After sweating our asses off in the camper that night we decided to get moving early to try and beat the heat of the day. We failed in that. The heat was oppressive and had my son and me on edge. This was not a good time either as we had the toughest section of the trail up ahead.
Don't let the scenery fool you though..
It's steep and narrow.
Photos were limited from that point. We got ourselves into a situation on one of the uphill sections. Following Bill's Waggy into a tight section the trail had a hard left turn at the top of a climb. The turn was so tight, you needed to actually go right, and turn around in a wide flat spot and then head back the other way. We had stopped to let Bill turn around and then we would continue up. Though when watching Bill make that last climb we saw the right rear wheel of the waggy on the edge of what would be best described as a drainage ditch off the main trail. We noted to each other to watch it as we got up to it. I made my way up to that spot I had came to a stop just before my front tires getting to the level ground. As soon as we stopped we felt the truck list over quickly to the passenger side as the ground gave way under the right rear tire. I looked at my Lev-o-gauge on the dash and saw the little ball peg at the end showing 45 degrees. I'm pretty sure at that point the left rear tire was off the ground and then the truck settled back to the left bringing the gauge back to 35 degrees.
It was tense for a few minutes. I knew if I got out, the loss of my weight might allow the truck to continue to go over. My son didn't want to get out but he might weigh 140 pounds at the most, but the Dad side of me wanted him as far from inside of the truck as possible. Bill got our attention over the radio and told us not to move. Yeah, already doing that! He said he'd position the waggy and start unspooling the winch rope. I had a soft shackle under the kid's seat and had him pull it out. I tossed it out the window to Bill as he was rolling over to the front of my truck. Keep in mind Bill is in a wheelchair getting this recovery going. Hooked up he got back to the Waggy and started the pull. Though the heft of the K5 did more to pull the his truck to mine than mine to his.
Bill called back on the radio for the kid to hop out and come hold the brake on the Waggy. It was the ticket. We only needed a few feet worth of tugging and with the K5 slowly turning tires in low/low it walked out without any damage other than brown stains on both the seat covers.
After we got pulled up:
The rest of the way out was done mostly in silence as we were both spooked and paying extra close attention to any narrow section. Getting back to pavement, we decided to drive back to Moab and get a shake from a little local joint and figure out our next move.
We had planned to head back out on another trail and camp out one more night before meeting up with the Blazer Bash folks. But with the heat still high we needed a break. I called our campground and was able to snag a cabin with a/c for the night. We had our own shower too. Bingo, sold. Bill took his time heading back to Colorado and we checked into the campground. Meeting up with the crew after cleaning up was a good time catching up and bench racing. I was leading a trail on Saturday again and felt like we should pre-run it because there was some mention of damage from recent flooding.
So we set off the next morning for Chicken Corners with a friend from Texas in his killer Suburban with his Dad.
The trail takes us up and over Hurrah Pass. We are now on the east side of the Colorado river and looking due west back into Canyonlands where we were at a couple of days before.
We stopped for lunch in a cool shady spot and took in our surroundings while having a great conversation.
David's Burb is a mechanical work of art. Tucks 40's, moves faster over rough track than you would think the laws of physics would allow. I've seen it rock crawl like it's nothing and dance over dirt roads like a pre-runner. Amazing.
We came back to camp and I used the residual heat from our fun to help de-thaw a couple of t-bones for us to eat for dinner.
Blazer Bash is next...