"Salmon River Driving"

Yesterday I had a 11 hour day at work..since this is crunch time I was expecting hours like this though. The last part of my day was just fun though which made the long hours bearable.
So before I describe my day I will tell you what "Salmon River Driving" is. Salmon river is south of my town and if you think Fort Jones is Redneck and out in the boonies, you are mistaken because Salmon river may be the textbook definition of redneck. The only way to get there is on this TINY road through the mountains and this road is only one lane most of the time with several turnouts and large curves the whole way. So when people drive through there they drive pretty much straight.. driving on both sides of the road when it is large enough to do so. They also have such tight driving spots that to turn around you basically have to back up or pull forward until you hit something and then reverse and do it again. (ps I have picked up the salmon river driving while pulling the horse trailer because some of those curves are so tight they really make the horses sway even though you are going 10 miles/hr)

Anyway- Steve (my range tech) and I were out on the Siskiyou crest by Mt Ashland. We drove to one of our monitoring spots and there was about 2 inches of snow on the road we wanted to take and it had a decent grade down. We took the truck without 4 wheel drive because it is a smoother ride than our other truck. Bad decision. Before we did go down this road we did check that the bottom connects us with another road (just in case we couldn't get up it again) so we decided to go down and park. Well when we were ready to head out we decided to turn the truck around and try to get up the hill because the permittee had just met us in the bottom of the meadow and was going to herd the cows down the road. We didn't want to get in his way. Well turning around the first time was ok but there was NO way we could get up this hill. The truck tires were spinning and slipping all over the place. So we turned around again but this time we ended up in the ditch and then I got out and placed bark on the road for traction while Steve tried to rock the truck (meanwhile doing "Salmon River Driving" against the bank). We finally got out and headed down the road. We caught up to the trailer with the horses and all the cows on the road. The wife had this big paddle to hit the cows with to keep them going as she walked behind them. The ranchers told us to just pass them and try to get in front of the herd. We also told them Sorry because we would probably scatter the herd; they told us we owe them beer for this! Steve was freaking out because he had to drive fairly fast on a small road while trying to not run over any calves. I was just laughing hysterically in the passenger seat because of the previous snow incident and the funny predicament of trying to outrun the cows in the truck on a dangerous road. Needless to say it took us awhile to get down to the main road after all of our "roadblocks". I started driving and doing a little Salmon River technique on the highway to Yreka because we were so late heading home. I guess this is all a day in the life of a range specialist!