That time I got really cold thread

[Phaseolus]

Since it’s been sorta cold now is a great time to post that time you got really cold. Here’s mine.

In the 80’s a couple of my buddies and I went goosehunting on a lake northeast of Wellington, Colorado. It was the first really good coldsnap and the new ice wasn’t very thick. We carefully placed the decoys and the farthest couple were placed where we knew the water wasn’t very deep, just in case we fell in. No geese flew that morning and my friends decided to leave early. I decided to stay another hour. I slid around on the ice careful not to make any moves that might break the ice when I picked up the decoys. I saved the farthest out one for last. As I bent down to pick up the last decoy I went through the ice, it was only chest deep but I couldn’t get back on top of it because it kept collapsing as I tried. I ended up breaking my way through the ice to shore by heaving my upper body onto the ice. I was real cold by the time I got back to the blind, grabbed my shotgun and walked the quarter mile to my VW Beetle. VW Bugs don’t really have a functional heater and my coveralls were frozen sold, it took me forever to dig the keys out of my pocket through that hand slit in the coveralls and get the bug started. I was barely functioning by that point and realized I wasn’t going to get home. Stopped at the nearest farmhouse and pounded on the door, they put me in a hot shower because the zippers and shoe laces were froze and couldn’t be undone. They got me warm, gave me some clothes and coffee and we had breakfast while my clothes tumbled away in the drier. I owe a lot to those folks.

 

[duckhunt]

When I was a kid I would ride my bicycle around a few miles from the house running a small trap line where the creaks would go under the road. One set was at a culvert that had a pool of water about 50 ft around. A cold snap hit and it froze over so instead of walking around I figured I would just walk across the ice. You guessed it I went through to my waste. Well below zero with strong wind and I was on my bike. Was only about a half mile from the house my cloths were also frozen solid except around my knees where it stayed flexible from peddling.

Another time when I was very young I got home from school and wanted to ride my snowmobile. I put on my coveralls, hat, gloves, helmet, and for some odd reason my tennis shoes. I have know idea what I was thinking. The rule was I could ride in the fields behind the house until mom turned the outside light on. That meant supper was ready and I needed to go inside. My feet were covered with snow and frozen solid but I wasn't ready to call it quits. By the time mom turned the light on I went in and had to sit in the mud room for about a half hour to let the shoes unthaw to get them off.

 

[Trailsend]

Living in South Dakota, every winter you get really cold! I’ve went through the ice a few times. Been out in some nasty blizzards that I should have never been out in.

 

[BRoth82]

When i was 16 or 17 we were deer hunting the weekend before Thanksgiving in far Northern MN at out cabin. The cabin sits in 40 acres surrounded on 3 sides by the BWCA. It is an hour long 4 wheeler ride from the nearest road and then another hour and a half to the closest town.

I had shot my buck that morning and my step dad wanted to take the snowmobile and sled to go retrieve the buck he shot 2 miles from the cabin the day before. The winter road he shot it off of was covered in waist high cattails, I had to bust a trail through it just so the snowmobile would make it without getting hung up. We made it to the buck fine and loaded it into the sled, for some reason my step dad decided to take a different winter road back to the cabin.

About 1/2 mile into it we came on a beaver dam it was close to 4' tall and had maybe 40 yards of water before swamp grass, it was frozen but we couldn't tell how deep the water was or how thick the ice was. My step dad decided to just give it the wood and try to scoot across the ice and hopefully hit the swamp grass before the ice broke if it did. I got off and walked across the dam so if something happened I could help out.

He got going as fast as he could and actually made it a ways across the ice until the sled and deer hit the ice and broke it, the snowmobile, sled and him went down immediately. I just stood there in shock, after a few choice words from him I slid to the edge of the water and went in to help get the snowmobile, sled and deer out. The water was up to my neck,,, it took us a good 5-10 minutes before we were able to get everything out.

At this point we were about a mile and a half as the crow flies from the cabin, we would have to go through clear cuts and swamps to get there. We dumped the water out of our rubber boots and started walking, thankfully my step dad is the best woodsman I've ever met he knew exactly where to go. As we were walking everything started to freeze and get hard to do, we tried talking to each other bit our speech was slurred, we would fall down as we tried to cross over logs. It was to the point where I could no longer feel anything from my waist down and from my shoulders down.

But we just kept moving forward, and by a miracle we walked out of the woods no less than 200 yards from the cabin, we got inside and got a fire raging in the wood stove. When we finally got feeling back we changed into our dry cloths and wrapped up in as many sleeping bags as we could find.

The only reason we are here is that God guided us through those woods and got us out safe. There is no way we could have gone through that country in our condition and come out right at the cabin.

 

[Dougfirtree]

I always remember this one day I skied with friends at Big Mountain in Whitefish. The morning was great, but as the day wore on, the wind picked up and the temp dropped. The last run of the day, I remember the whiteboard at the lift to the top said, "windchill value: -62 degrees". The lift ride was brutal and skiing down, the wind was whipping the snow all over the place, so not only was I shivering and too cold, but everything just looked white and I had no depth perception trying to ski down the bumpy slope. Not fun!

