Scariest offroad moment in a Tundra?

My scariest Tundra off-road experience was actually on a highway, that should have been an off-road course once mother nature got done with us.

A buddy and I went down to Cortez, CO to Jimmy's 4x4 to pick up his crawler. No big deal right?

In Pagosa Springs, CO filling up.



A blizzard was coming in from the south, which historically in CO is just nasty. The storm was to reach southern CO in the late afternoon. Hell, we would be long gone by then. The Jeep was ready to go...or so I thought.

Upon arrival, I knew we were in deep shit. The Jeep was still on jack stands, no axles or links under it....with a blizzard on the way.

Finally, in the mid afternoon after about 4 hours of work, the Jeep was on the trailer and we headed out trying to beat the storm....and beat us it did.


We started out east bound on Highway 160, which is the deadliest highway in CO. By the time we reached Pagosa Springs again, it was starting to come down. This was from inside a Wendy's.



The major concern for me was going over Wolf Creek Pass and La Vita Pass. Wolf Creek area gets something like 425" on average per year of snow.

Overview of Wolf Creek Pass.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_Creek_Pass




I came prepared just in case if we ended up getting stuck out on the road overnight, and had really never tested out the Tundra towing passes with around 6500 lbs. The craptastic factory P-Metric tires actually performed pretty good. This trip made me sold on the Tundra for towing performance. My buddy was still in a Dodge 2500 diesel and was rather impressed with the Tundra.

We got through Wolf Creek Pass, maybe seen two other vehicles out. That got me a little more nervous. The snow and ice buildup on the truck and trailer had to be knocked off several times this trip. The weight of the trailer due to the buildup of ice was substantial enough to notice it.

This picture was actually taken after we started heading out of the blizzard on north bound I-25. We took about 30 minutes every time to knock off the ice buildup.


Next up was La Vita Pass. This one isn't as steep, but just as dangerous. There were tractor/trailers stuck everywhere and mostly off the highway. It was like a slalom ski competition with a trailer. We had to maintain speed for momentum, but not so much we would end up like everyone else. The Tundra traction control system work very well on the road. I'm not a fan off-road, but most people spend 98% of the time on pavement.

This trip was for the books. I have been in worse weather, but not towing on mountain passes like these in a blizzard. Hind sight is always 20/20, we should have stayed in Cortez or had better knowledge if the Jeep was finished or not.



https://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/3963-la-veta-pass.html

After 24 hours of being up and driving, I was never so happy to hit my pillow.