One Wrong Turn

In a sentence, don’t trust Google. As you can well imagine, I am using many different apps to get where I need to go. I have 2 different Route 66 apps, one that is really good at showing the points of interest and one that’s better for navigating me back to the ‘mother road’ if I choose to deviate on the faster interstate highways for a bit. I have several camping and boondocking apps, some are free and based on submissions by fellow travellers while others are paid services like Harvest Host, where your membership entitles you to free stays at farms, wineries, businesses, etc. with the expectation that you will make a purchase during your stay. Most of these also interact with Google Maps and add the destination as a stop to the ongoing navigation task. The problem is, when Android Auto is connected, sometimes it navigates to the county rather than the specific address.

On this particular day, I had been heading for Uranus Fudge Factory with no clear plan for rest stop or campground. I found the Robert E. Talbot Conservation Area in iOverlander, one of the apps that includes free and paid options. It was listed as a small place with 5 gravel sites, each with a fire ring – quiet and dark. It sounded perfect and since there was nothing I had my heart set on seeing between Uranus and the Crap Duster in Carthage, I could cover some miles and get a good start on the next day. Unfortunately, when I added it as a destination, Google placed it as a stop between where I was and Uranus. No problem, it’s relatively easy to reorder the stops, so I made it last and off I went. But, Android Auto set the destination as Lawrence County, not Robert E. Talbot Conservation Area. As you can see from the screenshot of this map, a record of my location for that day, I was more than a little of course. That backwards J took me THROUGH a ranch, with cows and everything.

At one point I remembered I now have a dash camera running and recording everything in a continuous loop, so I locked one of the videos. It’s actually on my way out, after I realized what had happened and got ‘the rig’ turned around. At this point I’m heading back through the farm yard and past the house toward the highway. And I know what you’re thinking. “Why would you keep going once you saw the farm buildings?” Well, some of the sites I had read about include opening and closing gates. There is BLM land in Arizona and Nevada where animals are free ranging. There are cattle guards going in and out of the truck stops and you’ll still see wild horses grazing along the entrance. So it wasn’t that far fetched that you might need to drive past this ranch to get to the camping, right?

Eventually I got myself back on the right road and using the GPS coordinates provided in the app, found the exact location of this delightful spot – dark and quiet, remember… Imagine my surprise when I pull in and discover it is filled with tents and trailers and pick-up trucks. There were fires and generators and music and general merriment. Ahh man, was I going to need to find someplace else?

By now it was probably 7:15 and totally dark and the last thing I wanted to do was fine another spot. I hadn’t even had supper yet. I drove in slowly and spotted a kind of laneway leading to a gate at the back past the first set of trailers. The kind of gate you can walk through but can’t drive a truck. It looked pretty flat, maybe I could just tuck myself back in there. I continued around the loop and circled back, that was as good as it was going to get.

I backed in and decided that the best thing to do would be to approach the big fire where all the music and laugher was coming from and see what the atmosphere was like. I could still leave if I needed to. As I approached, a pair of men, probably in their early 60’s came towards me. I apologized for the intrusion and asked if my presence would be a problem. “It’s public land” they both said, “you have just as much right to be here as anyone”. But it could be noisy in the morning, as everyone would be filing past me and through that gate. You see, it was opening morning of the deer hunt.

Turned out to be a great place to stay and the price was right. So I set about preparing a feast fit for the night before the hunt. I fried up a couple of sausages and the homemade pierogies gifted to me by a kind woman from back home. She’s a darn good cook and I had enough pierogies and sausage for 3 meals in total.

I never did hear the guys passing by me in the morning. I did wake to gunfire, but I was prepared for it and I was able to get an early start. Before I left I took a little wander around with my coffee and snapped a few pics of the neighbours out enjoying the sunshine. Another happy ending…