Well we made it. Got to Burlington, Colorado Thursday morning at about 10:45 am, and wouldn't you know it, they had just closed I-70 at 10:35 am due to one of the biggest blizzards the Colorado plains had seen in recent years. Dammit, we were only a 175 stinking miles from Denver at the point. Since there was no choice, we had to pull off the highway with the rest of the westbound travelers to try and get some scoop. We pulled into the Petro and found out from a couple of farmers, milling around inside, that there were white out conditions all the way to Denver, the Interstate had iced up, and the Colorado Dept. of Transportation hadn't been able to keep up due to the size of the storm. We were clearly on the eastern edge of the storm, but the winds were packing gusts of 35 mph, and the snow was blowing, even though it wasn't sticking to the pavement just yet.
I spoke with the farmers about options to Denver. One guy who had to be much younger than he looked with his weathered gaunt skin,said that we could drive north to US 36 and might be able to get through to Denver. Of course if we got stuck up there, there might not be any motels or services to speak of. His other suggestion was to rent 5 hotels rooms across the street, and then gouge unsuspecting travelers as they were forced into Burlington to wait out the blizzard of the decade. I pondered that comment for a bit. Since it was clear there was no idea how long the highway would remain closed, I turned away from the two farmers, who were clearly enjoying the chaos the storm was creating, grabbed an Atlas off the shelf, opened it up, and noticed that US 385 headed due north out of Burlington for about 35 miles, where it crossed US 36. From there, US 36 went westward straight into Denver. Kathy and I looked at each other, and we new instantly that neither of us wanted to ride the storm out in Burlington. Plus there was the task ahead of being at Denver airport by 2:30 pm to pick up Denise LaBarge, our friend. That is if her flight was to leave St. Louis on time. I had made similar bad driving treks through conditions like today. We had 4 wheel drive, plenty of gas, blankets and candles, food and water, so I said to Kathy "lets do it. It was 10:55 am.
As we headed north out of town the winds were gusting to 35 miles per hour. The snow was blowing horizontally, but it wasn't sticking yet. As we found the turn for US385, we noticed that we were to be followed by an RV, and perhaps another brave adventurer or two behind the RV. The speed limit was 65MPH as we headed north away from Burlington with a glimmer of hope, that we could make it through. I had no doubt.
The road heading north was fine, and we soon lost all of our followers. the snow was blowing, and it was windy, but the snow had yet to stick on the highway pavement. We passed some semi traffic heading south, and I kept my fingers crossed that US36 would be open when we go there. When I checked the Atlas at Petro, I did not pay attention to the size, our number of towns on US36, and now I was kind of wishing I would have spent the 7 dollars for that Atlas. If we were to be stuck, it would have been nice to know what, if any, options we might have along that highway. We were flying blind up US385 with the hope that if US36 was open west bound. The next few minutes would determine our fate for the day.
We had left Burlington 35 minutes to the south. It was about 11:30 am when we reached the crossroad of US 36. We hung a left, just after a passing pickup truck heading westbound, and started into what was to become one of the major blizzards that the Colorado plains had seen in the past 20 years.
The snow was blowing hard, but still didn't appear to be sticking on the road. We came upon a small town just 5 miles after making our turn westward US36. The pickup truck pulled into a parking lot of a small cafe, where locals were gathering for lunch. Other than that this town was one of those classic cases of a town once rich with prosperity along a US route which filtered traffic to Denver, only to suffer from the creation of the Interstate system, which would push the flow of traffic 40 miles to the south. Sleepy, run down, a snapshot of Americana from the mid 20th Century. As we left the pickup at the cafe and moved to the edge of town, we were lucky to find that the snow gate, which would block westbound traffic, was still open. We plunged forward into the blowing snow, a sign read "Denver 150 miles." Kathy noted the odometer at 19320.
