A little background first. 10 guys from Ohio in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for a long weekend of riding snowmobiles, and gaining material to tell stories. We had NO idea...
The Nightmare Ride story actually started out several days before the ride actually occurred. Once we arrived in The UP Pat was pushing us all to ride, ride, ride, and ride some more. All of us were about riding, but Pat wanted a long trip. "Let's go to Sault Ste Marie tomorrow!" Ummmm.... Several of wanted to stay close to camp, and ride local trails, play on the hills. Still riding our asses off, but closer to camp, play on the lake, hit a few trails that were close, within "DAMN IT'S COLD, I'm going to the cabin for 10 minutes" distance. Nope, not Pat, he wanted long distance exploration! His inner Pirate was showing! I perfectly understood his perspective, as he just bought a "new" used sled specifically for this trip. I'd want to ride too!
Febrary 27, 2015
The night before:
We ran from our base camp located near Curtis all the way up to Newberry. Someone thought it would be a good idea to have ME lead. I've been riding my entire life, but I have never been this far north, let alone on these trails. I had my map and compass though, let's ride!
Made 2 wrong turns, cost us some time, made it to Newberry in 2 hours or so. Fueled up and the group decided to head back home due to tiredness and temperature. We made it home in 40 minutes. Wait, what? 40 minutes. OK, Newberry isn't all that far via trails, maybe Pat has some validity in his trip argument.
Our ride is highlighted in green.
So later that night, after some arguing it was "decided" that tomorrow's trip would be from camp to Paradise and back, with a stop at Tahquamenon Falls State Park for a warm up and dinner. I was sore from today's ride to Newberry and back, haven't ridden this hard since I was a kid. So my plans were to help the gang get rolling then hang back, go play on the lake, hit some local trails and take it a bit easy.
February 28, 2015:
With "the plan" in place, we all woke up at staggering times according to our internal clocks. We all wanted to get an early start as we had a long ride planned and it's much warmer during the day. This is when things started going awry. Not enough to throw in the towel, not even enough to suspect a hint of things going bad. Just a late start, nothing more. I woke up around 05:00 and made some coffee. Once the cabin came to life around 09:30, I went outside and started all the sleds and got them pointing in the right direction while everyone was getting their riding gear on. Except the Ole 440 that Uncle Ed loaned me for the weekend, as I wasn't planning on going on this trip. In passing, I mention to Pat "You guys are all set, who's leading? Timmy?" "No, you are." "I'm not going with you guys, just gonna hang around here."
"You drove 10 hours to sit in a cabin??? ARE YOU KIDDING ME???" At this moment in time, a pure and simple YES would have made my life so, so very much easier. I felt the word yes coming out of my mouth, but then FMS syndrome set in. "'Fraid of Missing Something." As I was saying "YES", the smell of 2 stroke exhaust from the running sleds wafted in, the sight of the boys gearing up, my brain said "Yes", but I became keenly aware of my senses and I actually heard myself say "Yeeeaaah, gimme 10 minutes to get ready." I immediately thought don't let your mouth right checks that your ass can't cash. So sore and tired. Well, I said it, I'm in now. With the gang ready to roll, it was decided that we'd ride to "Blueberry" again, and refuel, and see how things were, with the plan of hitting Paradise and back before nightfall. 150+ miles ahead of us. The time was 11:15 AM, and off we rode. Myself, Timmy, Danny, Ed, Vadim, Jimmy, and Pat. Seven sleds on a mission. Stopped in Curtis to top off fuel, and then Ride Sally Ride, even though Sally wasn't with us, and none of us actually knew anyone named Sally.
The ride to Blueberry started off enjoyable and seemed quick. Sunshine in my face, even though it was only 10* it seemed warm, last time we rode it was -10*. I knew where we were going, I had good friends behind me, Youngstown was the furthest thing from my mind. I'd never been north of Blueberry, but I had my map and my compass and felt confident with the team behind me. Thinking about my father and all the miles we put on the snowmobiles in my youth. Beautiful scenery, and all in all a fantastic ride. Then Dan broke down. Almost expected, so no red flags yet. Quick fix, minor delay and we were off and running again. Just south of Blueberry, Dan broke down again. Big time electrical issues. Only 7 out of 10 of us on this trip, so we had a backup sled at camp for him, if we're gonna do this, let's call in the Rescue Team now to meet us in Blueberry and exchange sleds. Towed Dan a few miles to Blueberry, It's actually NEWberry, but Vadim called it Blueberry, so I'm going with it.
Refueled in Blueberry, Rescue Team met us and got Danny a running sled. Team meeting, 14* everyone is feeling good, off to Tahquamenon Falls it is!!! Has anyone seen Sally? RIDE! At this point, I'm getting concerned. Not concerned about The Nightmare Ride that was looming in our future, we had no idea what was coming. I was concerned about me leading on a 20 year old sled, in places I had never seen before. I had my first-aid kit backpack on, a map, a compass, and gorgeous Upper Peninsula Michigan wilderness in front of me, and the best friends I've ever had behind me. Giddy Up! As you leave Blueberry to the north, there's an actual display of a mangled sled with a sign that reads Ride Safe! At this point, we had already passed several "Death Crosses" on the trails, and it starts to hit me.
We are in the fahking wilderness, 35 miles from civilization. It's easier to die out here than it is to live.
So off we ride, I'm leading, "Little Bastard" is at the end. There are certain rules you follow when you're out here because it's really easy to die and end up on the Discovery Channel. Donner, Party of 12. There's a chain of us 7, check behind you, if no one is behind you stop. If you're the lead dog and no one is behind you, turn around, go pick up the second dog, you both go pick up the third dog, etc until you're chain is all back together. Safety in numbers, literally.
We leave Blueberry to the north, again our trail is highlighted in green:
Once we get North of Blueberry, I am reminded of Super Mario's different worlds. Ditch Banging "woods" up to this point, and then holy hell. The slowest sled leading, at the approach of an 11 mile drag strip! ANYONE that knows me, knows what's about to happen!! My throttle thumb got tired!!
After the 11 mile drag strip, I saw this:
Now this is exactly what I grew up on, "Ditch Banging" and I wasn't about to pass this by. So I decided to stop for a play session, stretch the legs etc. This is the exact moment we should have turned around!
I had a "broken chain" so I headed back south to find Eddie and Pat. I passed them, so all was good. I needed to turn around, and got lazy. I didn't feel like dragging the Ole 440 again, so I decided to try a brake slide turn. Full throttle, slam the brakes and turn left! Sled is supposed to spin around approximately 180*. I forgot about the ice picks on the track. It spun according to my intentions, but only about 30* until the picks dug in and stopped the sled. In an instant I was on the ground, felt like someone hit me in the back of the head with a 2 X 4, and the Ole 440 was "Mmmm mmmm mmm" coasting past me. OUCH!!!! But I'm OK, go back to original plan, dragged her around and headed back north with an incredible headache.
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