Monday, February 06, 2006

Sunday Drive


We decided to take a drive Sunday after church and take the long scenic route home. I'd packed a few sandwiches and chips and we thought we'd have a nice little picnic about half way through our drive. We stopped at an old shack house (the middle picture) that was next to an old loading dock for mine cars. We ate our lunch and the girls scavanged around looking at the shale and quartz that was all over the ground. Then we continued on our way. On the map/atlas we were using it showed good dirt roads the way we wanted to go, at least the map showed the road was as good as the one we live on. It is a gravel road that we can go 60-70 mph on with no problem. The map was wrong.

The road was good up to a point then it became just a two track road that got worse and worse as we drove farther and farther along (top picture). The road became so bad we were bumping back and forth and even mud-bogging in some places. We had less than a half tank of gas in our Suburban when we started and when the road got bad we realized we didn't have enough to turn around and go all the way back the way we had come. We had to keep plowing ahead. Poor Marie got car sick. Thank goodness for the plastic ziploc sandwich bags! When she filled one up we chucked it out the window. (No we were not concerned about the environment at that point!)

Needless to say after driving for three hours on terrible dirt road (and towards the end NO ROAD) we were all glad to make it back home with the Suburban running almost on fumes. Did I mention we both had forgotten to bring our cell phones and also our GPS so I kept having this vision that I'd have to stay with the girls and try to keep them warm while Joseph went walking to the nearest ranch (we could see it about 8 miles away) to get help. Sure glad we didn't have to do that!

We did see some pretty sights, though. The bottom pic is of the 'Slumbering Hills' and the 'Bloody Runs' together. The 'Bloody Runs' have the snow on them. We live between those two mountain ranges so it was neat to see them both together like that. We passed about 6 or 7 windmills. They are set up for the cattle that run on the BLM rangeland. I'll have to tell about the windmills in another post.

Next time we'll think twice about going for a drive on Sunday. And be more prepared by bringing our phones and GPS and NOT trusting the map. (We've labeled the road we took 'The Road From Hell' on our map).

2 comments:

Bookworm said...

Wow, I'm glad you made it through OK. This will be fun to laugh about later--your kids'll NEVER forget it! LOL

Anonymous said...

What an adventure!! :-) We all went for a Sunday walk down a park trail once after church. We started out from our house with storm clouds in the sky. We should have known better than to walk far, but walk far we did and got caught in the storm. We (the kids and I) hid out in a tunnel near a playground, buffeted with wind and cold, while dear, dear hubby ran home for the van in the rain. I think the part we all remember best, though, is after we got home and dried off and lay all together on my bed listening to the rain pounding on the windows. Lovely!

Julie Lybbert