Weather Woes

Cascade Mountains, Washington

Fraulein Maria may have included "snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes" in her list of favorite things, but they are certainly not on my list. In fact, I'm pretty much tired of snow in general!

It's been a few weeks since I last blogged...and boy, do we have some stories! It's been a crazy few weeks, with weather, mountains, new states, and new experiences.

Did you hear about the huge storm that slammed the East coast a couple weeks ago? Thankfully we weren't stuck in it, but we did get sent to Connecticut shortly afterwards. The interstates were clear, though local roads were still in bad condition.

Snowy trees in Wisconsin 

However, from there we went straight down to Richmond, Virginia...by way of New York and New Jersey! And of course, I made a wrong turn and ended up going right through the Bronx. Let me tell you, not a fun experience! We made it through that, but when we dropped south into Maryland, the road conditions changed drastically. Maryland was not prepared to handle the volume of snow they received, and they were still working to clear the interstates. There were plow trucks with no warnings and accidents caused by slick road surfaces, not to mention that the outside lanes kept disappearing under snow!

We finally got down to Virginia, and conditions improved slightly. When we got to our shipper location, however, they had no signs or markings on or around their building and we unintentionally passed it. Thinking to loop around the block and come back, I turned at the next intersection...only to find myself on a narrow, 2 lane country road lined with houses. After 5 miles, we finally found a local church and cemetery with a large snow-covered parking lot. It was nerve-wracking, but we got ourselves turned around and headed back in the right direction! We eventually got back to the shipper, but since we had been slowed down by the weather, it was 11pm and they had all gone home for the night! Sighs...

Recently, we were stuck in Wisconsin about 24 hours due to a cracked windshield. Another vehicle had thrown up a rock, and what started as a tiny chip grew rapidly in the frigid air until it nearly reached top to bottom on the driver's side. Of course, the local glass repair technicians were out of our model of windshield until the next day!

Snoqualmie Pass, Washington 

Last week, we were assigned a load from Columbus, OH to Seattle, WA. We ran into a few snowstorms on the way out there, and some slightly concerning mountain passes, but for the most part we were doing fine until we hit Snoqualmie Pass. Now, the Cascade Mountains receive one of the highest annual snowfalls in the world. The Snoqualmie Pass is far from being the steepest or narrowest pass we've ever driven, but it was under 6-8 feet of snow! The interstate literally wound between walls of snow on each side. A recent snowfall had left slush and ice on the road, making the pass especially nerve-wracking!

From Seattle, they sent us back to Michigan. We had to stop for about 12 hours in North Dakota due to high winds, the kind that threaten to knock a grown man off his feet. Another bad snowstorm hit us in northern Indiana, but after many several delays we finally made it to Detroit. That city is one of the few places we have traveled through while trucking where I have actually felt very uncomfortable. I was glad to leave that city and head back down to Ohio...only to be given another load, this time heading to Sacramento, CA! We've already stopped twice on this load due to snow and ice. We'll see how it goes.

Stay safe out there!