Embedded Files
Overhead and Ground Level views of Picnic Site
Please Note - These are recent images. The 'stuck' incident described took place ten years ago. The forest tracks at that time were in constant use by all vehicles using the Picnic Site. The majority of them have been blocked off to vehicles for a number of years. The grass and vegitation have therefore been allowed to grow unchecked, and now encroach onto the tracks, considerably reducing their width. Consequently, yet another potential 'stuck' location has been taken out of circulation by the Local Authority, whilst trying to stop unauthorised persons from setting up a camp there.
OVERHEAD NO. 1
The ground slopes downhill from the lane at the bottom of the photo towards the middle of the image, with the steepest drop around the sharp corner in the top right of the image.
It then falls away steeply from the track across the middle of the image towards the top edge.
OVERHEAD NO. 2
The track along the yellow line is just about flat. It then turns up hill as it turns to the right. The site drops away steeply to the left of the yellow arrow, down to the valley floor.
OVERHEAD NO. 3
The movements are numbered.
Black lines indicate car moving forwards.
Red lines are car in reverse.
Lines with other lines across them are where the car wheels were spinning.
Black dots indicate where the car was 'stuck' and unable to move.
A series of small arrows indicates that Stuck Lady was rocking in her seat whilst spinning at these locations.
Incident 4 - Stuck at the Picnic Site
Incident 4 - Stuck at the Picnic Site
Stuck Lady and I had only been together for about two months. She did not yet know about my fetish for stuck ladies! However I had a feeling that it was going to be a good day because when I looked out of the window that morning, I saw that the ground was covered in snow (for the first time in a couple of years). It got even better when Stuck Lady suggested that we go out for a drive and take some photos of the snow covered countryside!
She was not too keen to drive in the snow, having never done so before (she was in her early 30’s then). I therefore drove and used it as an excuse to show her the ‘do’s’ and ‘don’ts’ of driving on snow covered roads. This was all new to her, as her previous husband had refused to allow her to drive if there was ever any snow or ice around. Apparently he thought more of his car than he did of her, and would not allow it in case she dented their car! After all, as he used to tell her, women can’t drive in snow! I suspect you can guess why she divorced him, and I don’t think there is much chance of him being a member at ‘Stuck World’ either!
Anyway, we drove out of town and up onto some higher ground where I knew that a country lane followed the ridge-line of a set of hills. About half way along this road, I had seen an entrance to a picnic site, which was situated right at the edge of one of the hills, giving a great view from the top, down across the valley.
The picnic site was set in amongst a wood, but there were lots of clearing and open spaces as well. When we got there we saw that the normal forest tracks were covered in ‘virgin’ snow, no one else having bothered to drive there in such weather!
The picnic site was triangular in shape. If you can imagine a right-angled triangle, then the bottom edge was the country road running past the site. The longest side ran parallel with the edge of the hill, which then dropped from the top of the hill down into the valley. The entrance was in the corner where this long side met the shortest edge, i.e. the country lane. The third edge was the track back to the exit, where it met the country lane in the third corner. The track along the edge of the hill had a very sharp (acute) turn at the end, which then brought you back along the third side and back to the country lane. There were various clearing off to the right of the long track i.e. in the centre of the site, and good views all the way along this track, to the left, down into the valley. I parked the car in one of the many pull in areas off of this track and we went for a walk.
To leave the site, we could either complete a circuit of the site, or return the way we came in. To carry on round, we had to drive on along the track parallel with the edge of the hill, and then at the end, turn sharp right, and go alongside the wood round to the exit.
When we got back to the car, I suggested that Stuck Lady have a drive, as it would be a chance for here to get experience and gain confidence, whilst driving in a safe environment (well safe in that there were no other cars about, but not so safe if you count trees as a hazard!).
She readily agreed. Actually although I have not made it sound so, she is actually quite a good driver and she did not like the fact that she was a little unsure about driving on snow. As I already mentioned, I had been explaining to her on the journey there, how it was important to drive ‘smoothly’ when on snow, keeping a bigger distance behind vehicles in front etc and doing all of the driving actions very slowly and carefully. Well, you can judge for yourself if she took any notice of my advice - this is what happened!
