Sitting on the porch of a jungle bungalow in Thailand sweating with nothing to do, seems like the only way to cool of other than another cold shower might be to think of cold. Really cold.
The cabin at the end of the road is halfway across the world and cold as hell right now. I know I’ve been there.
2010 December sometime. We had finished the summer before and used it for climbing trips but it hadn’t seen any winter use yet, insulation and a stove went in that fall as temperatures dropped but that was when the road was still open. In October probably.
Now that the road was closed and the snow thick in the mountains the thought of an overnight trip to the cabin seemed like a really good idea, Jarrett and I, Dave Tuttle and his girl Bobby Ann, with her 5 month old foetus. The Fellows, Gary and Johnny. A good idea indeed.
The plan hatched and agreed upon several weeks prior, all seemed go until Jarrett decided to get a vasectomy, 3 days before the trip. He was still in but his wife didn’t really think it was smart, and then the weather forecast for the weekend came up. -35 C. Pretty dam cold, but still doable. Pig headed fools that we are the plan moved forward. Jarrett agreed not to ride like an asshole and we all agreed to smack him if he did, that didn’t really impress Brandi but it did get a go ahead, she’s his wife and the boss when push comes to shove.
Husky gas station, north end of Dawson Creek 6:00 a.m. Saturday, -35 as promised, two trucks with trailers full of snowmobiles meet for fuel and coffee. Go time. Bobbies belly gets some fun poked at it but she’s been riding and seems confident. With 2 and a half hours to daylight and only 130 kilometres to cover till the beginning of the trail the plan is a go.
Tumbler ridge, 100 km. From Dawson we stop at an oil and gas camp for breakfast, Gary and Johnny’s mom is in charge of the kitchen and feeds us up as if we were all hers. The sun is coming up and although the temperature is steady at -35 it’s still early yet. We push on to the beginning of the trail. Where the plough stops on the road into the Monkman Park is a wide spot with a stop sign and turnaround. From here we have 50 kilometres to ride to the cabin.
Unload the machines and get them fired up, hitch skimmers behind the biggest machines and strap jerry cans to everyone else’s backpacks and gear on. Everyone is very careful to cover exposed skin neck warmers and scarves and balaclavas all around. The temperature isn’t bad at rest but with wind-chill frostbite is a very real concern. Checks and double checks complete we head out into blazing blue skies and a sunrise that pictures can’t describe.
Within the first 5 km. Jarrett’s pulled over.... his machine is overheating, steam billowing from under the hood. A check of the coolant shows the catch can full of green ice with the coolant lines running to the tunnel stiff with ice as well. Someone forgot to replace the coolant from last year’s ride where he cooked it till it boiled then replaced what boiled with snow melt. Someone being him. Blame be dammed it’s time for a fix, and as luck or fate would have it on one of the skimmers is a 3 foot section of stovepipe for the cabin. An afterthought to help the woodstove draw a little better by getting its end above the roofline.
To work! We all start chopping or sawing, dragging wood next to Jarrett’s machine. He carries a hatchet under his hood and all our shovels have saws in the handles so in no time we have a smudge of smoke then open flame next to his machine. Fire the stovepipe into that and prop it under the tunnel pointed at the cooler and the fix is on. We keep dragging wood from the bush and he keeps the fire crackling and fans the flames up the pipe. Lots of laughter, who brings a stovepipe snowmobiling? Just in case? We do! Every couple minutes he fires the engine till its warning beeper sounds, getting the heat into it from both ends.
It’s going to work, and we are all quite pleased but a new development comes to light. Bobby’s belly is getting kicked from inside and she’s not very happy with it. In fact she’s obviously pissed right off. She’s not a very girly girl and the thought of going back has her downright mad. However, to her credit she’s also not stupid, better now than way out there so while Jarrett Johnny Gary and I deal with the dud sled Bobby and Dave Dave decide to pull the plug on her ride, she tells Dave not to worry if he loads her sled with her she will drive home alone and he can keep riding, it leaves us with one more sled to haul on Jarrett’s truck and trailer combo but we all agree it can be done.
Dave and Bobby head back and we carry on with the big thaw. Finally the reluctant sled fires and runs without beeping and the temperature has come up t a fully acceptable -20. Dave’s not back so we race back to the truck. And I do mean race, with a 130 horsepower under the throttle lever it’s really hard not to want to go fast.
Bobby’s sled is loaded and we get back to the truck just in time to say goodbye then it’s time to make serious miles, Dave and Jarrett are both lugging skimmers so it’s up to Garry, Johnny and me to break trail through the fresh snow and for the first 20 km. There is a track to follow, someone has been out here in the last couple days but their track disappears at the turnoff to Kinuso falls. From there it’s 30 kilometres more through two feet of fresh powder on top of another 3 feet of packed snow. Drifts and the rough road underneath make for some pretty epic riding but not really easy to keep a straight line through, add in the urge to race factor and Garry and I make a dogs breakfast of what should be a decent trail.
