Ok so here's my story from the weeekend.
Kelly and I booked a room at the Stonegate bed and breakfast in Hillsborough NH
It was yellow to match sunshine.
Great place. Great breakfast. We headed out to meet Scott and convoy to the
Staging area
We combined trails 1 & 2 and Trails 3 & 4.
Got a little bit of a late start but headed out to the first road. Scott was leading and
Gave this his best effort but couldn't make it. We busted out some shovels and chipped away at it till
Steve knocked it down.
Once we got it in, it was still slow going with Scott breaking trail. The snow
was deep and fluffy so traction was horrible.
I got stuck at the first incline and decided to air down more. Kelly "helped" me and did one tire while I worked on the other 3. (This will be important to remember later.) I got to break in the new winch and it worked like a champ. Pulled Sunshine and an open open Jeep that was behind me. I think the jeep was getting pretty good traction though and drove most of the hill.
When it bogged down again, I let Kelly take the wheel as I was going to pull cable for her and she drove to the top of the hill like it was nothing.
After that we kept plugging along in the second group. After a while of us having some slow going and the others not catching up I went back to see what was the hold up. Pat's new 4 door Rubicon wasn't letting her lockers stay engaged and keep up her wheel spin. This just left her digging in and going now where.
She had 2 capable Jeeps with her and they said they would be ok and I could keep our group moving. So I walked back up and we took off again.
Kelly still driving she was doing great and we were moving at a good clip. She also happened to be wearing mittens and the ruts from group one were grabbing the tires and yanking the steering wheel around on her. She lost her grip for a minute and we sort of bumped into a tree about 8" in diameter on the passenger side. It grazed the bumper so there was no damage to us and we headed out again.
We caught up to the first group and got out onto a plowed road. Remember that tire Kelly worked on, well it was now looking REALLY soft so I put a gauge on it.
2 PSI. :rofl: Kurt from baystate had a compressor so we air it back up to 12 and waited on group 3. Eventually they radioed over and said they were turning back because they weren't getting anywhere.
Scott hopped in with Steve (Willy) and they headed back in the way we came to see if they could help. Steve got Sean from Baystate/DWE turned around and headed out then got Pat unstuck. He dragged her backwards for a ways until she could turn around and then she drove out on her own. Finally Matt came out. His Jeep is Very built, but he was having some alternator issues and starter problems. His family decided to call it a day and we headed off to trail 2.
Steve and Scott got over this bank ok,
but when Kelly tried she got high centered. She tried rocking it back and forth with no luck. Steve hooked up and started tugging. Kelly floored it, and Steve almost got us over the bank, even though Kelly had the truck pinned in reverse.
Once she was back in drive we made it over and started out after Scott. At the first turn, Steve took over breaking trail then it was Scott and Steve Nordby in his Jeep and then Kelly and I and Ryan (exploring NH) in his Toyota.
With lots of skinny peddle we were able to keep moving ok until Scott broke and axle shaft on a difficult hill climb. He kind of veered off the trail a bit and we think he hit a rock. Now down to 3 wheel drive he wasn't making much progress on his own so Steve hooked up an dragged him out. It wasn't that easy though. The going was tough even for Steve's truck and Scott was trying his best to help him but they were pulling a lot of cable. We caught them so I went up to help and took over pulling so Scott could actually drive his Jeep instead of Steve N steering from the passenger side.
We were doing ok, but that left Kelly back behind in Sunshine. She tried going on her own but it was just too tough. Garret from LIOR and Ryan both pitched in and helped her with the winch and got her moving forward again. Once she got going she was doing all she could to keep moving and that left Ryan behind with no winch in front of him.
By now I left Steve and Scott to fend for themselves and went back to check on Kelly. I started pulling cable for her so Ryan and Garret could get themselves going. I was very impressed with Ryan's rig. If he had just a little more clearance, I think he could drove most of it with out getting stuck. It was when the snow built up under his truck that he had trouble.
So Kelly and I were plugging away, 92 feet of cable out, 92 feet reeled.
When she did get traction I would grab the cable and run ahead of her so she could keep driving. Running in snow is not easy and occasionally she would over drive the cable. At one point I was giving her the "cut it" sign by waving my hand across my neck. With the biggest cool aid grin you ever saw she was waving at me back from the cab, with her foot pinned to the floor and snow flying from the tires.
Now we could see the end of the trail. Steve had given up on the winching and he and Scott agreed to just use the 350 and drag Scott out. Once out, Scott toook Steve N back to get his truck that was at the meeting spot and Steve headed back to the hall.
Finally using the other Steve as an anchor Kelly and I were able to get Sunshine onto the road.
Scott came back with one of the hardcore Jeeps and TJ went to work.
His Jeep on Dana 60's with boggers and a 350 made short work of going down, hooking up to the first rig in ,line and dragging them at about 25 - 30 mph out onto the road.
We went into that trail at 2:30. The last truck got out at 7:30. It was only a mile long. This was also 2.5 hours AFTER I was supposed to have cooked the Spaghetti supper.
Fortunately Tammy and Roy bailed me out. I had dropped the food off the night before and they got there early and cooked and set up everything.
The really covered my ass and I am very grateful.
So all in all it was good day. I blew a bead on the way back from the trail to the hall but Pat and Sean came back and helped me get going again.
By the end of the night Kelly and I were so beat we decided to stay over again but this time we just got a place at the Days Inn in Concord.
Along weekend and lots of work but a lot of fun too.