It twists and turns with many forks in the road,
Although always, and inevitably, we are given a choice ...
Do we turn to the right ... or the left?
Do we take the high road ... or the low road?
Do we take the easy path ... or the difficult one?”
(An excerpt from a poem by Kit McCallum)
Linda and Larry were here for a weekend of geocaching and 4-wheeling. Saturday we had joined up with another cacher and cached from Fallon, NV to Dixie Valley. The highlight of the day was our adventure at Box Falls, but, that’s another story. Today we knew we couldn’t expect another adventure of that magnitude so we settled for venturing up into the Virginia Range and hopefully getting “First to Find” on a new cache and possibly picking up a couple more if we had time before Linda and Larry headed back to Roseville.
There are a limited number of access points to the Virginia Range and after consulting topographical maps Mike decided the best way was from the south through a rural community called Virginia Highlands. Mike had explored that area before the advent of geocaching and Mike and Cynthia had once taken a trip up into the Range at the beginning of their caching history. It’s always been a rocky, rough, slow ride up to the top. Once there, the roads aren’t as affected by erosion and would be considered…better.
It only took one wrong turn before we found the road that would take us to the cache. “Road” is not really accurate, more like a boulder strewn track that once was a road, but eventually, it got us to within 300-400 feet of the cache. Imagine bumping and lurching all the way up here just to find a little piece of paper tucked into an ornament hanging in a Christmas tree. Oh, did I forget to mention the gorgeous scenery and a multitude of beautiful and curious wild horses? And, yes, we were the “First to Find” so happy dances were performed by the less reserved members of the group.
After the happy dances and walk back to the Jeeps, it was decided that we had time to find one more cache at Washington, an old mining town 1.4 crow miles to the north. Piece of cake…except we decided to take the short cut around the east side of a mountain instead of the longer “main” road around the west side. The map showed it as a 4x4 road so how hard could it be? Finding the road wasn’t that difficult but very soon it became obvious that this was the road less traveled. In fact, it’s entirely possible that we were the first in about 150 years.
It’s difficult to describe the road; I hope the pictures do it justice. At the point that I stopped and walked back to asked Linda and Larry if they really wanted to do this, the road was slightly more than an imagination. The pattern of the rocks and flora suggested that wheels had been by here sometime in the distant past, but that was about it. To my surprise, Linda and Larry were eager to try it, so we continued. Shortly, a berm of boulders appeared on both sides of the road and, as the slope of the hillside increased, the berm on the downhill side increased in height. You could almost imagine Chinese laborers moving boulders from the uphill side to the downhill side resulting in a fairly level track. If they used dirt/gravel to fill in the cracks around the boulders, it wasn’t apparent now. Now it was just lots of large rocks roughly outlining a very narrow way north.
We continued slowly and carefully. In many places the bushes and trees had seriously overgrown the trail and caused serious scratches to the paint and plastic windows, but we kept going. Several times we thought the road ended but upon close investigation we thought we could see the road, so we kept going. A small indistinct gully created by the mating of two hills marked the end…or was it the end. On the side of the next hill the pattern of rocks and plants again suggested there once was a road here. As scary as it might seem, it turned out that this was the best part of the road.
After the road went around the corner of the hill it deteriorated into little more than a gully with rock berms on both sides. Both machine and driver were coping with the slow rugged terrain until all that was left of the road were two rock berms and a very deep trench in the middle. Mike walked the “road” and discovered that the washout didn’t extend very far and if the Jeeps backed up a bit and drove over the downhill berm and across country they could bypass the washout and re-entered the road several hundred yards ahead. The plan worked!!
Once back on track, we slowly made our way around the mountain, weaving around the overgrown trees and bushes. Twice we had to get out and move 18-20 inch size boulders out of the way. Then, once more, the road disappeared and it was impossible to go any further. Mike walked the road again and discovered that the washout was much longer than the previous one. He placed Linda at the location where the Jeeps would re-enter the road and put Cynthia at a strategic spot along the work-around route. Slowly, carefully, Mike and Larry drove the Jeeps across county over rock and around trees and bushes until both Jeeps were, once again, back on the road.
During all this, with all the planning and maneuvering, while Linda and Cynthia were standing at their stations waiting to direct traffic, a remarkable thing happened. Everyone was having fun, even the women, who, until geocaching, wouldn’t have been caught dead off pavement. They were actually having fun out in the middle of nowhere on the top of a mountain range directing Jeeps around rocks and trees. Unbelievable!! One wonders how fast the good humor would fly out the window if we had to back up all the way to the beginning.
As luck would have it, once we were back on the road, the conditions dramatically improved and within a short while we could see the “main” road.
Despite all the fun people had, everyone was relieved to be back on a real dirt road, in fact if truth be told, Mike and Cynthia got out of GeoJeep and he kissed the ground while she did the happy dance. A short distance down this road was Washington and the second cache of the day. The way out to civilization was easy and boring compared to what we just experienced.
We are all a little better now for taking the road less traveled.
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