Beyond the wonderful photoscapes...

centraljune-4731, originally uploaded by Alta Marie.

Why did I trust my GPS so blindly?!? This is the part where the lack of a guardrail became exceedingly bothersome. You see, there is nothing protecting me (and my cousin's car) from the precipice!!

You may think it odd that I took some time to take photos on the way down this abandoned mule-path that I happened upon, but in fact I didn't.

When I first encountered this "short-cut" I drove it. Slowly. At 1 MPH while sweating profusely and containing heart palpitations. Seriously. My heart spent the whole ride trying to escape my chest, which I didn't appreciate since my mind was busy focusing on the road in front of me, and on trying to brake safely on wet gravel. At one point I had to exit the car to move large fallen rocks out of the way and that's when I started to worry that when I got to the bottom of the road it might be barred, and I would have to turn the car around and come back up. PANIC!

To make matters worse, I didn't even have my camera with me. I was really upset with myself, because I knew I would NEVER drive this road again.

When I finally got back to Central City after my adventure (Drake was in rehearsal, you see) I was shocked to hear that everyone had heard of this road! "Oh you went down Oh My God Road? in the rain? that's awful, I'm so sorry Honey!" I was comforted and affronted by this acknowledgement. Comforted because it meant that people knew about it and felt bad for me. Affronted because-- people had previously discovered this abandoned mule path and not blocked it off?!?! Are they trying to kill tourists? (Not that I should talk... we do the same things in MA, but it's more of a vehicular homicide. We induce the peril on the roads. sick but true.)

So the next day I took Drake to the point at which I turned right and everything went wrong. And it turned out that it wasn't Oh My God Road. I actually exited Oh My God Road in order to take a "short cut" (so determined by my GPS) down a short part of Two Brother's Road, only to rejoin Oh My God Road at a later point. This made me feel better/worse.

Naturally, I parked the car, and Drake and I ran down the road a while (it's very easy to run down, back up was an entirely different matter) so I could capture a bit of what I saw on foot. On foot, where you can turn and flee when it gets perilous.

Do you remember reading about all the UK drivers who followed their GPS's to imminent doom? I CAN'T believe that I am their American counterpart. I turned off a paved road, and after having passed several abandoned mines and buildings, as well as signs that said "Abandoned mining grounds. Please stay on road" "Road not maintained during winter" I kept going. The problem is, you see, that once you get to a certain point, you have no choice. You can't turn around on a narrow winding mountain road without guardrails by yourself. You have to keep going until you get to the bottom and determine whether you'll be permitted to rejoin civilization or forced to turn around and make your way all the way back up the mountain.

I guess this is where I should say that it's like life in that way...