Steelie1030:
That story is too funny! Dave was a great friend of mine as well, and I can't tell you how many times he told me that story, cruising home from a long day on the river. You couldn't have fished with Dave without ending up with a couple of classics. Here's my fave:
Dave and I decided to be adventurous and hit the river in the middle of a cold snap in January, after a big snow storm. Couldn't get steelies off our minds, and he was absolutely sure that his old Jeep would have no probs getting up the backroads despite the "top of the wheel well" deep snow back there. We had a few close calls while we carefully made our way upriver that morning, and by the time we hit the backroads our confidence was bolstered to say the least! There were hardly any other "Crazy" die hards on the river that day(wonder why
) so that made us sure that our perilous journey would set us up for an amazing day full of leaping steelhead at the end of our lines. As we began to make our way up one of the backroads, we noticed that there were no tire tracks yet(not a good sign), but that didn't faze us. Dave kept on trucking! We made it about 5k in when the old Jeep sputtered to a halt. Dave tried and tried to get that engine to start but it was no use....we were absolutely stuck. We stared at one another for a few moments before we burst out laughing at the fact that we had gotten ourselves into this mess. We knew we had no choice but to gather our gear and hike out for help. That was what we did. I should mention that the snow was coming down like mad and by this point it was accumulating on the car at an alarming rate. We hiked for what seemed like an eternity.....slow going in the deep snow....and eventually made our way to a prison. We made our way inside....and after the prison guards finished laughing at the two crazy fisherman in full garb....they kindly offered us the use of a phone. Not surprisingly we were the spectacle of the day, as it seemed that each and every prisoner made there way out to laugh at us one by one. Pretty humiliating. At least one guy brought us a cup of coffee to warm up! After calling a tow truck, we made our way back up the road to the head of the backroad upon which we were stuck. Along the way I had a close encounter with either a large bobcat or a lynx....craziest close encounter ever....and it scared the crap outta Dave! We waited at the rendezvous point for 3 hours....and finally....off in the distance....there it was....a set of headlights in the snow!!! We were saved!! But when the truck finally arrived, we were a bit apprehensive.....it was a huge flatbed tow truck:( We told the guy it wouldn't be a good idea, but like Dave, he was sure he could make it. It went ok for the first bit, and in fact I started to think it'd be ok......right up until the point that the flatbed skidded sideways down a ravine, landing against a very large tree that(Thank God) held it from sliding all the way into the river!!! We climbed out and assessed the situation. Gotta give the driver some credit. He actually managed to use a culvert and winched it back up to the road. Needless to say, he went no further, and left us to wait for another truck. As we watched him drive off up the logging road, we once again burst out laughing at our predicament. After at least 2 more hours the next tow truck arrived. This guy was well equipped with an F350 4X4 Tow Truck, and he hauled up that road like it was nothing!! Finally we arrived back at the truck, which by this time was completely buried in snow by this point. Dave swept the snow off the drivers side and climbed inside to grab a few things.....he muttered something about giving it a shot. I told him to go ahead, and that's exactly what he did.....and guess what?! the Jeep started right up, and we were able to drive right on outta there. We followed the completely pi$$ed off Tow Truck driver all the way back to town.
I miss Dave too, he was a great guy, and needless to say I had some of my most memorable adventures with him!!