Get a vehicle/tractor unstuck from mud or snow - homesteading.straw.unstuck PEP BB

So this happened last week or so. One of the driveways on the farm is difficult to manage for a lot of people, especially when backing out. This person, bless their heart, missed the driveway all together. After failing to reverse out or go forward they were sent to find me. They were spinning out and it did make it slick and muddy but primarily it was the slope that had them stuck. I pulled them back up the the little hill with my truck and a tow strap, while they put their vehicle in low gear and assisted. I didn't get a lot of pictures as I didn't know this person (they were visiting a landmate) and I didn't want to explain what I wanted pictures for. They were embarrassed enough, haha. They were jutting out into the street where traffic was having to swerve around at a low visibility point of the road, glad I got them out before it caused an accident. Before and after shots were all I got at the time, hard to get a midway shot while pulling them out. The tow strap photos are a mock up of how it was attached. Not sure if this is a fit for this bb as there aren't any other submissions to go by and even the embedded video is gone, but I figured I'd post it to find out. I'll just make this as a normal post but if it fits the bill I can edit it into a submission or yall can work your back end magic.

Hey PEP-folks,
This last February we had days of rain, uncommon for here (so I am told), compounding the melting snow. We watched from the house as the creek came high, and the spillway over the cattle pond got whitewater, and then slowly began to crumble at the outlet. This was not a fun thing to watch. There is nothing you can do in that moment, the water will have its way. This is our first year on this land, but the spillway was ~10-20yrs old, I believe, so we were seeing a decade-scale event (of course, the Davis rain gauge went kaput in the wintertime, and we haven't had readings since - I have to climb a pole to get it down and fix it, and it has been low priority). Thus the need to repair the dam.

So, I pick a bucket of rock from the quarry after a few days of dryout, and start down the road to the dam. Soft. Softer. Stuck. The road happens to also drain the quarry, which I want to change this year... Dump the bucket of rock and reverse. No dice. Lift the front with the bucket and claw back with the hoe? No dice. At this point, the belly of the machine is on the mud, and the wheels have perfectly shaped mudholes to prevent them from getting purchase. So up to the garage I trudge to get the truck and the log chains.

In a perfect opportunity for humility on my part and swagger on his, I holler to my 13y.o. "wanna get me unstuck?" and he comes running. Two log chains, end to end, go down to the heavy bracket under the excavator that I use for trailering the machine, and the other end of the chains goes to a single front hook on the truck. This keeps the truck high up the hill, away from the softest bits. My son has the truck in 4 low, I am in the tractor, and I give him hand signals and the tractor a little juice to the drive wheels, and slowly, slowly, the tractor backs up to terra firma, I sign to cut power and slack the chain, and we're back in business, with a very muddy tractor.

I'm giving that road a long time to firm up.

You'll note the chain is installed in the stuck tractor picture, which I trust will satisfy the BB requirement for showing hookup, and the handy front hooks are visible in the truck picture, but not connected yet.

Happy spring homesteading,
Mark