Talk About Getting Sidetracked

View Larger Map  <Click here

This happened a few weeks ago, but it isnt so scary now..now it is just funny, so I will tell it, to my embarrassment. ;)

If you will click on this map and drag it with your little pointer travelling further to your left on down the road...you will see it turn to dirt...then there is an opening...dirt...look up to the northwest of that dirt pile and you will see another dirt pile...follow that road out...and out..headed more south..til it looks like there is no road..but there is...kinda. Then you will come to a pond. (NOT the big one, the smaller one) and then well..the trail disappears...yes oh yes it does.

Let me tell you where this leads...it leads to nowhere.

(Saving, brb, been having AOL woes, so I dont trust them, be righhht back)

*******************************

As you know, we go walking every evening, five times a week. One of these evenings we followed a road straight out of town. Straight. Paved Road. Okay? I asked Ian, doesnt this road come out on 278? He says I dont know, I think so.

That would be a NO.

I got adventurous...at dusk no less...and said, oh heck. Lets follow it and see where it goes.

Bad idea. If you are ever on a detour with me, well, it never seems to end good. I have no sense of direction anyway, then I want to go looking for trouble? LOL yeah...

So we are headed out...Hutchinson or whatever turns in to Tolbert Town Road...still paved...pass a house with a dozen mongrels chasing the truck and then...the road turns to dirt. No big deal, there are plenty of dirt roads that cut through from one paved road to another out here...

JUST NOT THIS ONE.

We kept on going..being big adventurers...the road started to get more and more narrow...so narrow that if another vehicle was coming I dont know what we would have done, there was no room to pull over...trees on both sides.

But a vehicle did come...a van...a mom type mini van..which was encouraging, I thought well, if a mini van, family vehicle came out of there, we are alright.

NOPE.

Guess they were feeling adventurous too..just not as much as ME.

Cause dummy me kept going after the van found a spot to pull over and let me pass in a little part in the woods.

Soon the road was not a road at all anymore. It was roots and dirt and leaves and rocks, oh my. Oh yes, and NO room to turn my big truck around.

What could I do? I had to keep going to find a place to turn around now.

Its getting dark. Incidently the power lines ended at the beginning of the dirt road. Maybe that should have been an indicator of what I was getting myself into.

So now we are rocking and reeling all over these roots and bumps, going up hill and around bends...in a big wide truck...each side of the trail, yes trail, cause it was no longer a road...having trees right up to the edge. It is getting dark...I am starting to freak out. There is still nowhere to turn around!

Ian tell me he doesnt think these Pirelli tires were meant for offroading and he hopes we dont have a flat.

Well isnt that just encouraging! I start to whimper a little...wimpy me. I tell him this is getting a little too hairy for my taste.

Then he says...well I would have turned around when we hit the dirt road.

Yeah, sounds good now.

So I keep pushing forward, nothing else to do til I can find an opening to turn around.

Finally, we come to a small pond. There is evidence of a fire being made by the pond.

Our guess is we were on hunting land. At that small pond there was indeed enough room for me to turn around. But oh it was mushy. We had finally had a good rain...and I picked a fine time to do this now didnt I. I backed up, no light to see behind me...into some mud. My butt was drawing up in the seat as I tried to pull forward and the tires began spinning. Oh no, no, no, this wasnt happening. I punched it hard before the tires dug in too deep and we got stranded and pulled out of that hell hole. Curiously, the road did just END. That was it. You could have probably taken a four wheeler up through there further...but not a vehicle.

We made our way back slowly, bumpity bump. Oh there was also a very small stretch of paved road out there...but when reaching it going in, it was badly washed out and I had to lunge the truck up a hill to get it up onto that pavement. That sucked too.

Ian said he would never complain about him doing the driving to our destinations again. ;)

Truthfully, that was pretty scary..and I am glad that I wasnt alone or I really would have been freaking out in that confined area in the dark.

So I dont get so adventuresome anymore. That was a little more than I bargained for. I did learn that not all dirt roads lead to somewhere!

If you look, there are other dirt paths that lead out into the woods in other directions..looks like maybe a hunting lodge is out there or something.

Funny huh? NOW...not then!