As I wind down the road, you can see from my rearview mirror that the temperature has warmed up to a balmy 27 degrees. There is no risk of getting stuck in the snow, only the mud or sliding off the road. Speed/momentum is the enemy here. I use the lowest 4WD gears to keep my speed to a crawl on the steepest sections. Once we returned to cell service, the two mountain passes to reach Andra's car were indeed closed yesterday. We weren't able to retrieve her car until Wednesday (5 days from today).

Well, I hope you enjoyed our trip as much as we did. It is always good to unplug and spend some time in nature. With this being a severe drought year, I don't think our usual fall backpacking will be possible once the foolishly managed forests are all ablaze. If, by some miracle, a fall trip is doable, I'd love to squeeze one in. Who wants to go?

All the best,
Mike, Andra, and Dawg. (Click here to play our trip's theme song)