I wanted to take this opportunity to share with everyone willing to read this, something that happened to me that I am quite ashamed of. A very avoidable lesson. First of all, to create a bit of framing I will disclose a little about myself. I am in no way making excuses or "tooting my own horn" but I want to paint a picture somewhat of how I as a person, operate. I am a military veteran, a former Marine and a Navy rescue swimmer with survival training. I am a mountaineer and rock climber, a high alpine fly angler, an outdoors person, and now a professional firefighter. I have seen first hand, even rescued people who got themselves into bad situations in the backcountry or in urban environments. With this amount of training, education, and experience under my belt, I should have known better.
My wife and I decided we wanted to take a leisurely cruise out to the desert in the jeep with our daughter who loves going out to the desert. We made plans and put out the word to other jeepers and off-roaders we knew. When we didn't get any takers we said: "okay let's just do Sin Nombre". Sin Nombre Canyon, for those of you not from southern California or who have not done it, is a very tame, very flat trail that meanders through a canyon out in the Ocotillo area. It leads out to a drop off into another canyon called Diablo Drop Off. The route then follows another canyon out to Fish Creek.
This is where my problem starts. I have gone out to this particular trail and done this particular route more times than I can count. I have seen Subarus, Honda Civics, minivans, and a number of other low clearance and stock vehicles do this trail. I have lead runs on this trail in the day as well as the night. I have gone alone when no one else could make it out. I created my own normalization of deviance. I had created so many good "slides" in my mind I didn't even realize my own complacency. I began breaking all the rules, the primary being NEVER GO WHEELING ALONE. Because I had done this trail so many times and I knew how tame it was and how many vehicles do it, I underestimated it and overestimated my self.
The situation unraveled before we ever even got to Diablo Drop Off (the only technical part of the ride). I think we were about 3/4 of a mile into Arroyo Secco Del Diablo trail, a trail that connects Sin Nombre to the drop-off. A huge portion of the canyon had collapsed and the normal section of the trail was covered by debris, but others had gone up and over a slight hill creating a new trail. The new trail going over the hill created a slight right-hand turn on an outward slope creating an off-camber turn. I got out to scout it. My wife and daughter stayed in the jeep. The off-camber wasn't terrible and up ahead everything seemed fine. I said: "let's give it a try." We started up the hill and eased into the turn, but I lost my nerve as the off-camber turn gave the sensation of tipping (even though we would never have tipped). I steered out on to a flat portion off of the trail and instantly my driver side front and rear wheels were completely submerged in mud.
The mud had been lurking under about a foot of dry crust. Crust that was sturdy enough for me to walk on, and unassuming enough that I had no idea the mud was there. We were stuck. We were alone. We were deep in the desert, in a canyon, with no cell service. I had made the mistake I never thought I could.
My wife was a champion. While I got to work attempting a self-recovery, she took my daughter on a desert "adventure" to look for... well anything. I dug, and I dug. The mud was about the consistency of a meringue pie filler. My hands worked better than my shovel because any time I tried to pull the spade back out the suction held any mud I was trying to remove. I was covered from head to toe in mud pudding. I managed to get the front and rear wheels dug out as well as the rear diff and gas tank. I chopped up some shrubs, found some rocks, and started to build some cribbing to hopefully create some traction. This was useless. the mud below my crib bed was the same consistency so even when I was able to crawl on top of the rocks and shrubs I kept sinking. Next step: create a winch point. I was about to remove my spare tire to put in a hole about 50 feet ahead of me to winch off of when two dirt bike riders showed up. We dug some more together and tried a few more traction beds and were about to revisit my "winch off the spare" plan when a Toyota 4runner showed up! We spotted them around the off-camber turn to the trail ahead of me and to put an end to the story I winched off them and got out without any damage to the jeep.
