I’ll start with what it was like just getting to the ride. For a few days leading up to the trip, we were experiencing extremely cold temperatures (for here). We’d had a high temp the day before I left of 16, while it got down into the minus 10 and teens at night. A storm had come in a couple of days ahead of the really cold temps and dropped a foot and a half of snow.
It took me awhile traipsing through the snow just to get everything loaded into the trailer for the trip. The day before I ran an extension cord from the barn to the trailer. I brought out a small electric heater figuring I’d turn it on inside the trailer LQ to keep things from getting too cold. At temperatures below zero, things will still burst inside the refrigerator. The only problem with that idea is that I overloaded the circuit breaker in the barn. Between the lights in the barn, the two stock tank heaters and the trailer it was just too much. And of course, I found out by noticing that the horses water trough was frozen the next morning. Doesn’t take long in minus temps. Fortunately it didn’t freeze enough to kill the fish. They have been frozen before and come back to life.
Each time the breaker tripped I’d have to go back and forth from the house through the snow, until I realized that it was a losing battle and just ended up unplugging the trailer and forgetting trying to heat it and didn’t pack any food ahead of time.
The road conditions during this time were horrible. It’s almost a week later (today) and the county finally came along and plowed our street. Ha! I knew that I wouldn’t be able to leave early and had to watch for my window of opportunity so that I could get from here down to Coso Junction. It’s about 270 miles if I go down Highway 395. It adds at least an hour if I go around through Nevada and come over Montgomery Pass. Dave put the chains for both the truck and the trailer in the back seat of my truck. I really wasn’t looking forward to the idea of having to chain up. I just don’t like hauling horses in those kinds of conditions.
Because of the cold I decided that I’d leave my truck inside the garage overnight. Looking back, I should probably have hooked up and pulled the trailer out of the driveway to the barn and into the street. On Wednesday morning I got the rest of my food loaded into the trailer. The horses had been getting fed extra soaked/rinsed beet pulp with salt since the night before plus plenty of hay. So they were ready to go, if we could get out. The forecast was looking good but it was going to stay below freezing.
At about 8:30 a.m. the highway conditions on Highway 395 opened up with no controls! I still knew that it was so cold that I didn’t need to hurry. I decided to get the truck hooked up so went out to the garage to open the garage door. Hit the button on the wall and crunch crunch crunch….the door opens about 2 inches and the light inside on the door opener is blinking. I push it closed, then open. Then closed, then open. I got it to come up about a foot and a half. It wouldn’t budge after that. So I went around outside to check things out…..<sigh>. Oh gee, here is the problem…there is ice freezing the door shut. Well, that’s just great I thought. I went back inside and got into the truck and got the remote for the garage door opener and then went back outside to the front. I was able to get the door open after several minutes of chipping away at ice and moving the door up and down. Finally!
Now to warm up the truck, put it into 4WD and hope I can make it out of the driveway! Put it into reverse and once I got moving I kept going. We made it! Now I backed up into the driveway back towards the barn to connect the truck to the trailer. Got out with my keys to unlock the gooseneck lock. Stick key in, turn. Nothing happens. The lock is froze solid and won’t release. Oh crud. Fiddled with that a bit and finally got it to release. By some luck I managed to get the truck in the right spot underneath the gooseneck and dropped the trailer down. At least the jack on the trailer worked!
Climbed up into the back of the truck and found that the coupler on the trailer was frozen hard in place. I had to fiddle with that for awhile to finally get it to move and then managed to get the rest of the brakes and safety chains hooked up. Checked to make sure everything worked from inside the truck, lights brakes, yep.
Things were looking up! I got the horses out to load into the back of the horse trailer. Tied them to the hitching post and went to open the back door of the trailer. It was frozen shut. I had to pry it open. It popped open much like a clam or oyster would. I’m beginning to wonder on one hand if this might not be such a good idea. On the other hand, getting to a warmer climate was looking pretty good right about now too.
Figured I should crack a couple of windows for the horses. Even in the cold with blankets on they still needed to have a little bit of ventilation, right? Well, that wasn’t happening. I couldn’t get even a single window to budge at all. Oh well, I figured they’d be okay until we got down to a lower elevation and I could then open up the window, at least I could open the drop downs. It was too cold to do it now though – only 10 degrees.
