It took me a while to write this and so I hope you don't mind me copying and pasting from gminsidenews.com (my main online hang out these days due to my Buick Reatta mostly)
I'm home. This is what went down (I hope I get the order of everything right, it was a long day)
I decided to take a day trip to get out and away from home to the area near our family cottage which we don't use in the winter. Though I hadn't done it in the winter I do enjoy two tracking up there. I went solo (bad idea).
I started out randomly on a seasonal road heading north from M72, west of Lake Margarethe. A "seasonal road" is a dirt road thats more for like logging and oil well trucks. They're typically rough and signs warn that they're not snowplowed. Snowmobilers ride on them quite a bit.
So, I'm fine for a mile or two (I'm bad with distances). Forester was doing just fine. The thing is, the road that the snowmobiles run on is pretty well packed and solid, formed with layers of snow and ice. The top layer is only a couple inches thick and it can turn out bad if you break through by spinning your tires on it. Worse is if you fall off the edge of the hardpack which results in you sinking down into around a foot of soft snow in this case. I wasn't paying attention for just a sec and this happened around 12:15...
I put on my coat and boots and get out my folding shovel and start digging. It was resting on its belly on the snow, the tires had no hope of getting any traction AWD or not. I didn't spin and get myself any deeper...I was just screwed. But I dug for quite a while and got the car back on its wheels but to no avail. The Alltel reception was good where I was and I googled for towing companies in the area...they either were not answering being a weekend or couldn't/didn't want to go off road. I called Subaru assistance and they gave me the same numbers. I then called the local sheriff's department...same numbers
I called my buddy Brian with a Land Rover in Dearborn to see if eh could come up and try but his mom wouldn't let him. I called all my buddies...nobody has a truck nor knows of anyone with one. This is when I posted my message on GMI and explorer4x4.com (where I used to hang out, when I had my pair of Explorers). I figured word spreads pretty fast on the internet and I didn't have any better ideas.
I then walked back south to M72 and stood there for a while, waving to 4x4 trucks and Jeeps passing by in an attempt to find a good samaritan, but no stoppers. I don't think I look like a serial killer
A GMI member called me and said he has a friend in the Grayling area with a tow truck but didn't get out of work until 7. Ugh I can't remember his username but it starts with an L
Back at the car, I got the jack out and found some big tree branches and tried jacking up the Forester and sticking the wood underneath my wheel for support. I figured the left front was most stuck and was the one spinning; manual trans Foresters don't have the cool traction control that puts brake pressure on the slipping wheel to get the other side moving, and my particular car didn't have a rear limited slip diff. It's around 4:30...
A group of snowmobilers led by Richard stopped by (the first to go by me all day). They offered me some advice and all tried to push me. With the logs and their force I was able to move a couple feet but that was all. Snowmobiles aren't able to pull out vehicles in situations like this. I gave them my cell number and would call me when they got home in around an a while. Richard lives nearby and has a Tahoe and would try to come get me if the hardpack supports the weight of it.
I decide to keep digging and do what I can to make it easier to pull me out. Another pair of snowmobilers stopped to check on me. Koasternerd called me around this time (like I said, if I've got the order of everything right). He told me him and a few other GMI members were wondering how I was doing. I wasn't able to get back on the board due to the slowness of the Treo and being busy trying to dig myself out or something.
Richard calls and says he's on the way and will be around soon. Being that it was pretty cold around (around 20f) and I wasnt really dressed for the occasion I fired up the car and sat inside and waited for Richard with his Tahoe (5.3L, LSD, and some beefy Firestones). Around this time Laurel (Mudmomma, whom I later found out was from the greatlakes4x4.com board) called me and asked if I still needed help. She tells me she has a lifted Jeep on 33''s with a winch and could soon head out from Elk Rapids, about 45 minutes away. I tell her about Richard being on the way and would let her know what happened.
After a while I look up in my mirror and see Richard...he fell off of the hardpack too. He brought a couple more shovels and him and his crew work to try digging it out but the Tahoe is sitting on its belly too. I call Laurel and tell her that he's stuck too and would appreciate her coming out...she checks to see that she can come out and calls me back saying she can and heads out to us.
Richard's brother actually left his 3/4 ton Duramax Silverado with beefy BFG's at the road and walked to drive it up. They left it there fearing it may get stuck too being heavier than the Tahoe. He tried pulling out the Tahoe but without success...he spun and began breaking through the hardpack into the soft snow underneath and stopped before he was stuck too. I felt pretty bad about Richard volunteering to try helping me AND getting stuck himself but says he used to do the same stuff when he was younger. They dug around the Tahoe some more while we waited for Laurel. Figuring she'll be around soon I make the 10-15 minute walk back up to M72. She calls and says she's going by the bar which we used as a landmark and I wave her down with a flashlight. I hop in with her...who lady would be driving a Wrangler on 33''s with a 12k lbs winch, a generous lift, and a recent change to 4.56 differential gears? She turns out to be really cool and tells about when she pulled out a police car that was stuck in the snow when a few guys in insulated suits and pickups tried, and she did it in dress clothes and heels. I find out that she found out about my mess on the Great Lakes 4x4.com board because a member of the Explorer board posted there and linked my thread.
The Silvy is moved as much to the side as safely possible and Laurel drives around it to winch out the Tahoe, with the Silvy being used as an anchor. It took a while to get it back on the hardpack.
She then got to me and got me out of the spot I was in. While backing away I got stuck again in the ruts that the Silvy made but Laurel extracted me again. I felt even more because she damaged her winch in the process. We all carefully drove our vehicles backwards until we got to a snowmobile crossing that was hard enough to turn around on. I made sure that both Richard and his crew and Laurel were properly compensated for their kindness and effort. This was around 9 pm...I had been stuck for over 8 hours
Things learned:
-Don't go off roading by yourself
-Don't go off roading in conditions like this unless you or another vehicle has winch. As shown, just having another vehicle isn't enough
-The internet and technology is very powerful...I was able to get help through it when all else failed...I used my phone (Palm Treo 700P) about being stuck when the police, locals passing by, and towing companies couldn't help.
-Though we can all be as anonymous as we want to on the internet there is a sense of family...I got a couple calls from GMI members offering help, first with a buddy in the area with a tow truck and koaster offering to drive up from Detroit, and wasn't even driving a GM product. I try my best not to make enemies here and thank you all that posted, called, thought to themselves "well that sucks" or at least got a laugh out of it. I don't know if anyone has ever made a post like I have but I'll do anything I can to help out any of you guys or anyone else for that matter...jumpstarts, quick repairs, whatever it may be. Sometimes its frowned upon these days but I try to stop when I see someone with their hazards on. I don't mean to leave anyone out that called me...my mind was pretty busy
I didn't get a chance to snap a pic of Laurel's Jeep but I did a quick search on the Great Lakes board...may not be the best pic but this got us out...I added her to my AIM and will see if she was a better photo she'd like displayed
While getting the Tahoe out I remarked to one of Richard's crew, "this lady's pretty cool". He replied "oh yeah she is, she came all the way here to get our sorry **ses out of here
