So, like, I love Wyoming. It's great. It's pretty. But sometimes...being at the mercy of Mother Nature is more than we can handle.
Take for instance this winter. We had approximately six hundred feet of snow. Some days, it was really hard to not be snowed in.
Or the wind. It seems to always blow. I really want a clothes line. But will my nice clean clothes ALWAYS be dirty?
Or take this other thing for instance. It's so funny, you'll just kill yourself laughing! Oh man, just thinking about it is killing me!
Oh wait, it's not.
See, Jake drives to work every day. The drive from here to Jackson is approximately 36.834 miles. Give or take. He goes through what is referred to as "The Canyon". Cuz it's a canyon. Get it? Anywho. This last April, we had the most rainfall in April ever. Ever. In recorded history. That's a lot of rain. And it's rained for the first half of May, too. That puts stress on things. Rivers. Dams. Arthritic people. And mountainsides.
See this picture? This is what happens when mountains get too saturated with water.
There was a little mudslide. They got it all cleaned up though, and traffic moved on. See that pretty red truck about to move on through?
Then it started to rain a little more. Actually, we had a couple of really stormy days. And it turned into a landslide.
Keep digging! I know we can get through!
But we couldn't. They had to close the road. See all that muck and mud and water and dirt? That has put a damper on everybody.
See, there are hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people who drive The Canyon road everyday. Normal, regular everyday people who work in Jackson, but aren't filthy stinkin' rich enough to live there. They live in Alpine or Etna or Thayne. Thayne is like 50 miles away from Jackson. That's a big drive.
So how do people get to work if their main road is closed?
Well, they have to GO AROUND!
You can see on this here map that it's a long way around.
Can you see Alpine on the bottom of the map? And now find Jackson. That's about 36.456 miles. Approximately. Now follow that green line from Alpine to Swan Valley to Victor to Wilson and finally Jackson. That's a whopping 71 miles. Just about twice the distance. If you live in Thayne, that's about 100 miles. Each way.
You might think, why don't you just go a different way? Well, here is an area map. Remember, we live in the mountains. There is no other around.
One other thing about this pesky landslide. It's totally messing with our economy. Here in Alpine, we have several hotels and businesses that are tourist oriented. If the tourists are coming from Utah and south, are they going to want to go all the way around? No, so they'll come from Idaho Falls and just skip us. What about the rafters? They have to get out of the river before they get to the landslide area, cutting the ride in half. Would I still go if I knew my ride would only be half as long? Nope!
A lot of people are staying at family's homes. Some companies are putting their employees up in hotels so they don't have to do the nasty drive every day. Did I mention that nasty drive includes driving over two mountain passes. Big ones. Teton Pass is very steep. I bet it'd be awesome to sled down...
So, we are all anxious to get these darn rocks of the road so we can all return to normal.
See those little tractors?
Next to the slide, they look so tiny.
See all that water?? That's the problem. It's so wet and soggy they can't do anything about it.
They couldn't keep up with it. They would plow, and it would flow even more. So for the time being, they've stopped working on it. It's moving pretty fast, too. Here's a little video put out by WYDOT. Those guys can really move!
Now every one is just in limbo waiting to see what happens. They are waiting for it to quit moving and the mountain to restabilize. They say after that it should only take a few days to get it all cleared off.
How many of those dump truck loads do you think it'll take to clear all that dirt and mud. The dump truck looks so tiny in that picture.
Here's my favorite picture.
The guy was in a helicopter. It really shows how massive it is. I'm really glad that it's not any bigger. There's a lot of mountain that could go. Let's hope that it doesn't rain anymore, and that no other part of the mountain goes.
And everybody start prayin' for sunshine!
Oh yeah, watch this. Remember when music was awesome?
