Oh, fun times. Now I know how to get Thanatoz and Tools offroad, neither of whom had been out with me in many months. I'm gonna try to find another less stressful way to accomplish this.
My story: I went up to Pine Top for a week to help a friend do some remodelling on his A-frame. Never one for pavement, I found a route (on Google Maps, incidentally- and no mention of Indian land or permits) to get from Highway 87 via Punkin Center and across to U.S. 60, and then on to Pinetop. I figured it wouldn't be more than forest roads, certainly no hard-core wheeling. The plan was to take this route from Phoenix to Pine Top, then after the week was over to run back on the evil blacktop. The plan had a hiccup almost immediately; the road from 87 over to Punkin Center was impassible by me due to an off-camber washout above a deep fissure. I went back to 87 and ran the 'normal' route on to Punkin Center and then rejoined my route from there. I had gotten a late start, so when I hit the Young Highway (dirt road) after a few hours of fun backroads and exploration, I chose to call it a day and took it up to the 260 and across to my final destination.
I spent the week doing woodwork; laying wood floor, ceiling, building and hanging a rough-cut exterior door, and other stuff. I decided to return to Phoenix via my route, and at least get to do the half I missed on the way up. I found my way to Cibeque and thought it odd that the town was populated entirely by Indians, but didn't give it a lot of thought. Just north of the town the pavement ended, I made a small water crossing, and continued on through the trees. The scenery was fantastic- deep pine woods with some snow in patches hanging around. The trail was maybe a 2 on a 5 scale, 2WD capable with tire ruts in the dried mud. Very little wet mud- in fact I don't remember any up until my fun ended. I went a few miles in, and saw a small hill with some serious ruts and a spot where someone had filled in a washout with branches and logs. The ground looked wet, but not treacherous. I hit the hill unlocked, not expecting a thing. Then the right side of the truck dropped. Hmm. It came to a stop and I didn't try to gun it, figuring to lock up the axles and continue on my merry way. With the magic switch engaged, I eased into the throttle and the truck slid sideways, shifting off-camber alarmingly. I got a bit worried now, but figured I'd back out and re-adjust my angle. Reverse got me more sideways movement and more off-camber excitement. All four tires spun, but I couldn't get any motion in any direction. I got out and looked it over; 35 inch tires on the passenger side completely under the mud, the right side of the truck leaning on the hill, dirver's side tires still sitting on top of the road. Now I'm a bit scared.
I walked up the hill to see if I could get cell service. I had signal and after many tries got my wife's voice mail- not what I wanted, but at least I could tell her what was going on. Then I called Thanatoz and Tools-R-Us and explained my predicament, where I was, how to find me, what I thought I needed to get out, etc. I told them I would try to extricate myself, but if they didn't hear from me they might want to get a crew together if possible to rescue my dumb ass. After some time looking at the truck, the mud (thick, gooey paste is my best description- and seemingly bottomless) I came to the depressing conclusion that I hadn't a snowball's chance in hell of getting out by myself- the truck was so deep that I couldn't get a shovel near where it needed to be, and speaking of snow, it was in the forecast and in the air on occasion. The Hi-Lift I happened to load wouldn't fit under anywhere helpful, and I hadn't convinced the wife I needed a winch just yet. Which, by the way, I could have easily used right when I first lost forward momentum, before I wedged myself up against the hill. So, back on the phone (which required many, many tries to complete a connection, but once established seemed to hold it) where the guys said they'd be happy to come up and lend a hand. Unfortunately, though, not until the next day. Ugh. Oh well, I had all my cold weather gear, food and water, and other necessities with me. The night was uncomfortable, but knowing rescue was on the way made it much more bearable. I'd have been truly freaking if the cell hadn't worked- it was a long hike to a phone.
The next morning the Indian forestry service/police showed up and gave me a ticket for not having a permit. My arguement that there were no signs posted requireing a permit or telling me that the area was closed fell on deaf ears. Fifty bucks (cash) paid that ticket, and then he called his supervisor and got permission to try to pull me out with his winch on an F250. I called the rescue team and put them on hold, they were at Gold Canyon heading my way, and they said they'd wait and see whether I got out. They winched me forward 'till the passenger tire found a solid part of the bank to get stuck behind (I call it a bank now because it was basically a river of mud down one side of the road, against a hill), then backward 'till the plows formerly known as my axles provided enough resistance to stop progression. He gave me permission to get help in, some directions as to where the help could get their permits, a handy brochure, my copies of my ticket and receipt of payment, and told me he'd check back in later that evening to see if I was still there. I called Thanatoz and after about 10 minutes finally got a connection to his voicemail, freaked completely out, called Tools and got through, gave him the news, and then went to work. The attempted extraction had accomplished one thing, I saw as I returned to the truck- it was no longer off-camber. All 4 tires were now close to completely buried, but the bumpers were a few inches out of the muck and I saw that a shovel and jack would be useful. I spent the next few hours shovelling mud away from the rear axle and moving it away from the truck, cutting the 'bank' back away from the passenger side so the truck could move backwards, and got the Hi-Lift on my spare tire and a 3'x3' piece of plywood and jacked the truck up to the top of the jack. That got the rear tires out of the mud. I had lunch, gathered wood and rocks, and around 1:30 PM started hearing chatter on the CB. Half an hour later the guys showed up, we built the fine road under the rear, jacked up the front and did the same, and then Kevin dragged me and mine back to terra firma. We got moving sometime after 5 PM towards town, hit Globe with fumes in Kevin and Michael's tanks, and hit a restaurant for pizza around 8:30.
I now have a winch-on-a-stick, as I like to call it, a winch that plugs into a receiver hitch, one of which I have on either end of my truck. Michael purchased it off Craig's List and brought it with him to the party. If the Indian guys hadn't pulled me in a better position, I suspect we would have had to use it as well as both of their fully-locked Cruisers to yank my silly butt out, but I'm glad we didn't have to find out. Thank goodness I had fully detailed my route on my home computer on topo software, and had the same software along for the ride so I could tell the rescue crew exactly where I was, and that Michael has the same software and a laptop to use to track me down. I didn't go looking for trouble; had I seen the mud I would have avoided it, and if there'd been a sign like the one below on my route I'd have turned around, but I did go looking for trouble by going out alone without enough equipment to rescue myself.
In my defense, this sign is on the road Tools and Thanatoz took to get to me, and there were no signs like it on my route.
Thanks, guys.
-Spike (spending the day cleaning the truck, and building up my yard. Oh, and testing my new winch.
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It alternated between sunny, rain, sleet, hail, snow, repeat all of the way there. Luckily Spike picked a spot that was relatively sunny to get stuck.
