspective, the 18th at Pebble, is the equivalent of Centre Court at Wimbledon, or home plate at Yankee Stadium. There is so much history . . . And, that course traditionally rated as #1 of the "Golf Courses You Can Play," meaning public golf courses. Of course, it's "public" only in the sense that if you have $500 to fork over, you can play the course (if you can get a tee time). But, it's quite a place -- site of some of the most famous shots in golf history (Jack Nicklaus' one-iron on 17, Tom Watson's chip-in on 17 to win the U.S. Open, etc. etc. etc.). True Holy Ground for golfers.