 

[Mallardsx2]

I got my feet tangled in some goose decoy cords and fell overboard out of my boat head first in the Susquehanna River on a February late season goose hunt one year.

Went completely under water. I was alone. It was Dark. It was 10 degrees outside.

I reckon that's the coldest I have ever been.

Went back the next 5 days in a row and killed limits every day....I really wanted to kill the birds back then. lol

 

[HuntTalk Freak]

I live in Texas, haven’t truly been cold like most of you. I did think I was tuff/suffering once hunting in late January here and temps were in the teens for a week.

That was back in the days I wore Walmart hunting clothes and cotton socks.

 

[Nick87]

I got my feet tangled in some goose decoy cords and fell overboard out of my boat head first in the Susquehanna River on a February late season goose hunt one year.

Went completely under water. I was alone. It was Dark. It was 10 degrees outside.

I reckon that's the coldest I have ever been.

Went back the next 5 days in a row and killed limits every day....I really wanted to kill the birds back then. lol

Pretty foolish the things you'll do when "your mad at em".

 

[blackbeard]

Went thru the ice quite a few times muskrat trapping, usually up to my waist or just under my arm pits. Lost the feeling in my legs the last time I went thru, decided it wasn't worth it anymore.

The winter of 95-96 we lost power on the farm for a week+, temps were around 0 if I remember. Got to wear snowsuites in the house to keep warm, plus wear blankets at night.

 

[gouch]

My dad's dog walked out onto the ice on a pond and broke through. She couldn't get out, so I stripped down naked, leaving dry clothes to put back on and waded out to her, breaking the ice as I went. I expected to get an argument from my dad, about wading out into an ice-covered pond but he didn't try to stop me, I think he liked the dog better than me.

 

[belshawelk]

My uncle took me sledding, in my grandpas 2WD 1972 Chevy pickup. Went up the mountains near Mt Baker Washington. Of course we got stuck when the snowstorm hit. Spent 3 nights up on the mountain. I was 8 or 9 and he was 21 or 22. He kept me warm and tried to keep finding help. We were way way up the mountain where we had no business being. I still remember 45 years later in the middle of the 3rd night seeing some lights and a Jeep from Whatcom County search and rescue coming up the road through the trees.

 

[RealMuddyboots]

I met up with bunch of friends to snowmobile at buddy's mom house foothills of Adirondacks when in early 20's. We were riding back in and came up in beaver flow. Existing trail went across it so all went and I was last. Yep, halfway across went through, sled went down hung up on back of skis on ice. I slid off and up to neck in water. Somehow somewhere I squatted down and pushed sled back up into ice. No clue how it happened other than fear. Pulled myself back out on back of sled. Was maybe 15 out and prob 7-8 miles from house. Buds came back, got my sled started and we started back cross country thru really rough terrain. One guy bent ski on hidden boulder but kept going. I had terrible time steering from being so cold. Will never forget that feeling. Got to house, his mom fired up shower and guys put me in shower fully clothed. Took 1/2 hour to get feeling back. Took off clothes in shower and his mom washed and dried while I was wrapped up in blanket in front of wood stove. How the hell does everyone cross and not me? Never left their tracks just went through. We couldn't believe I lifted sled back up on ice. It was an old Mercury that was prob heavier which prob was reason I went thru. Damn lucky I had friends with me.

 

[Addicting]

We were rabbit hunting an old swamp that froze over. It was thick with buck brush and we killed a ton of rabbits. On the walk back I was using an old ditch to get out of the swamp and fell thru. My hip waders filled with water and it took me quite a bit to get out. It was about 3/4 of a mile to the house and I made the mistake of draining my waders. It was so cold that once the water was gone and my undergarments exposed to air they started to freeze. By the time I made it to the house my lower extremities were numb. I had to get in the shower and run warm water into my waders to try and get them off. I ended up taking scissors and cutting them off as I started to panic. Coming up to temp was the most painful thing I can remember. It scarred me and I just can’t get comfortable on the ice since then.

 

[mountainlaurel3]

Not as bad as most of these, but I used to surf in Maine in the winter. Wetsuit, booties, mitts, so mostly it was fine, but trying to unlock and then start the car after a couple hours in the 40 degree ocean could take a very long time. Fingers wouldn't be close to working, so I'd have to sandwich the key between my palms and try to twist with my whole upper body. I miss surfing.

 

[Straight Arrow]

Thanksgiving Day my teenage grandson and I got a double on cow elk. His elk was in a steep draw with water running in the bottom and required halving the elk to drag down to the trail. Our boots were waterlogged and we were sopping wet as the snowfall increased. We sledded the cow elk down to the pickup, where grandson started the truck, warmed up, changed his boots, and donned his warm dry Carhart bib overalls. That made me shiver with chills even more, but realize that my grandson is so much smarter than I! We finally got both elk to the truck and I began to warm up ... but it was a cold, hard lesson learned from a grandson. Always bring extra warm clothing and boots.