Stage 13
Seacrest Overlook to Shippingburg
Temp. @ mid-day: 28°C
Night-time Low: 19°C
Weather: It remains dry, with moderate cloud cover, but stronger, gusty winds. By the evening, the clouds clear up, granting the opportunity to experience a spectacular sunset by the coastline.
Camp Challenge: “Most attractive car” (Most stops by police. In the event of a tie, the highest time wins.)
We leave Seacrest Overlook at dawn and head onto an old, familiar friend. It’s Highway Route 1, that same highway we ended up on in stage 2.
Yes, we could have just taken the highway up here, but that would have been boring.
Plus, if today’s drive was a common sight, we’d have been begging for dirt.
Signs were posted, of course, for 55 MPH / 90 km/h. The highway was packed with traffic, however, averaging 40 MPH / 65 km/h. Anyone planning on a shoulder pass or to do a little weaving would have a real bad time with the police, too, as it seemed every 30 cars or so had a patrol unit nearby.
The cause for the traffic snarl? An overturned dump truck had spilled its contents into the main driving lane, about 20 miles from the Shippingburg exit. Between people staring at the turtled truck on its side, the huge pile of dirt and rocks in the road, and the traffic laws preventing passing on the right, people were moving slowly.
Luckily, as we made it into the city of Shippingburg, we were greeted with perhaps the most modern-looking city yet. Nearing a million people in town, with a fair mix of sprawl and tall showing that they built UP first, and OUT when they couldn’t go up any more, a cargo port that gave the city its name with one hell of a freight rail connection, and a beautiful coastal beach looking out into the “Great Water,” the local name for the ocean, it was a fair sight to see.
Of course, our goal was the beach.
When it was discovered that the circular road around the city had the highest speeds, what had been a peaceful country drive erupted into snarling and roaring engines, screaming tires, and vehicles hurtling “around the ring” like maniacs were behind the wheel. Any lost time from the highway was made up by turning the ring around the city into a demented right-turn-only NASCAR race to the beach, albeit with some restraint for not annoying the city police.
That restraint… Yeah, it went out the window the moment tires touched the sand and it was apparent no one was in harm’s way as it turned into a 300 meter sprint in vehicles on sand.
Thankfully, most teams backed off as we saw the locals had put up a finish line for us (courtesy of our dropped map a while back) and had prepared a mild beach party.
Next Stage Expected Conditions:
Road Speed: N/A
Road Condition: N/A
Traffic: none
Police: none
Results Here: SR2023 Stage 13 - Google Drive
Camp Challenge Winner:
Mikonp7 (Haapala Streetcruiser) - 8 stops and 158 hours
Team Shift Happens
Takaraya earns himself a warning once they get into Shippingburg, not realizing that “right turn on red” is a uniquely American thing, and doesn’t apply to Nehmenweld. Kasiya is very-much-annoyed that he’s spent most of the rally dragging both trailers.
VS Mobil Generator AB
Remember the derailment all the way back in stage 5?
Turns out that it did more harm than initially expected, as the left outer tie rod decides to submit its 25 second notice. Luckily, innate stability due to suspension geometry and wheel flanges prevented another derailment, but crawling along at about 15mph to the next suitable location and THEN spending quite a while jerri-rigging a repair for that tie rod surely killed the mood.
Team M.A.D.
The Walkenhorst gets a warning for driving a bit too fast on city streets. The Sakura, on the other hand, earns a full ticket for “failing to stop for a stop sign.” A “California Roll” does not fly with the cops here.
Team Sinesian Rejects
Despite the engine sounding like a sack of hammers in a tumble-dryer, the Imbe makes it along with the three remaining crew members.
Team Not-So-Slow
After being pulled over and given a warning for “driving like an idiot” after driving the wrong way on a one-way street, the clapped out Schnell decides now is the perfect opportunity to cost a bunch of time when the rear shock absorbers break. The car never has to stop, but every bump sends the luxury car bouncing up and down like an eight-year-old with a pogo stick in a bouncy castle.
The Ambassadors
It’s a problem free run to the end of this stage, although the mood is not great courtesy of not finding the thing you were looking for on this trip.
The Knockouts
Kate makes it to the beach at full speed, sirens wailing behind her for most of the trip. Octavia is stuck at the side of the road for nearly four total hours, spending 30 minutes each time to let the badly-overheated engine cool off. An inspection in camp confirms that the water pump failed.
Team Mravolinski-Chitco
For once, the truck with the giant camper makes it to the finish line with the camper still in one piece. The Saguaro also makes it, kicking sand into the passenger compartment of the Kontir with a lazy victory donut for making it to the finish.