I had brought along a video camera that I had borrowed from a friend. It was the first one I had ever used. Stuck Lady wanted me to take some video clips of the trees being covered in snow. She decided to drive to the far end of the site to look for some suitable trees to film.
Stuck Lady was not dressed particularly sexily, as she had been wearing walking boots, a big thick jumper and coat when we were out of the car. However, when she got back to the car she changed the chunky walking boots for a pair of nice black leather ankle boots to drive in. She also took off her coat and so it was then possible to see her legs. She was wearing a pair of blue jeans that were quite tight. So, although it was not my ‘favourite’ outfit, at least she was wearing boots and tight jeans, and after all it had snowed and she was about to drive in it!
I forgot to mention that the picnic site sloped gradually from the country lane, down to the far end of the site, beyond where we had parked. She would have to drive up hill slightly, whichever way out she went, because the tracks from the entrance and the exit were both on a slope downhill. It meant she would have to drive ‘up hill’ to get from the viewing areas, back up to the country lane. Shame!
Stuck Lady started the car and tried to pull forwards as she turned the wheels to the right. The wheels just span in the snow and she did not move at all. She reversed a little way, spinning the wheels as she did so. She was then on less of a slope and was able to pull a way, even though both wheels were spinning like mad as she did so. She was busy talking to me about something else and did not even mention the wheelspin!
She drove along the track towards the far end of the site, slowing down a few times to look at the view across the valley. We then carried on along the snow covered woodland track. Her speed gradually built up and was a bit faster than I thought necessary, but I did not say anything. She was obviously enjoying driving in the snow as we sped along the level and straight woodland track!
It was obvious that at some point we would need to take a ninety degree turn to our right, to get us back onto the country lane. Stuck Lady was definitely not thinking about this, because she did not notice that she was approaching this sharp turn to the right. Suddenly, at the last minute, she realised that the main track made this sharp turn. She was probably deceived because there was also a continuation of our track which went straight on, and which ended at a gate into the proper wooded area. When she finally realised that she needed to make this turn, she quickly put on the brakes and did so quite harshly. She was going too fast to stop in time for the junction, as she had been talking (still!) and not really concentrating on her driving.
As a result, the car skidded on the snow, and just carried on sliding in almost a straight line. It slid over the edge of the main track as it turned sharply to our right, and down a slight slope on the continuation track, towards the metal gate (see blue marks either side of black line in adjacent image). She did manage to stop in time before hitting the gate, but for a few seconds, I think she had been really worried! She was certainly not in control of the car for those few seconds!
Whether though fright or relief I am not sure, but she then had a good laugh at her poor driving, as she then selected reverse and tried to go straight back up the slight slope, and onto the main track, at the point where it turned sharply right. The snow was quite deep and as soon as she let the clutch up her wheels just span round helplessly in the snow. She let them spin for about 10 seconds obviously hoping that she would be able to find some grip if she carried on spinning them. When it was obvious that she was not going to move backwards at all, she tried pulling forwards just a couple of feet which she managed, as she was facing down a slight incline. However, when she then tried to reverse for a second attempt, her wheels span round and round, and even though she was now on a slightly flatter area a bit nearer to the gate, she could still not get back at all. She looked a bit worried, as I think she realised that she might have a slight problem getting out of this situation. There was the locked gate just a few feet in front of her and an incline behind her, which she had already failed to drive up.
She had one more attempt at reversing, and this time she gave the accelerator a push further to the floor to give the car more power. However, it did not make any difference, she just sat there and span her wheels even faster, but without moving backwards at all.
Without saying anything, and having now gone very quiet having completely stopped talking (which was definitely unusual!), she then suddenly turned the steering wheel sharply to the left and tried to reverse in that direction, with even more revs. I was surprised that the car actually started to move backwards, although it required constant high-speed wheelspin to achieve it. She kept the cars wheels turned sharply to the left, and so she was able to reverse slowly until the rear of the car was almost back as far as the hedge that had originally been on our left hand side as we went off of the main track towards the gate. She therefore had to stop, which then left the car pointing up the hill towards the track that we needed to drive up to exit the site, but with hardly any room behind her before the hedge.