In the last 10 km. The worsening road underneath the snow has my machine dropping out from under me and then launching skyward every 20 meters, it’s fun but takes some heavy exercise to control finally the constant full throttle fun catches up to me, the machine drops out I chop throttle till I feel the next jump point uphill and when I squash the throttle to launch up instead of the pull on my arms everything stops moving, a brief panic rev and my bodies momentum carries onward. A perfect graceful front flip over the bars and I’m upside down on the hood of my machine.
Gary pulls up and whips his helmet off, “Dude that was awesome! I think you blew a belt.”
Chastised but unrepentant.... belt fixed and reefers burnt. We plug on, the going has been slow but we make it out to the cabin with an hour of light left and bushwhack our way to within a couple meters of the cabins backside. Time to fuel the machines and cart our groceries inside.
Home sweet home! A summers worth of hard work and an epic ride to relive round the woodstove, bobby sent a dozen homemade chicken pot pies with Dave and they may just be the best thing ever...Till Jarrett starts making tortellini! A mad orgy of eating, drinking fireball and smoking reefer ensues. Gear is spread out everywhere round the stove drying, and the bench racing is getting out of hand in the best way, did you see when I did this? Or what the hell was that in the bush you where chasing? I wasn’t chasing it I just ended up out there!
We carried a lot of wood in when we started the fire and in the loft space it’s almost uncomfortably hot, but by the time people start nodding, it’s obvious it’s getting really cold out, the floor is still chilly to the touch and the woodpile is almost burnt inside. Johnny the ape-man is first to bed and as he starts snoring the discussion turns to him sleepwalking. If he wakes with scuffed knuckles we’ll know right? His brother Gary loves this topic and it carries almost to bedtime for the rest of us. The snores stop and snickers begin. “Very good Joe....” is his final sentence.
There is room for everyone in the loft but someone has to stay below to stoke the fire, it’s burning a full box of wood every 45 minutes and if it goes out life is going to suck. I have the best sleeping bag and agree to stay below, head by the fire feet toward the door. Every time my feet start to get cold I wake up and stoke it. Must have woke 25 times that night, Jarrett goes for a pee and comes back in shaking,”my weatherdick says it got to be 45 below man”
When we wake in the morning the first light reveals the truth of the matter, a frost line a foot up the walls and carpeting the floor...when we get home we learn it hit -50 that night, killing cold.
By the time breakfast and coffee are done and the sun is shining on our sleds its come up a bit but still, its firkin cold out there. It takes 3 fires to get 5 sleds going, mine is the oldest and although it took close to a hundred tugs it did finally run without fire, Dave’s is the only fan cooled machine and brand new, also ran sans fire.
The ride out is slow, my sled won’t go fast without the carbs icing up and everybody else is running into issues as well. Not the least of which is just plain uncomfortably cold, the wind chill creeps into every chink in our gear and the next day we all have a black spot or two somewhere. My neck has 2 small hickies and Gary has raccoon eyes from his goggles before we even get to the truck.
Dark is falling fast as we reach the truck and a whole nother mess is there to greet us. We knew the truck was going to be frozen solid. The plan was hatched midday to get there and start falling deadwood.
What we didn’t expect to see when we rounded the last corner was a small SUV buried a hundred yards up our sled trail with 2 men shovelling furiously using the sheared of stop sign from the end of the road. As we get closer it turns out there are three off them, one inside the still running vehicle warming up and the other two with only one winter jacket between them. Holy dead men batman!
The questions begin and the answers follow. They are German tourists who thought they could drive out on our trail to see the falls. They realize now that there is no cell service out here and if we hadn’t come back to the truck today they would be popsicles tomorrow. And yes they are hungry? Garry and Johnny both have mini stoves bolted to their exhaust with pizza pockets and garlic sausage in them. They sit in the car and warm up as we hook three machines onto their bumper, then we tug and they push and their soon back on the ploughed road.
Back to our own problem, a turn of the truck key and nothing, we pop the hood and job boxes and start rounding up gear as Jarrett explains to them in no uncertain terms their obligations now. “You don’t leave till our truck runs.” They pull alongside and we hook our jumpers up. Will that work? Is their next question, but no one is sitting still to answer. A tarp is being stretched over the hood and trees are dropping in the bush beside the road.
Within minutes Jarrett has a fire going beside his trucks bumper. And we are all dragging wood not just to feed the fire but to keep warm as well. It’s a killing cold and in order to live there are tricks. By the time the fire has produced enough coals to fill a scoop shovel it’s so cold that a jug of motor oil turned over the coals doesn’t want to pour. If the oil was hanging six inches out of the spout and the jug righted it would just retract like a snail’s eyestalk. But when the oil hits the coals it produces serious heat so we keep on the track, it will work we just have to get the engine oil inside the motor thin enough to let it turn over.
And sure enough it takes two hours but the truck does run and everyone gets home safe!
Wives are unimpressed Jarrett’s balls are sore and we all have frostbite scars to remind us, but every time I think of this story I also think of a bumper sticker I saw in Squamish once
“Your worst nightmare is my best vacation”
The end.
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