Wrong Turn
Hailie and I were talking Wednesday morning about where we wanted to go for the day. With all of the election results still being up in the air, we both wanted to get as far away from cell phone service as we could. We looked at a few options, but we agreed a short trip would be best, since that last trip with 10 hours took a lot away from our ability to get caught up around the apartment. Ultimately, we decided that it would be nice to go up to Lake Cascade, and get a the final look at the autumnal colors beside the lake before the dump of snow that was expected within the upcoming week. I had already made sure the batteries had been charged for the drone the night prior, so we loaded the dogs up and hit the road.
The drive up 55 is always a beautiful one, especially once you get past Banks, and more into the Boise National Forest. It was a gorgeous fall morning that was cut abruptly short when we saw the blockade at our turn off at Smith’s Ferry Dr. The road worker said the road was closed. What to do, what to do? Here’s an idea, I had gone camping at tripod reservoir with a friend last year in August, so I promptly decided that today would be the perfect day to finally show Hailie the spot we stayed at. I mean, we were already at the intersection of NF-644 by Cougar Mountain Lodge, so we were less than ten minutes away from some great hiking trails.
I had a lot of faith in my ability to get us there, but this was largely a misplaced faith. You see, the problem with this idea was the fact that I was trusting myself to remember a place that 1.) my friend had driven me to 2.) in the dark cover of night 3.) more than a year ago. When you add all of that to the fact that we had now veered away from the predetermined path I had downloaded (back when cell phone service was a thing) and I now had no ability to reconnect to the GPS services on my phone because they were largely reliant on a cell phone tower to recalculate the route.
It should have been a six minute drive from that intersection to the campsite at Tripod Reservoir. Six minutes, that’s it. Six. But instead of turning left at my turn off, I turned right. Six minutes was transformed into forty-five minutes, with an additional eleven miles, before we would eventually arrive at Sage Hen Creek Campgrounds. Once I realized I had taken a wrong turn somewhere, I decided to keep driving straight until I came across a sign that would point me in the direction of a landmark, so I could get an opportunity to backtrack. The first sign we ran into had directions to Sage Hen, and I immediately recognized the name. A handful of people that come into the shop have mentioned that sage hen was one of their favorite campsites, but I personally had never taken the time to check it out.
Today was that day.
One of the great things about having a day off in the middle of the week, is you greatly reduce your chances of running into other people. That was definitely the case with this trip, as there was only one other person on the opposite side of the reservoir, fishing. He was already putting away his pole by the time we got there, so the entire reservoir was our playground for the time we were there. The water levels were incredibly low, so we drove out onto the beach to let Sumo and Tesla get some of their energy out, while we took in the views, and found evidence that we weren’t the first ones to drive out by the water.
Hailie jumped in the driver seat to give me a chance to fly the drone around the area. After seeing this place from the road and above, it’s easily a place I will be coming back to, especially when we can have an opportunity to wake up to the sunrise over the water front.
The lesson to take out of this story is twofold.
1 - Losing cell phone service in the forest is a real thing.
If the GPS on your phone can’t update itself without a cellular connection, you could run into a difficult time, especially if you are unfamiliar with the area. We happened to run into 2 moose and enjoyed a little extra time driving through the forest with all the colors of fall.
2 - We took a wrong turn instead of turning around.
Don’t be afraid of the unknown. Improvise and be willing to spend the additional hour going out of your way to find the adventure, instead of turning around as soon as you see a road closed sign.
Now, I’m writing this post on the Monday that followed our trip, and it has snowed for the past two days. I’m incredibly grateful that we got up to the reservoir when we did, because I think we were able to catch the peak of autumn scenery. The colors were all changing, but driving hadn’t yet began to worsen. I have complete and total trust that the Subaru is capable of handling those roads, but I’ve seen similar roads in worse conditions, and I still want to wait until I have the right tires before I test my theory out in subfreezing temperatures, .
It’s supposed to continue snowing tomorrow, but fortunately, none of it is sticking down here in the valley. Most of it has already melted, so we’ll see how much mother nature wants to throw at us, see how the roads look, or see if Wednesday becomes, “Chris and Hailie run to Costco and then have a lazy day off together.” You could sway my vote either way.
Speaking of voting -
Good job, America.
-Chris
