Other Attendees: Phil and Angie

.....The early crew, comprised of Radar, with Woody riding, Rain Fly, and Mouth, made a run up to Spider on Friday and then hung out back at the tow rigs for us late guys to arrive, which we did about 12:30am. They had called earlier to request more gas be brought. Snow wheeling tends to suck the go juice! Rolo, with his faithful sheet metal fabricator, Tinman(That's me) riding along, and our new friends Phil and Angie made up the late crew. No new snow at that point. Onto the trail and made camp about 4 am at the base of Walker after some fun moments on the uphill of the bypass before the Postpile. Rain Fly ripped his traction bar apart but the new guy has a welder. Sweet. This Phil guy, whom we have given the temporary nickname of TJHooker, was showing us some stuff. Didn't make it up the hill on the first try so he does a front dig and heads down to try it again faster. He's plain gettin' it and runs the left front into a boulder. Doesn't let off and launches the TJ about four feet into the air. This dude has potential.

..Started snowing the next day and didn't stop for a long time. IT WAS COLD. At times the snow was light and dry but most of the time it was wet, icy, and blowing directly into our faces. Of course the only effect this had on those with windshields was to neccesitate the turning on of wipers. A little cold... Is that heater on high? Those without? Well, we just froze and couldn't see where we were going. Riding in Rolo's Jeep on a snow run is like sitting in a snow bank for about 8 hours. At times we had snow covering our laps. I'm glad I've already had my kids. I think Rolo's chances are now slim and none. The plan was to try and make Buck where we would camp for the night. With Rolo in his customary snow run position of breaking trail, we continued on and somehow a clever tree branch managed to find a couple of the only open square inches in Mouth's exo cage where it punched in the right front fender and destroyed his newly replaced marker light. The snow continued to get deeper and the storm harsher and not too far past the Box we lost the trail. The blizzard continued to get worse, and Rolo discovered his steering arm had sheared the front two studs yet again. Luckily our newest prospect, Phil, had that on board welder and after we rigged up some shelter, it was pressed into service for the second time. With the steering arm reattached and being as how it was getting late and we didn't want to do a reinactment of the Donner Party, we turned back down the trail with our tails between our legs. Mother nature, 1, Four Dice, Zero! IT WAS REALLY COLD. We took a photo op on the slab after the Little Sluice bypass and camped for the night at the base of Thousand Dollar Hill. IT WAS FREEZING COLD. We couldn't get a decent fire going even with the aid of a couple of gallons of high test.