I don't usually do stupid stuff when driving on a dirt road that I know just to get to my favorite place to go shooting, but I did this time! Two vehicles, mine and a Dodge Ram pickup, both loaded with people, took highway 330 up to the Manzanita Flats turnoff here in the San Bernardino mountains. There is a legal outdoor range to shoot guns here and to get to it requires driving over a dirt road going over a few very shallow streams. We usually travel about 3 miles back into the area and this time it had been raining quit heavily for several days. A window opened between rainstorms so we decided to do it. The truck lead the way and I followed in the E. 1/2 a mile into the expedition water ruts across the road made it difficult to cross except at the side. The truck made it, but it looked like I could straddle it and do the same thing, so I proceeded. WRONG thing to do!! The rut doglegged left and I went right. Next thing I knew the right front wheel took a dive on me and I was stuck. From the looks of the front wheel, it seemed that the only thing from keeping me going any deeper were the running boards and the front Aries grill guard, both of which caught on soft dirt. The back left wheel was in the air about 2 feet! We all piled out, grabbed lots of rocks, an a-frame sign and a big log someone found. The women and kids piled into the back to raise the front end and the front came up enough and went forward enough to get a level plane. At this point, to drive either way was no good, as I would have got back into the same predicament. So we filled up space behind the front wheel with rocks, the sign and the log, and with help from a strap from the truck pulling me from the back I pulled back THREE feet, then turned hard right and drove forward and out of my screwup! It took 10 people about an hour to straighten out this mess and nothing was hurt, bent, broken, or unworkable. My day of shooting ruined, I turned around and told everyone I was not in the mood for shooting and left them to fend for themselves if they needed to go shooting that bad, as all I had anyway was only a .22 revolver and a short barreled tacticle shotgun. Hey, the Element is a tough vehicle, even if it wasn't in it's element at the time.

Next time, take your camera!