I guessed that I would now witness more spinning, as we were on a slope covered in snow! I looked down at her thighs and admired the tightness of her snug fitting blue jeans and ankle boots. They looked lovely as pressed her left leg out straight to disengage the clutch whilst she selected first gear. She slowly let out the clutch and pressed down on the accelerator. I suspect that she did it slowly as she knew there was a high possibility she would spin her wheels. She would not have been surprised then when her wheels immediately span in the snow and she could not move. She let the wheels spin to start with, without making any adjustments to the pedals. Once it was obvious that the car was not going to move even a small amount, she started trying to rock the car by accelerating and then slowing down a couple of times. I watched her right boot repeatedly press down on and then lift off of the accelerator pedal. She did not alter the clutch, leaving her left boot on the pedal, but with it just about fully engaged. I was willing her to start ‘rocking’ in her seat, but she did not do so – I was not even sure if she knew that she should be trying to rock in her seat in this situation. After all, this was her first time stuck in the snow.
However, she did at last start talking, saying: “Come on, find some grip, please” followed by “Oh I don’t like this very much, now I’m really stuck”.
It was useless for her to keep trying to drive straight ahead like she was attempting, as the car was facing up quite a bit of a slope, and she was driving on snow that was covering grass, and therefore she did not have a nice firm gravel forest track underneath, as she had previously. She really was totally stuck, as she did not think that she had anywhere to, as she had stupidly reversed almost right back to the hedge. She said: “Why did you let me reverse so close to the hedge? I can’t get up this slope and I can’t go back because I reversed too far. You should have told me to leave some room. I am no stuck completely, and we are in the middle of nowhere. I don’t like it because I do not know what to do. Would it help if you got out to push?” I said: “Keep trying for a little while, you might dig the wheels down through the snow onto firm ground underneath and then suddenly get some grip”
I let her carry on trying to go forwards for at least four or five more attempts, as I was really enjoying this, my first ‘real’ stuck experience with her. It was made all the better by the fact that it was caused by her own driving, and I had not had a hand in getting her into this stuck position, other than suggesting that we go to this picnic site. However, I did now realise that we were out in the middle of nowhere and getting help was going to be very difficult. Not surprisingly, no one else had decided to take a trip to this picnic site in the snow! If she got too bogged down, then one of us was going to have a very very long walk to try and find help! I wondered who? Let me guess!
I therefore decided that it was time that I made a suggestion to try and prevent this. My thoughts were that, even if she got out of this particular situation, she still had to try and get the car up the slope on the track along side the woods. I could see from where we were stopped, that this track was quite steep at the bottom, as we were sat facing it. I would therefore still get to see some more wheel spinning once we got out of this current situation, but at least the next occurrence would be at a place where she could always reverse back to have another go if needed, unlike where we were at present with a hedge right behind us!
I looked behind and wondered if there was a possibility of actually reversing towards the hedge? I decided this was our only hope! I therefore told her to turn the steering wheel as far to the right as she could and to reverse at high speed, back towards the hedge, but to leave the wheels turned on full lock, so that hopefully the rear of the car might just clear the hedge (or just scrape along it), as she made the sharp turn.
My logic was that at least the car would by able to take advantage of the downward slope to get some momentum going backwards to start with, followed by the harsh acceleration. I hoped that once round far enough to be parallel with the hedge, the car would be more or less on the level and then she might be able to carry on reversing across the grass and back onto the main track, joining it prior to where it turned sharply to the right. She would then be able to slowly pull away along the main track and very soon afterwards have to make the turn and attempt to drive up the slope around the corner at the same time. Almost certainly she would then get stuck again. That was the theory anyway!
She managed to do this exactly as I asked. She gave the car a lot of revs and really went for it. I will give her due regard for her confidence in her own abilities. Many women would have been scared and probably only made a half-hearted attempt to turn and accelerate so hard. She really did go back at quite some speed, but she also had the sense to carry on and use the momentum to get back across the snow covered grass and back up onto the track.
