I hop out of the car to go meet the driver of the trooper, his name is Kurt and is up there with his wife Karla, they're maybe in their mid 40's. Great couple, completely hysterical. They're from Loveland, but come up all the time to help keep the trails open (I think that was their excuse to go play in the snow like teenagers
).
Well at this point the crystal snow just below the surface is becoming a pain!! Even the trooper (with 4 low and good tall tires) was getting stuck! He was working on getting unstuck to a point where he could pull out Scooby backwards, Scooby and I are digging and placing ramps to try and get him unstuck coming forward. Sometime around here a MASSIVE scout shows up! Unfortunately I didn't catch the name of his driver and passenger
, but it's two guys in their late 20's early 30's who are members of the mountainers, a serious local 4x4/rock crawler club. Man this was a serious vehicle! ARB/Warn everything, big lift, tires, wench and a sweet sounding hypercharged chevy 350 V8. The driver does all his own wrenching, and definitely knew how to handle his right. Well, he basically hung out behind the trooper while we all worked to get unstuck. (here's a pic of his rig later, the only one I've got)
This is also about the time snow starts to fall, slowly but gains speed throughout the day. I think it's about 1pm...
Well, we got Scooby unstuck (inch by inch, we'd get him out and he'd slide back in, several times), and his confounded chain breaks!
We try to rig it the best we can, but nothing works. (note to self, bring d rings or something in the future...) I'm facing Scooby, so time for me to back down to just a bit to a wider area of the trail, so everyone else can get around me. and the moment you've all been waiting for, i get STUCK! oh yes, miserably, beautifuly, completely stuck.
LOL I hate backing up, especially in a situation like this, just can't control the car to keep it from going into the deep ruts. Lots and lots of digging, leapfrogging the ramps for the tires in the ruts, and some pulling from Scooby and I get out enough to get down the trail a smidge and get out of the way. Well, then who gets stuck again? scooby!
In the same rut I was in. Keep in mind we've still got the trooper behind us (he gets stuck and unstuck a few more times, but with the low range is able to get himself out pretty easy), and the scout behind him. We all decide to make a plan (and have a beer, thanks scooby!
). Walking down the trail a bit, we check out where I turned around. There is also another offshoot here (too deep for the Foresters, but the trooper will handle it with a run and of course the scout won't have a single issue), so I'll stay out of the way (got myself stuck again, backed right into a bunch of thick tree branches. doh), everyone will get by me, we'll get everyone turned around and head back up the trail together. (Snow is falling harder, but we're all having an absolute blast helping each other out, I love Colorado people)
My apologies for the lack of pics, we were all busy digging!