Team HETS
When the VanGo’s engine practically exploded on the highway, the only option was to tow it into town and let a local wizard fix it. Unfortunately, said local wizard relied heavily on ritual magic, and so what could have been a 6 hour fix turned into nearly an 18 hour repair session.
Team Flaming Gallahs
The drive is a smooth and simple one, but the beach party is likely to be outright wild.
Team Friendship! 
Like the other bus, there’s really no trouble on this part of the trip.
Team Hillbilly Rollers
After making it to the finish line, it’s very clear that Marie wants to get properly drunk. It’s also clear we plan to stay here for an extra day, as the Shift Happens crew has set up an ocean-facing gun range. Whether that means Marie gets a day of drinking or not is, well, still up to Andreas, Janne, and Arne.
Team Sane Insanity
The KKR ends up causing a fairly annoying delay after doing a little bit of drifting in the city. After beaching the car on a guard rail, they wait for a tow truck to extract their car from the rail, and take a ticket from the local police for “unlawful and aggressive use of a motor carriage.”
Faolan Industries
The rather unique Aether Hydropneumatic Suspension system has caused trouble again. The patch done in Stage 11 held up wonderfully - The line blew out a foot further away and dropped the 11/2 onto its frame on the road.
Determined not to miss the festivities, Ze’ev and Storm decided to put blocks in the suspension to allow them to tow it with the 52 H into camp, where it was fixed several very long hours later and “driven” a foot to stop the clock.
Team Taciturn
Ticket? Yep, the disguised aliens couldn’t talk their way out of this one after finding out that no country allows a left turn on red.
Team ReUnity
It’s a trouble-free run to the finish for the fast-moving crossover.
Team Spy Kids
The Mocabey is the first to make it into camp. The Reekayns, on the other hand, failed to make a corner properly and got hung up on a guard rail. After the crew bailed out and went in separate directions to make capture more difficult, the Shippingburg Police Department sent out a full force of “retrieval teams.” The crew of the Reekayns, now properly bruised from being hunted down by trained Dyre and angry policemen, end up in jail for the next 12 hours. Convincing them afterward to release your car from the impound lot takes another 6 hours of waiting in line.
Team J3
The Tiharris gets pulled over and given a warning for driving on the sidewalk. Otherwise, nothing much happens here for Team J3.
Team Aeromad
“We do not understand this “drifting,” but please stop doing it. It irritates the Dyre, it makes them angry,” the officer said during the warning he gave to the driver of the Torrento. In the back of his patrol truck, visible through the thick-barred cage where a truck bed should go, was an 11 foot tall werewolf wearing body armor, indeed looking quite irritated at the tire smoke.
Once they got into camp, the Torrento was used to create a sandstorm by doing some donuts on the beach. The Juggernaut almost got stuck until it was driven onto one of the many platforms set out to keep the heavier vehicles from sinking into the sand overnight.
@Tzuyu_main & @FallingComet
Team Black Rabbit Disavowed
Other than a casual warning for speeding for the Dauer, it’s a trouble free run. Somehow, even the wide Seikatsu has no major issues getting to the beach. It’s parked up on a platform to avoid it sinking in the sand.
Sheriff Scott’s Posse
The Warren Warlock earns another ticket, this time courtesy of taking a “shortcut” through a gas station to avoid a red light. They counted it as running the red light, unfortunately.
Team “486”
Luck holds out for the two Kaufmanns as they rocket through the city and avoid the police.
Team Magdelena
How long does it take to fix a broken drive axle? About 12 hours, about half of which was spent getting the vehicle to a suitable wizard in the first place.
Team Machinas Con Passione
The Faenza develops a misfire and gets caught. The Blue Wonder has to go quite some distance off of the intended path to retrieve the car before the police have it impounded, and after loading the little yellow lump of cheese on the back, ends up getting a ticket after several bumps cause the headlights to blind the driver of a police car.
Cunning Stunts
The VHT Supermobile gets pulled over and given a warning, this time for a particularly mundane reason: It has a brake light burned out.
Team Till D End
The Linx gets a warning after hopping the curb and squealing tires on the way into the gas station.
Basedworks
“Get this ridiculous thing out of my sight.” The MCMOTD got a warning for “disturbing the peace.”
Team Gunship
Another crazy drifting team that found out that guard rails bite and the towing services here are fucking slow. Also a team that found out that crashing your car typically results in getting at least a warning from the police if they suspect you were doing something “stupid.”
4 Dicks in a Truck
The four dicks in a truck quickly found out that “I got shoved through the light by my trailer” doesn’t fly around here. A red-light ticket later, they make it to the beach, where they park up on one of the platforms to keep their rig from sinking.