I told her I was impressed with that bit of driving, even if she had rather let the side down by not concentrating and driving too fast to start with! She laughed and tried to blame me, saying I was talking to her and that was why she missed seeing the track turning off up the hill. I think that some of her determination to carry on reversing at such a high speed was that she realised that my suggestion was her only hope of getting the car out of the situation that she herself had got us into. She knew that if she only got part way round, she was likely to be completely stuck again, and then there would be no other alternatives available once in that situation.
It was lucky that the hedge was more like a giant set of brambles, rather than a fully developed hedge, as it allowed the rear of the car to squash some of it down as she made the turn.
Once we were back on the track she stopped and we had the above conversation. She then said: “Right, so now I need to turn up the track to the right to get out, is that correct?”
I replied: “Yes, but you need to approach the turn very slowly, so that you do not skid off to the side as you make the turn. Remember what I was telling you when I was driving to get here, about speed and smooth driving actions when driving on snow. Well now is your chance to show me that you can drive like that”
The car was now on the level section of the track a little way back from the bend, but as soon as I answered ‘Yes’ above, she slowly started to pull away. She managed to get moving forwards with only a tiny amount of wheelspin, but as soon as she reached the bend and started to make the turn, she started to spin. The car was only moving at about 5 miles per hour as she reached the start of the hill on the bend. She slithered about half way round with her wheels spinning slowly on the snow, but as more of the car came onto the slope it span to a halt.
I watched her struggling to find grip by turning the wheels first to the left and then right. She continued to turn the steering wheel one way and then the other, as she continually pressed the accelerator up and down with her right boot. She seemed to think that by turning the wheels one way to the other, she might find some grip, but the car had so little momentum as it drove onto the slope, it was obvious to me that she was never going to be able to get very far. It was useless to keep trying, as she was totally stuck again. I did not say anything to start with but just sat and watched. She was not pumping the clutch pedal at all, just continually turning the steering wheel to the left and the right whilst allowing the wheels to spin at a constant speed. Eventually she dipped the clutch and held the car on the handbrake. She then let the clutch up as she pressed the accelerator much more. She really revved the engine a lot, and then suddenly released the clutch at speed. The car jolted but still did not move up the hill as the wheels started spinning at a higher speed. After about 20 seconds of this, including trying turning the steering wheel from side to side yet again, she finally gave up.
The noise of the wheels spinning on the fresh snow was very loud. In fact, the whole experience was now fantastic, because she was stuck, in that she could not drive towards the exit, but at the same time there was no concern on my part about being ‘stranded’ and a long way from help. She was able to reverse back down the track and have another attempt whenever she wanted to, and she could have as many attempts as she (or I) wanted her to. Although she probably did not have the driving experience to approach the bend at enough speed to get up the slope, I was confident that if I had to, I would be able to do it. There was therefore no pressure that we were completely stuck there until we could get help, although I think that she probably felt that there was. I doubt if she had realised that I would be able to drive us up the slope if I needed her to. I suspect that all she could think of was her pride and showing me that she had the driving skills to get herself out of being stuck whilst trying to climb the slope!
As the car was not moving, I decided to get out and try and film her further attempts at getting up the slope. Don’t forget, at this stage she knew nothing about my delights in watching her spin her wheels. I therefore told her that whilst she was getting the car up the slope I would film some of the snow covered trees, as she had asked me to earlier. I am pretty certain that she did not ‘sus’ me out, although it was a slightly odd thing to suggest in the circumstances!
I got out and turned on the camera, but unfortunately the camera battery was flat! Fancy my mate lending me a camera with a flat battery – some mate. This would have been my first ever ‘stuck’ video clip had it worked okay!
I was still stood by the passenger window and therefore decided that I could still take advantage of the situation. After all, my lady was still stuck trying to get up one of the only two ways available to get off of the site. She was on a reasonably steep slope and it was covered in snow. She had not driven in snow before and she was wearing tight fitting jeans and little boots. These things don’t happen every day and so I thought I should make the most of it, even if I was not able to film it!
