Snow Way

Our driveway at 2:30 am the morning of the big storm

Our Driveway as it looks today

Last year, all the ski resorts to the West of the Continental Divide had record snowfalls - up to 500 inches in some cases.  On our side of the divide (Denver and the Front Range) we had a record low snowfall.  This year the whole scenario flip-flopped and we've received probably 70-80 inches so far, while the resorts are barely hitting 50 inches at best.  What this means is a lower fire risk this coming summer and more income for those who plow commercially.  I'm just scratching the surface of plowing as sidebar way of earning a little extra cash, but I've already realized that the cost of maintaining and repairing my truck could easily outstretch what little income I may earn.  Now I understand why most guys who do this on a serious level use an old, beat up pickup instead of driving their primary vehicle.  Hmmm.  I'll have to see about that for next season.  The last big storm we had a little over a week ago dumped somewhere around 30 inches on Conifer, but Bailey (just 15 miles to the West) only got 5.  One of my friends from church works as a fireman down the hill, and since the storm coincided with his 48 hour shift he asked me if I would plow for his 12-15 clients.  I hate plowing blind, which means plowing someone's property that I'm not familiar with.  The reason being that it is too easy to break something on their property that I just can't see under all the snow, or break my truck in the process.  I tried to drive to as many of his properties as I could before the storm hit, but I was only able to see about half of them.  The snow started falling around midnight, and by the time I drove out of my driveway at 2:30 a.m. we already had 10 inches on the ground.  One of the addresses he gave me was on Broken Arrow Dr, and I only realized once I'd driven all the way over to Evergreen (15 miles out of my way) that there are actually THREE broken arrow roads between Evergreen and Conifer.  That wasted an hour of precious time, as the snow was getting deeper by the minute.  The first homes I got to had about a foot of snow, and since these were new properties to me I had to get out of the truck and trudge through the thigh-deep snow with a big spotlight and a ski pole, poking around as I tried to figure out where the driveways actually were.  I saw one of the homeowners peeking out of his window, probably wondering what in the world I was doing out there.  And with the number of guns per capita in Conifer, I was probably taking my life in my own hands!   Amazingly I got through 12 driveways without an incident, and without getting seriously stuck either.  As you can see in the picture above, sometimes the snow was actually coming over the top of the plow blade as I "swam" through 3-4 foot drifts.  It was a crazy couple of days.

The big snowfall provided a good excuse to pull a practical joke - as my friend Phil did when he filled the bed of my truck up with snow with his front-end loader.  Took me and two other guys 20 minutes to shovel it all out.  I'm still plotting my revenge.  I sent him a text message to make sure he knew that I was on to him, and in typical Phil Phashion he replied: "Let me start my three part apology by reassuring you on your smashing good looks... moving on to how merciful we should be to one another... and finally... Josh did it!"