Initially, we were able to maintain speeds of 55 to 65 mph. The snow still did not appear to be sticking to the highway. I entertained Kathy with stories I had experienced along US 36 when I was going to school in Western Ohio. I had spent two summers building farm fence with an old arthritic farmer, who took to fence building to make ends meet. At 77, he had succumbed to the arthritis that had crippled his legs and hands, but not his spirit, and his love for the outdoors. He would hobble along barking out orders, dragging along a small stool he could rest on. It was at these times that he would unveil his real craft, storytelling. He would tell stories of the territory, and speak of Indian girls, and you swore that it was 1881, and not 1981. If he wasn't sure he had told a story before he would always preface the beginning with, "this might be a rerun, but I haven't heard it in awhile."
I kept the jeep at 65 -70 mph knowing that the further we could move on clean pavement, the less of the nasty stuff we would have to deal with as we moved into the heart of the storm. We were still rolling along in 2 wheel drive, and after an hour, started to see an occasional semi driving eastward. We took this as a good sign that we just might be able to get through to Denver. 10 miles passed, then 20 miles passed, then 30 miles passed, and slowly the snow started to stick to the highway. The thermometer on the dashboard had registered 33 to 32 degrees, and had started to drop to 30 degrees, then 29 degrees, then 28 degrees, and came to settle at 27 degrees. 40 miles had passed and the snow was now clearly sticking on highway. Visibility was getting worse. We came upon another small town, and as we drove through, the town looked ominous. There wasn't a living thing moving. Not one car moving, not one business open. It was an eery site. Clearly these people were hunkered down for something big, and as we headed westward into the whiteness, conditions continued to grow worse.
I noticed as we left the ghost town, two small bright dots in the rearview mirror. The wind and the blowing snow had slowed our progress to 40 to 45 mph. We started to lose visibility. The road was clearly covered now. The lights in the rearview mirror continued to draw closer to our jeep, and finally after about 10 miles, a pickup truck was following us. Visibility was slipping away. The snow reflection was bright, and created ghostly images ahead. I was maintaing 40 mph, but clearly the road was getting bad enough. I would have to pull over and clear the wipers, and put the jeep into 4-wheel drive.
We could barely see through the crossing snow, and the wind whipped the snow off of the plains to create a sense of snow blind. The lights in the rearview mirror stayed steady. We came to an intersection that had a wide shoulder and it was time to pull over and lock in the 4 wheel drive. US 36 had disappeared into a mix of ice and snow, and we were crawling along at 40 mph, and then 35 mph, because we just couldn't see. The wipers continued to ice up, and the defrost wasn't keeping up. I slowly pulled over onto the shoulder, turning on the flashers. The pickup, which had been closely following, roared buy and disappeared into the blowing snow.
Kathy and I sat for a second in the jeep just amazed at how bad the conditions were getting. "Are you sure we are going to be alright?" she asked, nervously reaching for a cigarette. "It's really not that bad yet," I confidently responded. Yes, we finally had to lock in the 4-wheel drive, and visibility was down to about 50 yards. We couldn't make out anything of the terrain around us, except that it was all white. While Kathy rolled the window down a bit to exhaust the smoke, I hopped out of the jeep to quickly clean the wipers. As I opened the door, I really got a feel for the first time how strong the winds were. I jumped out on the lonely snow and ice packed road, and proceeded to clear the windshield.
The snow was melting and freezing so fast on the windshield, that ice was forming on the wipers and building up on the edges of the windshield. I need an ice scraper, I thought to myself, and realized we didn't have one. I'm standing out in the blowing snow for what seemed like an eternity, when it dawned on me. I reached into my wallet and pulled out a Starbuck's gift card I had been toting around since my birthday last July. I grabbed the card as I felt the chill deepen into my bones, and started to chip away at the built up ice. I moved from the drivers side to the passengers side, flipping the wiper, and chipping away at the ice. As I'm standing on the passenger side I notice that I'm standing in about 8 inches of snow. I finished up, hopped back in the cab, and decided that I wouldn't say a word about the snow accumulation to Kathy.
"Michael, I can't believe this snow. You looked miserable out there. I'm going to try and get a hold of Denise and see what her status is on leaving St. Louis." You know what is amazing about that statement? Here we are in a blizzard. In the middle of nowhere, and yet we still have cell phone service.