I therefore opened the front passenger window and shut this car door. I told her I would help her up the slope by pushing her. I pushed on the front door pillar with my right hand as she tried to pull away. Her nearside wheel was turned to the right (as she was still trying to get around the corner) and so I had a great view of it spinning in the snow as she tried to move. I looked at her legs as she let up the clutch and then looked back round and watched the nearside wheel spinning round and round in the slippery snow.
She was not making any progress at all and she was about to stop trying, so I called to her: “Try rocking”. I am not sure how she knew what to do, but she immediately started to repeatedly dip and raise the clutch up and down. Her thighs looked really great as she tried to get going. I started to push a little bit for real as well (for the first time – up until now it had all been for show!). The car did start to rock backwards and forwards in response to her actions and so then I called to her: “Its almost working, you need to start rocking in your seat as well, to give you a little bit more momentum”. She said: “How do you mean?”
I told her to stop for a minute. I then said: “Could you feel the car rocking slightly once you were lifting up and down on the clutch and I was trying to push in time with you”. She replied: “Yes, but what do you want me to do, I don’t understand”. I said: “Hold onto the steering wheel tightly and each time you let up the clutch, push forwards on it by moving your upper body towards it, and each time you dip the clutch, you push back into your car seat. You will find that your body weight will provide a bit of momentum, just as though we had a second person here pushing. Sometimes it can be just enough help to rock you up and out of a rut, or in this case, up a final section of a slope. I bet it will work provided you really go for it, and don’t make a ‘half hearted’ attempt. You were so near to getting going weren’t you? I bet you could feel it? Well this could be the difference between us getting out of here ourselves or having to walk to get someone to assist us”.
She said: “Oh God, I don’t want that. It would be so embarrassing. No, its okay, I will give it a go. Like you said, I could feel that the car was almost moving”
I said: “Okay, but don’t forget you will really need to ‘go for it’ and it might take a few minutes, so don’t give up until I tell you to”
I could not believe that I could be so bossy! Anyway, she put the car into first and let the clutch up whilst revving the engine at high speed. I started to push and she started to press the clutch up and down. Her wheel was spinning nicely and then she started to rock. Oh my god, what a sight! Talk about really going for it, she was fantastic! The whole of her upper body started moving backwards and forwards in perfect timing with her clutch movements. I have been with quite a few women in these sorts of situations (lucky guy aren’t I) and although I have seen some who were good, this was by far the best I had ever seen, especially as it was from a complete novice. I could not believe that she could get the hang of it so perfectly, the first time she tried it.
The whole of her effort was full of determination. She was obviously intent on getting up this slope whatever it took. I quickly wondered if it was the mention of us having to get help that had ‘worried’ her into being so determined to get out using this method. Whatever it was, it was a great show and I really enjoyed seeing my wife struggle to get up the snow covered track, whilst out in the middle of nowhere!
The car actually started to move very slowly whilst the wheels were spinning and she was rocking. I decided that I might as well push, as I had been fortunate enough to witness a real ‘unplanned’ stuck, caused by the lady herself, followed by a fantastic show of her ‘rocking in her seat’. I also thought that if she discovered that the rocking technique actually worked and helped her get ‘unstuck’, then she would almost certainly be more willing to try it again at some point in the future, if she were to find herself in another stuck situation (hopefully!). If she got disillusioned with it because it did not work today, she might not be very willing to try it again!
I pushed quite hard to get her going and she would have seen the effort that I was putting into it. Hopefully this would help to convince her that I was genuinely trying to help her get out, rather than desperately working to keep the stuck situation from ending. The wheels continued to spin as she struggled on slowly up the slope.
Once the car was onto the straight and flatter bit of the track, she stopped to pick me up. She obviously assumed that she would be able to pull away okay once I was back in the car, now that she was on a more favourable section. As she tried to pull away she span her wheels again for quite a while, without moving forward an inch. She said: “Oh no, not again. Am I every going to get out of here?”
