I tried to go on a hike today but an event interfered with that happening. At the trailhead, I backed the car trunk first into the parking lot and then got out to get everything ready for the hike. I went back to open the trunk, and I was annoyed because I'd backed the car up too close to the edge of the ravine, and it was not going to be easy to get behind the car and open the trunk to get at my stuff.

So I got back into the car to pull forward, and the back wheels just spun in the loose dirt! That was alarming. I tried to turn the wheels this way and that, but the wheels just kept spinning. Then something really bad happened: the car started sliding down the 50 foot slope towards the bottom of the ravine! Everything was happening so fast I could barely absorb what was happening. The car wasn't slipping at breakneck speed and so the slippage wasn't extremely alarming, but I knew from the start, I would be needing a tow. That feeling filled me with disgust and waste, but no sooner did I come to that realization when the car suddenly stopped its slide down into the ravine, after sliding down about 10 feet.

It was difficult for me to get out of the car and scramble back up to the parking lot, but I made it. A female construction worker whose equipment had broken down had all the time in the world to drive me to a cell phone access point at a lodge and I called AAA for a tow. I arrived at the trailhead about 6:30 AM, ready for a wonderful hike on a crystal clear day to the overlook of Elliot Glacier on the east side of Mt. Hood. But now I was stuck waiting for a tow truck, which didn't get here until 9:45! Then it took another half hour to pull the car out of the ravine and get on our way to the nearest town where the tow truck was stationed, 30 miles up U.S. Highway 35 to Hood River.

The front driver side door was all bashed in. The tow truck guy said that car might be totalled. I was not injured, but the scab on my left knee was half torn off and I got blood all over the knee of my pants. The wash washed out the blood completely. At home, I took care of the towing and All State Insurance claim. Big hassle.