We stopped for all of 3 minutes, but it seemed like an hour. The truck that passed us was gone. We had not seen a car or truck moving eastbound in some time. I put the jeep in gear, and away we went off into the hazing whiteness. We were alone again with a 100 miles to Denver.
We hadn't seen any radar on the size of this storm. But we could tell as we pushed on that we were right in the heart of it. Visibility continued to worsen. 50 yards turned into 30 yards. Denise's plane was sitting on the runway in St. Louis getting ready to take off. No flights had left St. Louis that day, but for some reason, her flight was taking off. We had an hour and 45 minutes to get to Denver Airport to try and meet her. Drifting snow was beginning to collect on US 36. Kathy nervously lit another cigarette.
The snow was blowing from north to south, or right to left as you looked out through the windshield. We were trying to come up with a manageable setting of the defrost, and wiper speed. The snow would collect on the passenger side wiper, melt on the windshield, slide across to the driver side wiper, and freeze from the windchill. If the wipers moved too fast, the windshield iced up, and we would have to slow down, and stop to clean the wipers, and scrape the windshield. This was happening after 5 to 10 minutes of drive time. If we kept the defrost cranked too high, we couldn't breathe in the cab, from the heat. If the wipers moved to slow, you couldn't see a damn thing, it was blowing that hard.
I happened to have two Starbuck's gift cards in my wallet. I handed one to Kathy, and when we iced up, we'd put the flashers on, pull over to the shoulder, and pull a Nascar pit stop maneuver. We could get in and out pretty quick, as we struggled to manage the wiper speed to defrost ratio.
We tried to go as far as we could before pulling over, to try and gain some time. We couldn't gauge anything. All we new was we needed to get to 19470 on the odometer. Just as we finished one pit stop, we noticed lights behind us moving westbound. So we waited knowing we would have to play this wiper cleanup game. It was a semi, and he was moving pretty well. This gave us hope, that others were trying to get through as well. The truck passed, and we moved in behind him following a fresh set of tracks.
The bridges were the worst. You couldn't see them until you were on them, and they were catching and holding snow because of the rails. We were caught they were catching and holding snow because of the rails. We were caught more than once going too fast when we hit a drift on a bridge. The sudden jolt tossed both of us about the cab. Kathy reached for another smoke.
I tried to stay with the semi as long as I could. He was about 30 to 50 yards ahead of me, and would literally disappear at times. After 15 minutes of traveling, we passed the big pickup that followed us out of the Ghost Town earlier. One of the guys was hopping out of the cab to take care of as nature intended. I'm pretty confident he didn't face into the wind.
We hung with the big semi as long as we could and finally had to let him go at a crossroads known as "Last Chance." The wipers needed attention, and Kathy needed a smoke, so I handled this pit stop. We saw the sign for Limon heading south, and new we had about 70 miles left to go to Denver. If Denise was in the air, we just might make it to Denver Airport in time to pick her up. How was that for crazy timing?
Before we got to Burlington, we had been making great time. We thought we could get all the way to Boulder, check in, and then double back to the airport to pickup up Denise at 2:35 pm. So what does Denise have to do with this story your asking? Denise's son Trevor is on the Colorado football team, and we were all planning on going to the Missouri vs. Colorado game on Saturday. Jack and Trevor played high school ball together, and were now facing off against each other in a Big 12 showdown. So we had planned this trek together and was planned a little get away, with some hiking and site seeing, not a blizzard dumping 27 inches of snow on the region.
Last Chance, Colorado. The name didn't mean much as I cleaned the wipers, yet again. Just one of those quirky names out here in the west that sounds like it dropped right out of a Louis Lamour novel. There is allot names like that out west. Cheyenne Wells, Arapahoe Junction, there names that capture the imagination even though your not quite sure what they mean. Well, we couldn't see much of Last Chance, but it did have a snow gate, and the snow gate was for traffic heading southbound towards Limon and I-70. The gate was open.
