It ain't Ontario

This is the day we decided to drive 44 miles, each way, to view the Gila Cliff Dwellings in the Gila National Park, outside Silver City NM. These are natural caves that were occupied by Indians ( Native People) about 1200 AD. They had been in use prior to that as well. Well, the day started off with picture #1, a light dusting of SNOW, in spite of the fact it was, at that time, 45F . After Sue's return from church, we struck out. Some of the scenery on the way is in photo #2, very dramatic. Remember, we started out at 6,000 feet. The higher we went, the more it snowed...not too bad though, just flurries. We reached our highest point of 7,440 ft. just after the Continental Divide. To get there a grade of 7-8% had to be handled over a distance of 7 miles and full of switch-backs. The sign at the entrance to the National Park said 2 hours to go 44 miles. Finally got to the Visitor Center, only to discover to see the caves required an additional 3 mile walk. Well, Sue has challenges with her infected toe and my knees aren't what they used to be, so we did the tour of the information at the center and headed back to the camper.......so far so good eh? It was not snowing at the Visitor Center by the way at 5600 ft. Off we went. Well the return trip was not a walk in the park. During our visiting time, the snow had not stopped, as a matter of fact, it had intensified putting about 4-6" of wet snow on the roadway. We had no weight in the bed of the truck. Everything was going along fairly well, until about 12 miles from the end ( beginning) of State HWY 15. We had a 180* bend that included a hill........going up. Needless to say, we were stuck!!! Despite a couple of attempts in a higher gear, all we did was slip. Backing down the hill to a safe point on the bend, we weighed our limited options. By the way, this road is plowed, but not on weekends or at night. Eventually a Mexican speaking father and 3 of his teenage sons approached from the opposite direction of our travel. Fortunately he had a tow strap in the back of his old 4X4. We hooked up and he backed up the hill and we drove forward, eventually making to a point where we could proceed on our own. Quite embarrassing, a Mexican pulling a Canadian out of the SNOW. The adventure we thought was over. We still had 12 miles to travel. In spite of Mother Nature doing Her best to stop us on some additional grades we made it out of Hell. So Canada, we had enough of this white crap. We're over 4,000 miles from home and want to start enjoying the weather we were supposed to get. Please cease and desist.