Ghost Canyon on Snowmobiles

Ghost Canyon Blizard
During one of the snowmobile trips we took into Ghost Canyon Lee and I had a wonderful day and then it started snowing. We were riding the then new Yamaha Mountain Max and the old Rupp. The Rupp didn’t have a windshield. It wasn’t bad for most of the day but it sure did get cold when it started snowing heavy and the wind started blowing hard. So we took turns coming out of the canyon and off of that mountain as fast as we could. The snow was piling up and we were in almost white out conditions by the time we got out of there. I have been cold while snowmobiling and other times while in the mountains but this was one of the coldest trips I ever remember. I sure was glad to get back to the truck and the hot coffee that was waiting for us in a couple of thermos jugs.



Stuck in Ghost Canyon
Another time we took the Mountain Max, the Jag, and the Cougar in. There hadn’t been much snow on the Vacas River road or on the way up the mountain but there sure was in Ghost Canyon. The farther in we went the deeper the snow got. And in that narrow little canyon we couldn’t find a decent place to turn the snowmobiles so we could go back out. Our machines didn’t have a reverse on them as some do. Finally, as usually happens when we go snowmobiling, one of them got stuck in a snow drift. This time it was the one in the lead which was the Cougar that Dustin was riding. Dustin was about 16 if I remember right and of course he thought he knew everything (and still does). Now most snowmobiles weight about 600 pounds. It is not an easy job to dig one out of a snow drift and get it where it will run again. Lee and Dustin started digging. And dug, and dug, and heaved and huffed trying to get that big black machine out of the snow.
When we had stopped all our helmets came off. A helmet is nice while riding as it keeps the cold wind off your face as well as being a safety factor. But when not riding they get hot in a hurry. When I took mine off it knocked my glasses off and one of the lens fell out as one of the tiny screws that hold them in had loosened up and came out. When I took of the helmet the lens fell into the snow. I never found the screw that I assumed fell into the snow, too, but did find the lens. Now I needed

to find a way to keep the lens in the frame until we could get back home where I had some extra screws. This trip taught me to keep a repair kit for eye glasses in my purse and in the snack bag that we always carry on one of the snowmobiles every time we went riding. If I couldn’t get the lens to stay in I would have to wear my glasses with only one lens, with a helmet on to get out and that didn’t sound like any fun at all, especially since I have very poor eyesight. I have worn glasses since I was eight and could never figure out how to wear contacts. Even trying them in the doctor’s office was more than I could handle.
What with the snowmobile stuck and not knowing where we would find a good place to turn them around and my glasses problem we were starting to get upset and disgusted with the whole trip. The though was running through all our minds that we would have to turn the machines my hand right there in the narrow trail. Three machines at 600 pounds each was not going to be easy. As I had many times before I wondered why all snowmobiles never had a reverse built into them. Or at least ours didn’t.


So I started searching though the snack bag that was in a rack on the back of the Yamaha snowmobile. Lee suggested I use a small wire but I couldn’t find one small enough until I realized if I took the plastic off of a twist-em wire for closing plastic bags it might be small enough. Getting tired of standing while trying to strip the plastic off of a twist-em I sat down in the snow right behind the Yamaha. The snow didn’t bother us as we all had on full snowmobile suits and snow boots. In fact I was a little to warm in mine, but I knew it was getting late and if we didn’t get the three machines dug out and turned around we might have to consider spending the night in a very cold Ghost Canyon. I took a moment to look around to see if there was any place near by that would be good to build a fire if it took much longer so I could make a pot of coffee for us, at the least. There were several large boulders near by that I figured would be good to reflect some heat if we started a fire close to them. That decided I turned back to repairing my glasses.
I was concentrating so hard on the wire and glasses that I only half realized that Lee and Dustin had finally dug out the lead machine, the Cougar and Dustin had taken it on up the trail for a short distance where he had found a place wide

don’t know if it was because he was a teenager and just didn’t think or what caused it but Dustin just started the Yamaha with one quick pull of the starter rope, jumped on and gunned the engine to make the machine break loose and take off so he could get it turned around. He never even realized that when he did the snowmobile track threw snow all over me as it took off, since I was sitting right behind it and concentrating on fixing my glasses. My first thought was that he had done it on purpose because we had had a few strong words due to the predictiment we were in. My mouth was full of snow, the glasses and still loose lens were in the snow again, and there was snow in my helmet that had been laying beside me; upside down so it wouldn’t get snow in it, hopefully. I spit out the snow and started screaming and yelling at him. Dustin, of course, couldn’t hear me as he was already out of sight round the next bend in the road headed for the place he could turn around at.
Lee saw what happened and was laughing at me. That just made me madder. Within a few minutes Dustin was back and since he hadn’t heard me the first time I made sure that he heard me that time. It took a few minutes for him to understand what he had done and he started laughing at me, too. Finally I calmed down,

brushed all the snow off of me, found the glasses and lens in the snow where they had fallen and let Dustin take my Jag snowmobile down and turn it around so we could start making our way out of the canyon. Lee was able to help me fix the glasses enough I could see while wearing my helmet and we made our way out arriving back to where we had parked the truck and trailer about a half hour after full dark. We lucked out that day.

Three on a Rupp
Another time, in fact it was a few years earlier, we had taken the Rupp and the Skidoo way back into on the Fenton Hill road. That road can be very narrow and sidling even in summer. With snow on it, it is even more narrow as the wind drifts the snow and causes it to be a very sidling ride on a snowmobile in several areas. Dustin must have been about seven or eight when this happened, still fairly young. It was the first day of snowmobiling that year and we had spent a long day playing on Fenton Hill and were headed out fairly late in the afternoon when the Skidoo quite on us. After checking it over Lee found that the rubber tubing hose that carried the gasoline from the gas tank to the engine had disintegrated. That is what happens when snowmobiles sit in the hot sun of New Mexico all summer and then the cold of winter. After a few years the gas lines have to be replaced.


Lee started taking a few pieces of extra long hose off of the Rupp to see if he could get enough to replace what he needed to on the Skidoo. And the hose on the Rupp started doing the same thing. It would just fall apart when touched. Finally he had the Rupp running again. It was late, we had a small child with us and about ten miles of snowy road to travel to where we had left the truck and trailer. The Rupp was a smallish machine, not built to carry two people let alone two people and a child, but we did it. Lee drove, with Dustin sitting in front of him while I barely hung on to Lee on the back of the machine. I remember falling off a couple of times and Lee would have to stop and let me catch up with him. The hose on the Rupp barely held together for us to make it to the truck. We kept expecting it to quite, but knew every foot it kept going was a foot closer to the truck that we didn’t have to walk.
The next day after sending Dustin off to school, Lee and I road back up to the mountains and rode in on a repaired Rupp together again with new gas line hose for the Skidoo. We were able to fix it, and get back out and home before Dustin was home from school.