The semi was gone. And the pickup we passed awhile back came flying by again. One thing you notice about locals driving in bad weather, they like to drive in bad weather fast. You wonder if they ever catch a patch of ice, or slam into an unexpected snow drift, finding themselves skidding off the road, bam, stuck. I think they do. I did notice the guys in the truck wave as they passed by. I waved back knowing we shared a bond as a couple of the crazy's out here in this monster blizzard staring mother nature in the face and flipping her off.
I couldn't remember much of US36 from the Atlas mental snapshot I took back in Burlington. I assumed US36 would take us straight to Denver, or so I hoped. I also kept telling Kathy, that if we got 40 miles away from Denver, we should start seeing signs of suburbia. But that was still 30 miles away. It was snowing harder.
We followed tracks in the westbound lane. They were faint, but we could just make them out. We hadn't seen another vehicle going eastbound in over an hour. We crept along, pulling our wiper pit stops when necessary. The drifting snow was getting deeper.
Flashing lights appeared moving eastbound as we slowed to cross another bridge. It was a county vehicle, and after sliding through the snow drift ruts on the bridge, the truck disappeared in the rear view mirror.
Man we were getting close. We showed about 45 miles to go, when a snow gate came into view. The eastbound gate was closed. The westbound side of the road was open. We passed, and saw a gas station on the right, and then a sign for I-70. My god we made it!!! But where the hell were we, and where did US36 go?
As we road around for a bit we figured out we reached a small town called Byers. We weren't sure we could get on I-70, and we seemed to lose US36. We were so close, and yet we feared we would be stranded in this little town, just 40 miles from Denver.
We doubled back to the BP Gas station, and I went in to see if they were pumping gas. The gal behind the counter said that I-70 westbound was open, and they had power and were pumping gas. She also said that Denver was clearing up. My god we made it.
Kathy went into the BP as I pumped the gas. That county truck had returned from where ever he went, lights still flashing and in a big hurry. He disappeared under I-70.
We fueled up, and hurried to get on I-70 before somebody changed there mind and dropped the snow gate again.
I-70 was awful, we understood why they closed it. Now our mission was to get to the airport, and pick up Denise if her plane made it. Thankfully, our old friend Duke called asking about the blizzard. He has been tracking it all day, and wondered if we had experienced any of it. I couldn't help but laugh, as I tried to give him the Cliff Notes version of the past 3 hours. He also served as GPS, letting us know where we were, and how far we had to go to the airport. It was 2:25 pm. Denise would be on the ground in 10 minutes. Duke and I chatted for a bit. Kathy calmed herself with a smoke. We saw the sign for I-470. We made it to the airport!
At 2:45 pm we were beginning the long drive into Denver Airport. the adrenaline was still pumping through my veins. Kathy called Denise, and her plane was taxing into the terminal. Her Southwest flight was the only flight to get out of St. Louis that day to Denver. Visibility was better at the airport, but still pretty bad. We pulled in to arrivals, and waited. No Denise. The cops were busy writing a ticket to some idiot who left his car and walked into the terminal. 5 minutes, 7 minutes. I hopped out and cleaned the wipers, and windshield one last time. No Denise. The cops finally turned their attention to us. I rolled down the window, and the cop said we would have to circle. He asked if we new how to do that, and then gave us the instructions. He was pretty nice, I was still jacked up on adrenaline. Denise called right as we left the arrival area, and said, "where are you guys?"
We made the loop. Sat patiently in traffic. Cut off some ski bunny in a Range Rover trying to cut in line. Got to the Southwest pickup area. Saw Denise. She hopped in the car, and said "how you guys doing?"
Postscript: We had no idea how severe this storm was until we watched the evening news when we got to the hotel. I-70 remained closed until Friday morning. The northbound gate from Limon was closed to Last Chance. They closed the westbound gate on US36 at US385. We saw the Eastbound gate of US36 closed at Byers. They said the storm was dumping 20-24 inches across the plains as it moved into Kansas. We heard from people at the game that they had gotten stranded in Kansas. Denise's Southwest flight was the only flight from St. Louis to Denver that Thursday. Best of all? Missouri 36 - Colorado 17.
No comments:
Post a Comment