Driving out of Wallowa County to the greater Portland-Gotham City area for Thanksgiving last week, my reflections on what to be thankful for kept getting interrupted by radio announcers saying not to travel over the Blue Mountains that day if it could be avoided. I kept turning the channel to get a better outlook, but radio announcers were unanimous from all over the region, telling listerners to stay off the roads if possible. My list of nominees for things to be thankful for began to focus mainly on studded tires, snowplows, the travel website tripcheck.com and Dick Tracy smartphone technology that makes it possible to pull over next to the Opera House in Elgin to see which route is less terrible — up and over Cabbage Hill, or the sneak route via Tollgate.

Years ago I drove a Jeep CJ7 for the six-hour trip to the west side, which is just a horrible idea all on its own. This trip was in winter, which made it an even worse terrible idea. That journey over Cabbage Hill accelerated my aging process an average of one-and-a-half years for every terrifying mile. Visibility was somewhere between half to three-quarters of an inch. It was snowing so hard it just seemed like the weather was angry for no good reason and the snowflakes coming down were the size of insurance claims. The road surface was a sloppy mixture of ice, packed snow, bad manners, loose marbles, used Band-Aids, worst nightmares and just a sliver of hope I might make it to see Pendleton. The parade of semi trucks blasting by my little Jeep created tsunamis of slush off their tires each time they shouldered by, pushing the Jeep around with waves of chunky ice, pieces of gravel and what sounded like sections of broken tire chains. It was not relaxing. I did make it across OK, but was not able to undo my grip on that steering wheel for several weeks. Had to unbolt it and carry it around with me that whole time.

This year the road conditions over Cabbage Hill sounded awfully similar to that Worst Trip Ever, so I was tempted to go Tollgate. But then again, I’ve been lured in before by a cheerful, reassuring winter road report for Highway 204, only to get up there and find mayhem, looking like they’d never heard of a snowplow, cars and trucks in the ditches like a shuffleboard game and it looked like they were filming a winter scene for a new Mad Max movie.

It’s great, being tucked away up here in the far-right corner of civilization. Not so great when you need to venture out with crappy roads. Sure, I-84 gets the most attention from road crews, sanders and plows. But you also have to consider the number of crazy people in the world and how most of them are in the next lane every time I try to go over Cabbage Hill in poor driving conditions. Tollgate puts you out in the hinterlands, but there seems to be less shenanigans from other drivers. Then again, if Tollgate gets plugged up, it’s probably real plugged up. It can be a real toss-up.

This year I went Tollgate and it was great. Only one hay trailer sitting abandoned in the road. Other than that, smooth sailing. So this Thanksgiving, amid all the good vibes about what we’re most thankful for, I was just happy to not have my fingers permanently gripped to a steering wheel and when it was my turn to make a toast, I had to go ahead and raise a glass of sparkling cider to Tollgate cutoff. Here’s to you.

Jon Rombach is a local columnist for the Chieftain.