The Unstucking: Part 2 Things Get Worse

The next morning I awoke full of hope and belief that today was the day we would get the truck out. I only had a short way to go with the snowblower and a path would be there for the truck to follow to freedom.

It was, of course, really cold again over night and I had to start out putting the battery charger on the tractor again. While that was working I thought we could try to get the truck forward on the path and out of the snow pile. We had dug out the front end and the sides the day before. I wedged my way in and turned the key….no start. Gauges came up, lights on, but no start. Sigh.

I decided it was more important to finish the path and not worry about that yet. I got the tractor running again and tried to get things rolling. It wouldn’t move. I figured it may have frozen to the ground and gave it a “lift”. It started making some strange noises and lurched a bit, but no go.

Well, I fiddled around a bit and shortly thereafter there was a puddle of oil from the transmission pooling under the tractor. Perfect. The machine still ran, just didn’t move so I thought maybe I can rig it so the blower runs and then simply shovel the snow into it so it blows over the snow bank.

That didn’t really work so now I had to make a choice. Continue with the truck plan, or accept help from my brother-in-law who offered to come by. Option one means shovelling the rest of the way to the driveway (50 or so feet of 4-5 foot deep snow). Option two is to shovel around the trailer so someone can get by. Seeing as both involve shovelling snow, I go with two as it involves far less snow.

The snow bank by the trailer was fairly easy to work with as the top layer stuck together nicely and the bottom was compressed already. It didn’t take too long to make a lane wide enough for a truck to pass by. While I was there I shovelled the snow from around the front of the trailer and tires. It wasn’t too bad there, it wasn’t high centered or too deep.

I decided to take a risk and bring the bus back and try myself. I backed down the driveway and carefully tried to avoid the ruts I had left the night we arrived. Hooked on, fingers crossed, gently pushed the gas and hurrah! We are unstuck!

I proceeded down the drive proudly, my trophy in tow. My fans waving from the window, proud of their resourceful father. If only I had listened to my wife from the beginning. She had advised me from the start to try with the bus, or ask for help.

I still want the truck though as driving the bus everywhere is tiresome. But for today we can now leave our property.