On December 21st, Heather and I were headed out to MN for the week of Thanksgiving, but before we
left Ryan Scott, Chuck, Bryan Youngs, Jim Pytel and I wanted to go out and run a first descent of a creek flowing off of Sugarhill
Mountain. That day Chuck had to be to work for a meeting at 3:00pm, so we met at Bryan's place at 7:00am so we could hit the
creek and catch our plane and Chuck could get to his meeting on time. We all hooked up and off we went, a typical Oregon morning,
cold and rainy, and by the time we started to hit the mountains, Snow! We were all determined to run this creek snow or not,
finally we reach the road the creek is on, and of course its not plowed. There were some tire tracks from earlier but it was
snowing enough to leave a few inches we still had to go through. We started on our way up, it was beautiful, there was about
1.5 feet of snow everywhere, covering trees the road and anything else we came by and it wasn't letting up. Bryan was in the lead
with his Subaru Wrx, followed by Chuck in his Chevy S10 and then be in our Olds Bravada. I was kind of nervous going up because
it was solid ice below the foot and you could feel the tires spin every so often. Finally the inevitable happened Chucks S10
couldn't make it, I'm behind watching back end skid back and forth while I look over the edge at about a 200' drop, so I stop
and watch them for a minute but they aren't making it, so Jim got out of chucks truck and stood on the back end to help get some
tracktion, didn't work, then they put on tire chains, still no luck. Finally we had to go back down, easier said then done, after
all we were on a single lane road with a foot and a half of snow surronding us. So we ended up backing down the mountain for about
a half of mile until we got to a wide spot to turn around, so we got out our paddles and started shoveling snow for a turn around
area, it worked great! Finally we got down the mountain, and we decided to put Jim's and Chuck's gear in our Bravada and make our
way back up, and as we were about to go Bryan and Ryan ended up coming back down, they saw the creek and said it was really low.
We all conversed for a while and decided to check it out again and do a very low water run.
  
So we go back up driving on the snow and ice up the mountain, every so often you can feel the 4 wheel drive
slip in and power up, it was determined to get us to our creek. Finally we get there and Ryan and Bryan were right, it was the
lowest I'd seen it yet. Bummer! It looked way to low to run, but Ryan and I were the only ones that had ever seen the creek
so Jim, Bryan and chuck were anxious to see it. So they walked up to see what was avbove the last two drops, and when they came
back they were excited to go and do it, but we all agreed that right now it was just too low and we would have to come back another
time. The only problem was, is that we will have to wait till spring, so the road will be drivable. We all looked at eachother
and said now what? So Chuck having to be at work at 3:00 said "If we can't think of anything stupid to do, I'm going to work".
Something stupid, Hmmmm.... someone says, I know lets get pulled behind the car in our boats. Not such a bad idea, sound like fun
to me, but I'm thinking to myself, "would there be a safer spot then on the mountain where it drops 200 feet around each corner, well
I guess that would take the stupidity out of it then, wouldn't it". So Ryan, Bryan and I played paper rock scissors to see who would
go first, it was Bryan. He hops in his boat, I tie our strap to the bumper of the car and he grabs the other end. With Jim driving
chuck in the back shooting out the back of the Bravada, Heather and Ryan up the road with two more camcorders and me with my still
camera I look at Bryan and said ready? He looks back and says yep, I yell to Jim, "GO" and Jim takes off with Bryan behind and all of us
with cameras. He had to let go a few times but he made it up to as far as we wanted to go, so he hops out and I jump in with a huge
smile on my face and say "lets go!". So we take off down the mountain and I was able to hold on the whole time, at least until
Jim stopped where the other car was but my brakes didn't work so well, well actually I didn't have any so I slide up and a little bit
under the car until the boat is rubbing on the back tire, I let go of the rope and told Jim to go so I wouldn't end up any
farther under the car.
 
After our little road creeking episode we all packed up and headed out, and on the way all of us were
happy with the great day we had, granted we didn't get to run the creek, but we got to be in deep powder and it snowed all day,
It is by far the most beautiful spot I have been so far in Oregon.
 
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