Chapter XVI

We get settled in the Power Wagon, down off the hill, through the Mount Baker Tunnel and and across the floating bridge.
The Floating bridge has always amused me. There is something anti-logical about a major highway being supported by floating boxes made out of concrete. It has mostly worked well, except for the time they were working on it and left some of the doors to the pontoons open when a storm blew in. Major portions of the bridge are now a fish sanctuary. Of course they replaced the sunken portions, but the concept amuses me. Mostly.
Out through Issaquah where the forest meets the city. The weather was typical Pugetopolis in November. Gray skies and something between a mist and drizzle dropping on us. At about the Denny Creek exit, the fog/mist/drizzle became freezing fog, and the wiper blades had all they could do to keep the stuff off of the windshield.
The last couple of miles up Snoqualmie Pass were a pain in the butt, but as often happens, once we got over the top the skies cleared up, which I was glad to see. What I was not happy to see was the road covered in black ice.
For those of you not familiar with the concept, let me diverge for a second. Black ice is insidious, because you are not sure it is there until you hit it, and then it is generally too late to do anything about it. A thin layer of water on the road froze on the road, When you see it, it just looks like the road is wet, and you can continue to travel on it as long as you do not accelerate, decelerate touch the brake or gas pedal or attempt to turn even slightly, at which time you will begin to lose control of your vehicle. What usually happens is the back end of the vehicle begins to travel in a very slightly different direction than the front end. You MUST not do anything sudden like step on the brake. Hopefully you will have enough maneuvering room to SLOWLY AND GENTLY encourage the front of the car to realign itself with the back. If you don't panic or over react, that is all you need to do. What usually happens is you over correct which swings the front end of the car too far over and you begin to travel down the road sideways. So you over correct in the other direction, and at that point you spin in circles while going forwards. At this point there is not much you can do but take your foot off of the accelerator and let the vehicle have its way. Hopefully it will travel in a more or less straight line down the road until it comes to rest. Then you will sit there with your hands shaking and in a state of shock for about 20 minutes, until you came to the conclusion that you and your vehicle and fellow travelers are intact. Then you SLOWLY get the vehicle underway and up to some careful speed.
With the Power Wagon, this speed is 45 miles an hour. Up to 45 the truck will handle OK. 46 miles an hour and you can feel the back end start to move around.
When we hit the top of the pass, it was black ice as far as the eye could see. We found this out by losing control and ending up sideways on the edge of the road, with Liz doing her "Oh My God I'm Going to Die" scream in my right ear. When I am doing my best to get a sticky situation under control, screaming in my ear is not at all helpful.
When we got stopped she was saying "I think we should just turn around and go home. This is obviously way too dangerous. No sense in risking life and limb."
Seeing as she had just maligned my ability to handle the weather and road conditions, I commenced to get pissed off. I told her "You can get out here if you want, but the truck and I are going to go on, so unless you want to walk I suggest you buckle up you seat belt and hang on."
Once I knew we were on black ice, I just put it in four wheel drive and dropped down a gear, and everything went OK. More or less.
We had gone as far a Lake Easton when I saw blinking tail lights on the side of the road and a guy in a business suit frantically waving on the side of the road. I have gotten myself stuck a few times and someone always came along and lent me a hand, so I felt obligated to stop. Of course this was over the objections of Sis "You don't know who this person is, they might be an axe-murderer!" "That's why you get to talk to him. I'm going to pull along side, you roll down your window."