Frightful Moods & Moments #SundayStills

I’m not sure where you’re located but, I’m experiencing my first full time, fall weather. Since it dipped below freezing, I claim it’s winter but Steve claims its just a brisk fall.

With Halloween coming up quickly it is the time to share photos following a “frightful” theme. I don’t typically save any photos that are frightfully awful but my sister has sent me a couple as blackmail material. Yep, I can have pretty bad hair days.

Moods

So, how about a spooky-ish mood photo.

This was taken one very early foggy morning in our orchard. The fig tree on the left has dropped it’s leaves and the branches now clamor to touch you. It was definitely, an eerie looking day as the sun was buried behind the gray fog curtain.

This next photo was taken on a late summer camping / road trip stop in the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest. Although it was technically summer, a cold rain storm rolled in and kept us stationary for a couple of days. We ended up with a small amount of hail too! We stayed put and enjoyed the down time mixed in with a few weather breaks to get out and go walk. Weather was yucky enough that we didn’t drive anywhere else. When it rains hard in the forest and you’re on a mountain, it’s not always a good time to drive down the mountain, if you know what I mean.

Kind of reminds me of an early experience with woods. Being a suburban raised kid, seeing dense forests was somewhat scary to me. They was a sense of foreboding and I never could stomach walking too far into the woods. Maybe I was told the little red riding hood story once too often?

Moments

Since, Steve and I retired, traveling off and on has been how we prefer to escape. To travel with any RV and camp out on public lands (sometimes it was the woods), I had to build up some navigational tools and skills. We also had to learn how to work together, listen to each other, and support each other, if we got into trouble.

One early lesson was to listen to the navigator (me). It would’ve prevented this first muddy overnight experience when we got stuck in the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest located east of the Phoenix, AZ area.

At this time we are traveling in our current truck with the older Lance camper. Dark was looming when Steve took the turn to our pinned destination even though I wanted to “see” the area before turning off the road. He just boldly went when he shouldn’t have and we sunk.

Between rain and dark closing in, Steve only had so much time to attempt digging this wheel out. All efforts failed to gain us any traction and it wasn’t long before he called it quits. After a somewhat sleepless night hoping rain would let up, we got outselves outside and found sunshine! The rain was gone but, the mud continued to hold on to our back wheels. Took Steve 4 hours of more jacking, digging, rocking hunting (my job) and eventually jeep towing to get us out of the mud soup.

From that moment, we were sure we’d learned what we needed to not get stuck again! We increased our jacking capabilities and more tow gear to carry with us. After we built the new camper, Maximus, we even had better tires in place. Unfortunately the road can be humbling. Even if you think you have it down, it’ll still surprise you.

Last summer, we aimed for a tricky camp spot in the Grand Tetons national forest. Although the weather was clear they had some heavy rain earlier in the week. As Steve took the turn off the forest road, the rear wheel found a slick section of mud. That’s when the rear driver side wheel just slid off the road.

Although frightful for me, my logical side knows that getting stuck isn’t catastrophic. It’s always scary as it happens. There’s the few moments of limited to no control of the truck. Then we come to a stop and can assess our next steps.

Unless we had rolled over, we knew we’d somehow get out. The Tetons mess required a wrecker with a hefty towing bill to drive from Jackson Hole and rescue the rig. Since that incident, our recovery gear has continued to grow. Maximus now has the big recovery jacks, more robust towing gear, plus both jeep and the truck now have winches. We can self recover if we ever get stuck again.

The Big Scare

Like I said, the above incidents were scary and nerve racking for me, but I knew we’d survive. However, just 3 months ago, we had a different failure. This was the failure that gives you the spooks just thinking about it. Take a close look at this picture…

We technically safely wobbled off the road. Upon exiting the cab, we started looking around to figure out what was wrong and found this wheel lopsided. You may need to stare at the wheels position as this photo doesn’t show it very well.

It clicked for Steve quickly at that point. He removed the hub cap and discovered we were down to 3 attached lugs with the others having fractured and broken. He was able to get everything on with spare lugs and we nervously piled into the cab for the last hour of driving.

Frightful?

I wish I had fun frightful, halloween fun pictures to share. I’ll have to work on collecting some for a future post. Even though we’ve had some scares on the road, we will continue to get out and explore.

Although our traveling has slowed this year due to our new home build, we will get back to it even with the risks out there including road accidents. Steve diligently will keep caring for the truck and we will get out there to see new sights and discover new places. The road traveling life, keeps us busy, active and healthy. To not get out and travel and experience life, is scarier than spiders and getting stuck in the mud. Yes, I’m pretty sure getting stuck will happen again.

About the Photo Challenge

A weekly themed photo challenge hosted by Terri. Check out her Blog and come back to visit for more SundayStills and traveling posts!

More Sunday Still Posts

Thanks for visiting our travel blog and I hope you enjoyed finding the #SundayStills Challenge. You can join the weekly challenge by visiting our hosts blog Second Wind Leisure. and checking out Terri’s post for this week, Something Frightful for the Season.