Take the long way home

The only real plans for the day was to head back to Pullman. I got my stuff packed and loaded into my truck. I had to make a couple phone calls about the insurance coverage from my surgery as well, but that was something I would do on my way to Pullman.

I hit the road. I knew they pass conditions where not great, but not bad either. I was told that the state patrol was holding up traffic near mile post forty-seven to check for chains or four-wheel drive vehicle. That caused nearly a SIX MILE BACKUP! It was stop and go for a great length of time.

Well the urge to relieve myself of liquids was great. I saw mile post forty-two coming up and Tinkham road was there. I worked my way over and took the exit. I was dismayed when I saw the exit was crawling with people participating in recreational activities.

I went up this road. I was pretty sure it would end at I-Ninety near the police road block. That would cut out about five miles of traffic. I also figured I would find a place to go pee. The problem that I ran into was that the snow was really deep on the side of the road. There were two tracks where peoples’ tires drive.

In front of me was a car and a truck. The car was starting to have problems. The guy stopped and came back to talk with me and the guy in the truck. Finally it was decided that he could not continue up the hill. So without a place to move out of the way, we would have to back out of there. I wasn’t worried about that. But I wanted to go forward not backwards, and I still needed to go to the bathroom.

After backing a short period of time I thought I saw a spot I could pull over. But what happened was instead I got stuck in deep snow. I was mad because I was stuck. I was also worried because I was stuck. The people above me could not get around me either. So they stopped and assisted me in getting un-stuck.

While we were digging the truck out, I said, “just a second, I need to go look at something”. I jumped a small stream and ran up a hill. I was finally able to relieve myself. I got back a little more relaxed. It took a bit more digging to actually get the truck out. I had some people in the back to give more weight over the back axle.

We continued down, but now vehicles were partly in the roadway. That caused me to move wide, and I got stuck again. After I got stuck, one of the guys came down from where he was and moved his truck, that didn’t do me any good. But some people helped me get out.

I got back on I-ninety and continued my slow process of getting over the mountain. Once across the mountain, it had been nearly three hours to get from Seattle to Ellensburg. Some of that was the time getting stuck.

The roads were now bare and dry. I was able to fly. I made up for lost time. When I got to Whitman county the roads looked wet. I was not sure if it was icy, or if it was the chemical that is put on the road to stop from freezing. I drove with caution.

But around milepost one-twenty-six on SR Twenty-Six the roads were icy. I slowed down. A truck I had been following all the way in lost control on a corner. She swerved back and forth across both lanes. She was lucky no one was coming. She lost control because as we rounded a corner someone else had gone off into a ditch.

She hit her brakes and started to lose control. I thought she was going to hit the other vehicle. But instead she missed it and just went on to the opposite shoulder of the road. No injuries in either situation. I continued on. I saw one other vehicle that had gone off the road. I called in both on my radio. I let Whitcom know that we had three cars off the road within one mile. I said the road conditions were really bad.

I went to Colfax fire and hung out there. But no calls came in while I was there. I was hoping for something. Tim was working and Bryson was on for the police. They gave me a hard time about not stopping to take care of the slide offs. I laughed and said that had I done that I would have probably be run over due to the bad road conditions and the fact I had no warning devices to allow the other drivers to know of the danger.