This time of year, it can go from sunny and beautiful to a torrential downpour at the drop of a boonie hat. And if it starts raining like it has lately, you’ll want that boonie hat on your head.
But for more than a few of us who live in the less civilized corners of Wyoming, the rain means more than just wet skin; it also means getting up our driveways or out to our favorite fishing holes is going to be a lot more challenging than usual.
I’ve mentioned before that with the tires that came on my new truck, mud is a significant obstacle. The tread on those tires is great for highway travel, but it’s useless for traversing my driveway if it’s even slightly muddy. And with the rain we’ve been getting lately, it’s been a long way from slight on the muddiness scale.
To be safe, I’ve been chaining up all four tires every night when I get back to the driveway, then taking the chains off the next day when I successfully make it back out of the driveway. The first few times I did, I wound up looking like Pig Pen from the old Peanuts cartoons. There might be a way to put chains on a pickup without wearing 20 pounds of mud when you’re done, but I haven’t found it.
I can’t get the chains on without getting mud on me, but I decided pretty quickly I didn’t have to get it on the clothes I planned to wear that day. I dug out my old Frogg Toggs poncho and rain pants combo, and now I keep those under the back seat. When I need to chain up, I just pull them over my other clothes. I still get muddy, but at least I can pull the muddy clothes off and still be presentable.
And better yet, now the Frogg Toggs are easy to get to when it starts to rain. They’re covered in mud, but I only have to stand out in a Wyoming spring deluge for a few minutes to get them clean again.
