bad day of hunting always be prepared.

[bad moon]

woke up late yesterday and decided to hunt desert country. as i am headed out the door the wife decides it would be fun to make a family day of it and promises she will be ok if i wound up on a hike. well all started out well the sky was clear, the snow had melted enough to make travel pretty easy. we finally made it out past all the livestock and onto some good country for cutting tracks. now the problem here is i am now further than i had ever been for and kind of unfamiliar with the roads. so we decide to follow some jeeps tracks up a wash that the map said would lead us back to the interstate. well what started off as on ok trail slowly got worse and less beat down as people started turning around. and then it happens boom a stab a rock and put a small hole in my bead and we are down. luckily i have a small compressor and tire seal. sure enough it worked, cause my spare is a street tread wich would of ending up in using chains to get around and i hate getting my chains out. (they are a last resort with me and never used to find tracks just dogs) so me and the wife study the handy map who claimed the trail is fourteen miles long so we figured our milage and determined we were well over half way so decided to continue onto the interstate. boy was we wrong. so we keep going susprisingly well as others keep turning around.should of been a clue but there was definate tracks of vehicles going one way so i knew you could get through. then we cut a track an old one but no doubt mr lion. i walk out on it and dertimine he is headed the same way as the trail. well as it turns out there is two really bad spots that was turning most people around but i cut the lion track again which took away all common sense. so we attempt the first hill and bang and clang the truck to death. funny thing here was as we are cresting the top tires doing sixty and us doing 2 mph my wife turns to me and asks what the problem is, i quickly turn and say that they must of been tight on budget and did not put enough traction into the road when they built it. her being the blond she is quickly states that it is traction and they sould always put enough. anyways to make a long story short just before the last hill my truck dies and were dead in water. luckily i am always over prepared. i immiedietley start checking the truck while my wife starts on a fire to keep my two little ones warm as it was now at zero and dropping. no luck on the truck with all the fancy computer stuff so i start calling friends. well the only friends i got set up well enough to get me are all out hunting else where. i figure out i am further than i thought and decided it be best to call search and rescue. i got them on the phone gave them location and my two way radio channel. knowing they were hours away i went to work on a shelter and a mound of wood. every thing turned out good they made it to us in about two and a half hours and got us and the dogs home. so now i got a broke truck in one of them places that you really dont want to ask your buddy with tire chains to go. so hopefully i can get it runing i am taking an engine code reader and a bunch of stuff to see if i can fix it. if not try to tow it which i am not sure can be done. at least not with just one truck it might take two all chained up to drag it up some of the hills. be there til spring if it snows again soon. anyways just a quick lesson on always being prepared cause you never know. i know the search and rescue was impressed at how well set up i was to be out doing what i was were i was.