Even I was surprised that she could not get going. The snow must have been quite deep, or the track on more of a slope that I had realised. She was forced to dip her clutch about five or six times in an effort to start moving forwards. After a while, the wheels must have gradually got down below the snow, to the firm track underneath, because suddenly the car started to move forwards very gradually. She was almost willing it to keep going calling out “Go on, go on, you can make it”. Suddenly her wheels got a decent grip and she accelerated away along the track heading in the direction of the exit.
It looked as though the track was going to be pretty level (or only on a very slight incline up) for the rest of the way through the woods. I therefore hurriedly tried to think of a way to get her to stop, so that hopefully, I could watch her spin for once last time. Luckily within about half a minute of thinking that an opportunity arose!
I saw a pheasant wandering about at the side of the track up ahead of us. I could not believe it. We had not seen any other wildlife the whole time we were there!
As we approached the pheasant, I asked her to stop, so that I could look at it and maybe film it rummaging about in the snow for some food. I then remembered that the camera battery was flat and remarked upon this. She was busy watching the pheasant, which had luckily gone to her side of the car. Whilst she was looking out of her driver’s window at it, I dropped my right hand down onto the handbrake lever between the seats, and slowly applied the brake, until it was fully on. I managed to slowly move my hand away and back onto my thigh without her seeing, as she was still busy looking out of her window.
(This image shows the dog in roughly the position occupied by the pheasant, and the blue line indicates where it moved as we drew level with it. The crossed black lines show where she span her wheels trying to pull away - the grass has grown up in the last ten years. At the time of this incident there were just small grass banks either side of a wide forest track!)
She asked me if I was ready for her to drive on. I said ‘Yes’ as I pretended to look at the trees out of the window on my side, whilst managing to keep one eye on her left hand and both her legs. She dipped the clutch, then put the car into first gear and took her foot off of the foot brake and onto the accelerator. She let up the clutch very slowly as she gently pressed on the accelerator to give her just enough revs to not stall the engine. It was obvious that she was trying to make a very gentle start, probably hoping that she could finally pull away at least once in the snow without spinning her wheels!
As the clutch started to bite, her wheels started to spin (yet again!). She accelerated a little bit more but still she did not move. I turned to look at her and saw that she was looking really worried - the worse I had seen her look all day! I could not quite believe it. What was she so worried about? Was it that she was a long way up the exit track, and that she did not want to have to reverse all the way back to the bend to start all over again? Maybe it was that she felt as though I would be critical of her driving abilities, in that now she could not even pull away on an almost flat piece of forest track without getting stuck yet again? Whatever it was I let her carry on trying for a few more attempts and then I looked at the handbrake and said: “You will never be able to pull away in this snow with the handbrake on, you dappy mare”. She looked down and was very surprised to see it fully on.
She said: “ I am going a bit daft today. It must be the cold weather. First I miss the turning in the track and now I try to drive off, after forgetting that I put the handbrake on. Are you sure you can trust me enough to drive us home in the snow once we finally get out onto the lane and then the main roads? If I was you, I would want to drive myself and not trust a dappy blonde” I reassured her that I was completely confident in her abilities, especially when she had reversed so determinedly down by the hedge, and had rocked in her seat so well that she had got us going. Obviously I did not mention that I had put the handbrake on!
She replied: “Well I knew I only had one chance to get it right when reversing, or else we would have definitely been stuck there all day. As for the rocking, that was really good. I was very skeptical when you suggested it. It even crossed my mind that you just wanted me to do that so that you could watch me for some reason, but I was completely wrong, because you were dead right. It worked a treat. I must remember that. It’s like having someone else with you to push. I was amazed it worked so well. I am really quite pleased with myself, and how I have managed driving in snow for the first time. Now, all I have to do is get us home safely along the country lane, and then the main road. I am a bit worried about getting up the hill in our road, once we get home, but I expect it will be okay.”
She then took the handbrake off and she span her wheels for about 15 seconds as she fought to get enough grip to enable her to climb up the very slight slope. Soon we were on our way out of the picnic site and heading home.
She managed the hill up to our house without any spinning and so ended the first experience I had with my wife being stuck in the snow.
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