I was extremely lucky. That is the thing about complacency. You can become so comfortable with something you don't realize how true, how real the danger is until it is too late. I put myself, my wife, and my daughter in an extremely dangerous situation. I hope anyone who visits the desert or their local "easy" trail alone, or who have entertained the idea of going alone will learn from my mistake and not make the same poor decisions I did. I see people traveling alone on the trails almost every time I go and I never think anything of it. This experience has changed that for me. I really hope someone else can learn from this, I sure did.
@Chris I hope this is the right location for this post.
My wife and I decided we wanted to take a leisurely cruise out to the desert in the jeep with our daughter who loves going out to the desert. We made plans and put out the word to other jeepers and off-roaders we knew. When we didn't get any takers we said: "okay let's just do Sin Nombre". Sin Nombre Canyon, for those of you not from southern California or who have not done it, is a very tame, very flat trail that meanders through a canyon out in the Ocotillo area. It leads out to a drop off into another canyon called Diablo Drop Off. The route then follows another canyon out to Fish Creek.
This is where my problem starts. I have gone out to this particular trail and done this particular route more times than I can count. I have seen Subarus, Honda Civics, minivans, and a number of other low clearance and stock vehicles do this trail. I have lead runs on this trail in the day as well as the night. I have gone alone when no one else could make it out. I created my own normalization of deviance. I had created so many good "slides" in my mind I didn't even realize my own complacency. I began breaking all the rules, the primary being NEVER GO WHEELING ALONE. Because I had done this trail so many times and I knew how tame it was and how many vehicles do it, I underestimated it and overestimated my self.
The situation unraveled before we ever even got to Diablo Drop Off (the only technical part of the ride). I think we were about 3/4 of a mile into Arroyo Secco Del Diablo trail, a trail that connects Sin Nombre to the drop-off. A huge portion of the canyon had collapsed and the normal section of the trail was covered by debris, but others had gone up and over a slight hill creating a new trail. The new trail going over the hill created a slight right-hand turn on an outward slope creating an off-camber turn. I got out to scout it. My wife and daughter stayed in the jeep. The off-camber wasn't terrible and up ahead everything seemed fine. I said: "let's give it a try." We started up the hill and eased into the turn, but I lost my nerve as the off-camber turn gave the sensation of tipping (even though we would never have tipped). I steered out on to a flat portion off of the trail and instantly my driver side front and rear wheels were completely submerged in mud.
The mud had been lurking under about a foot of dry crust. Crust that was sturdy enough for me to walk on, and unassuming enough that I had no idea the mud was there. We were stuck. We were alone. We were deep in the desert, in a canyon, with no cell service. I had made the mistake I never thought I could.
My wife was a champion. While I got to work attempting a self-recovery, she took my daughter on a desert "adventure" to look for... well anything. I dug, and I dug. The mud was about the consistency of a meringue pie filler. My hands worked better than my shovel because any time I tried to pull the spade back out the suction held any mud I was trying to remove. I was covered from head to toe in mud pudding. I managed to get the front and rear wheels dug out as well as the rear diff and gas tank. I chopped up some shrubs, found some rocks, and started to build some cribbing to hopefully create some traction. This was useless. the mud below my crib bed was the same consistency so even when I was able to crawl on top of the rocks and shrubs I kept sinking. Next step: create a winch point. I was about to remove my spare tire to put in a hole about 50 feet ahead of me to winch off of when two dirt bike riders showed up. We dug some more together and tried a few more traction beds and were about to revisit my "winch off the spare" plan when a Toyota 4runner showed up! We spotted them around the off-camber turn to the trail ahead of me and to put an end to the story I winched off them and got out without any damage to the jeep.
I was extremely lucky. That is the thing about complacency. You can become so comfortable with something you don't realize how true, how real the danger is until it is too late. I put myself, my wife, and my daughter in an extremely dangerous situation. I hope anyone who visits the desert or their local "easy" trail alone, or who have entertained the idea of going alone will learn from my mistake and not make the same poor decisions I did. I see people traveling alone on the trails almost every time I go and I never think anything of it. This experience has changed that for me. I really hope someone else can learn from this, I sure did.
@Chris I hope this is the right location for this post.
