Just resting..

The scene: Traveling from campground in the Mammoth Hot Springs area of Yellowstone National Park to Cooke City.

The views are fantastic but the road is narrow and the speed limit is appropriate.  The camper is wide though so I tend to give a little extra room to passing traffic. 
This is what happens when you misjudge where the side of the pavement is.  As many of you have learned the hard way...once the tire slips over the edge of the pavement the snow that is even with the road is 3" to 6" deep and it drags the vehicle in that direction.  If the ditch slants, like this one does, the progression is exponential as you move into deeper snow.  No reaction speed (including spiderman) is going to save you from sliding into the ditch.

 That orange marker is nowhere near the edge of the road...it's not really visible where I started the descent since wind blown snow has already obscured the trail.  You can see the crescent the wind has created on the ditch side of the rig.

My soon to be converted camper is 9000+ lbs at the rear axle (according to the sticker on the door jam) and it fought the good fight as you can see from how long the trail is into it's final resting spot.

I wrote in the snow sticking to the back "I will buy shovel" after about an hour of waiting for a park ranger.  Since there isn't a cell signal I was depending on them to either pull me out or arrange for me to pay someone to do it. 

Lots of people stopped and asked if I was okay.  One nice couple from down south [according to their accent]

asked if I wanted a snack 😊, and that went a long way towards restoring some of my lost faith in humankind. 

Only one person had any kind of tow strap or chain, (I am still skeptical of the rarity of this equipment considering the area), and they did try to pull me out.  No joy.
Interestingly nobody had a shovel either, even after I offered to buy it.

3 hours later and $325 a nice fella and his giant single axle tow truck from Cooke City pulled me out of the ditch. Look at the size of those tires!