Got the horses into the trailer. Truck was already in 4WD. Only did a minor amount of sliding and spinning but got the whole rig going forward. Creeped through the open gate watching things slip and slide and hoping and praying the whole time that nothing would go far enough to take out the fence on either side, or the big tree up ahead…or the other fence up ahead. As we got through the deep now and out onto the now sheet-iced street ahead (like I said, we don’t get plowed very often)…..I knew that there was no way I was going to stop and risk becoming stuck. So I looked back in the rearview mirror to make sure everything looked okay and kept on going! It was almost 10:30 a.m. and was 10 degrees.
I crept along at a snails pace from my house out onto Highway 395. This turned out to be the worst part of the entire trip. Actually, getting across the highway heading south was the worst part as the truck and trailer both slid just getting across the berm of snow. I was having second thoughts and if there had been a way for me to turn around right there and then I would have. But I figured that I’m this far invested, so I pressed on. I lived at Lake Tahoe for a few years so have lots of experience driving in winter conditions. This wasn’t nearly as bad as some situations that I’ve been in but it was still not something I enjoy. I know that going forward is the easy part (unless of course, you are stuck), it’s stopping that is the problem and that 4WD doesn’t do anything to help with that. It’s hard to resist the urge to step on the brakes when you start to slide on ice.
The remainder of the trip wasn’t too bad. We encountered a bit of fog going around Topaz Lake. The roads were covered in snow and ice all the way down to Walker. The flashing highway sign said the road was “open with no controls”. I went slow and careful just like everybody else and never slid once. When the lady at the state line inspection station asked me where I was going my reply was “to someplace warmer”. She laughed and waved me on through.
From Walker Canyon all the rest of the way to Coso the pavement was dry and roads clear. What a relief! I stopped in Bishop at the Shell station to fill up on fuel and filled up some water. I also let the horses out. They have a nice large area at the Shell station in the back with trees, dirt lot and some grass that is private and secure for walking the horses. They got a chance to eat a bit, pee and drink while I got the water filled up, and was finally able to crack open some of their windows. I think that Chief was pretty perturbed at me over the windows thing. I left the horses blankets on figuring that we’d be getting in to camp at just about dark. It took longer than normal to get water filled up since I first had to thaw hoses out. Everything about this trip was harder than normal it seemed. I was still not about to complain since I had made it to Bishop and knew that the remainder of the trip would be a piece of cake compared to what I’d already been through just getting to this point.
While I was going in and out of my trailer at the gas station I noticed that the floor in my bathroom had a perfect square of snow. Huh? I looked up. The vent was closed tightly. I climbed up and opened it. It popped when it released, but in the screen was covered in snow. I tapped on it and it sifted down to the floor like flour through a sifter. My jacket had been hanging over the top of the shower and was wet. Glad that the floor mat and rug were on the floor underneath where the snow had sifted through. The gasket sealing the edges must need replacing. Add it to the list. Oh boy, and what I list I have after this trip.
Up next: arriving in camp, setting up, and marking trail.
So far I am very entertained, and VERY glad that where I live , 25 degrees is COLD.
I have zero experience drivinng in the snow and ice, with or without a trailer. Would you mind doing a post on this someday? How do it, tips, how to put on chains etc.?
Sure thing. My best advice is to NOT drive in those kinds of conditions!
It is very stressful. Some rigs are definitely more stable than others. My gooseneck is great wtih how the weight is distributed, and I also have 4WD.
The big thing is to remember that you just cannot “stop” if you get in slippery conditions. Usually if you start to slide you need to be able to slightly touch the gas to pull yourself out of it and that works great most of the time. It’s just iffy and never fun knowing your horses lives are at risk if something happens. I had people pass me flying over snow covered roads towing trailers, but never gave in to the temptation to speed up.
One more tip – ALWAYS make sure you have water (and food) with you for your horses, even when headed home. That way if you do have to pull over and stay stopped somewhere for several hours, or overnight – you have that and won’t have to worry about that too.
What you describe is what I have to deal with from December thorough March for most years… exept I am a total chicken about hauling in snow and ice… Did you have to go down a pass in the snow and ice in that photo? eeecckkk! Your braver than me!
Hi Jonna – yep, lots of up and down, but fortunately the down was nearly all on the sunny side so we had pavement. I really hate hauling in any kind of snow or ice conditions and try to avoid it at all costs. When I left for this trip the road conditions report for Hwy 395 was “open with no restrictions”. I was a bit surprised! If I had known it was like that I would have waited a couple more hours for the road to get better cleared.