Snow adventures in a 360 F1 (F1 is not designed for snow)

I had to go see my Daughter yesterday and she lives about 1 hour away. Took off in a absolute downpour on Hi. 101 and about 45 minutes into the drive the freeway came to a complete stop due to a accident about a mile up the road. It was fun watching the 18 wheeler slide into the emergency lane while avoiding the VW in the lane next to me, that would have caused serious damage to the VW and I can't see how my 360 would not have been hit also, no accident all is good, just that the freeway is a parking lot in pouring down rain. We get to a offramp (Gaviota offramp for those in S. Calif.) and decide to turn around since the radio is saying the accident will take a while to clear, so another 45 minutes to get back where we started.

So we decide to go up the 154 (San Marcos Pass) to get to my daughter's. About half way up the pass the traffic comes to a stop, by this time we have seen snow on the side on the side of the road, nothing serious but we are only halfway up. Bad accident at the top of the pass, will take a few hours to clear according to the radio. Not a problem for me, I know this area well, I can take Painted cave road to the top and get around all this mess... Sure I can....

As we keep going up in elevation, we are lucky to be following a 4x4 Nissan whose tires clear a path in the snow for my tires, but in the center of the road is snow that is taller than my ground clearance and we are only 2/3rd's of the way up. Its been pouring down rain for days, I don't dare go off the pavement to turn around for fear I will get stuck in the mud, so we keep going but the snow is getting worse and the really small mountain road getting slipperier. Finally up in front of us there is a 4X4 pulling out another 4X4 of the snow and we are stuck in the middle of the road while he pulls him out. If a 4X4 is stuck, my 360 does not belong here.

I backed up the 360 about 1/2 a mile on a curvy snowy slippery mountain road to a driveway that I think is paved, my wife thinks its only gravel but it will be better than trying to turn around on mud. It was downhill all the way so I was in neutral the whole way down, no clutch slipping, its slipped enough all day in the snow. We turn around at the driveway and my wife who had gotten out of the car to guide me, clears some snow from the tailpipes and we go back down the mountain laughing about our adventure and call my daughter to say sorry.

The thing I learned today, F1 sucks in the snow. You can't really control the clutch slip so the tires are spinning in the icy mess on the ground as you try to take off uphill and then the tires grab and you are moving forward faster then you want. Since I have almost never drive in the snow I also learned that if you park on a hill and the car slides downhill, its not the parking brake that is not holding, its that you need brakes on all 4 wheels. I did not think of that at the time I took the one picture from out of the car, the car was sliding down the hill when I took my foot off the brake and thought my parking brake was slipping, nope, needed the extra traction of the front tires so my wife put her foot on the brakes while I took the picture and starting back up the hill was no fun. Other than that it was all good, no damage and lots of fun.
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I was actually thinking of the tire issue as I was in the snow, I do have fairly new tires but they are summer tires and I was driving accordingly for the weather. The car seemed to do fine at the speed I was keeping it at but I kept thinking wrong tires for this weather.

Greg, Yes, we are in S. Calif. and yup the pass was closed because a bunch of cars slid off in the snow. I have not been to C&C in over a month and I was going to go to C&C this morning but slept too late.

Happy New Years everyone !