I went up to Southfork with Ryan this morning, and though our original intent was to make it to the Skyline and down Reader ridge and wherever we might find ourselves inbetween, but Ryan's battery got jarred over by the nasty road, ripping some jerry-rigged wires out of the fuseblock and killing the engine.
We had no idea where they came from until we figured out that the battery was in fact, out of place. The new positioning of the objectives made it pretty clear where the wire had come from, although the snow and relatively light clothing on our backs was making it rough to make constructive decisions at the point we found that out. Things were progressing rather slowly on the electrical diagnosing front, so Ryan called his Dad to have him pull us down with his truck.
At about the point where hypothermia was becoming a serious consideration, we were fixing to get a fire going and aggressively diagnose the problem and get it jerry-rigged back together.
At about that same time, Ryan's dad finally arrived to help us drag the thing off the mountain. That was an adventure as well, with exploding tow-chains and overheated brakes, borrowed operable chains, switching from pulling the dead Toyota to following it down with the chain behind for braking, and painfully slow headway down the hill.
We made it though, and later on in the afternoon after warm showers and hearty lunches, we tackled the problem anew, with the sun shining and ample tools and material, over at Ryan's house.
We had no idea where they came from until we figured out that the battery was in fact, out of place. The new positioning of the objectives made it pretty clear where the wire had come from, although the snow and relatively light clothing on our backs was making it rough to make constructive decisions at the point we found that out. Things were progressing rather slowly on the electrical diagnosing front, so Ryan called his Dad to have him pull us down with his truck.
At about the point where hypothermia was becoming a serious consideration, we were fixing to get a fire going and aggressively diagnose the problem and get it jerry-rigged back together.
At about that same time, Ryan's dad finally arrived to help us drag the thing off the mountain. That was an adventure as well, with exploding tow-chains and overheated brakes, borrowed operable chains, switching from pulling the dead Toyota to following it down with the chain behind for braking, and painfully slow headway down the hill.
We made it though, and later on in the afternoon after warm showers and hearty lunches, we tackled the problem anew, with the sun shining and ample tools and material, over at Ryan's house.