What An Adventure

If you are familiar with a GPS and have relied on it to safely take you to a previously unknown destination, then you may understand just how helpful one can be on a trip. However, it can be one of the most misleading and aggravating devices ever invented. On Monday, we decided to take the kids hiking and climbing. We have been to this particular wall before, so the GPS wasn't really necessary for the initial leg of journey. We jeeped to the middle of nowhere (in the the NM desert) and then hiked into the climbing area. We enjoyed our time there and returned to the car to go in search of an abandoned Army Fort/Outpost for the Butterfield Trail. For this trip, we used Larry's high-speed handheld GPS and eventually found the ruins off of a NM County Road, which if you are familiar with county roads in the southwest, then you know this means they are barely more than a game path through the desert and if you're lucky, it might be graded once every couple of years. Anyway, we visit said fort, take our pictures and move out on our merry way following the advice of the GPS. It listed even more County Roads that could take us back to Interstate 10 without backtracking across the desert. We followed on the new course and wove our way through the desert. Next thing you know, we are staring at I-10 but can't physically enter the interstate. We crossed under a low bridge with cars zooming by overhead and came to a complete dead end. I'm not kidding when I tell you that this tunnel was creepy, probably used for nefarious purposes when the sun goes down. By the way, the GPS indicated an on ramp at that location. I guess we could have entered traffic if we had jeeped up the incline and busted through a barbed wire fence, but since we weren't feeling like Bo and Luke Duke, we backed up and went in search of another road. We eventually hit a "frontage" road (as indicated by the GPS) but the only thing frontage about this road was that it afforded us spectacular views of the actual interstate we just couldn't seem to get on. At one point, we were so close to I-10 that the GPS said we were on the interstate. Possibly a laughing matter now, but not so much when daylight's rapidly fading and there is no on-ramp in sight. Eventually after traveling through cow paths, scratching up the sides of the Jeep because the road was so narrow that thorny bushes reached halfway across the road, and winding our way through a ranch, we reached asphalt and made it to I-10 right as darkness fell. Needless to say, I am becoming very weary of GPS's as this is our third major incident of traveling through the desert on little more than game trails because the GPS had a quicker way to get somewhere. Hopefully this won't happen once we make it back east.

The climbing wall.

Larry climbing to the top and securing the rope for the kids.

Spider Monkey AJ

Lexi the Gecko

Me belaying Larry, and yes he can pick me up off the ground if I'm not paying attention.

The bone yard of some predator near a geocache Larry found at the top of the climb.

Adobe wall at the fort.

A foundation about to fall into an arroyo.

The sunset on our GPS guided tour of the desert.

Notice I-10 to the left of our frontage road.

This is the first time the same GPS steered us off course. We were on our trip to Utah and we stopped to see Chaco Culture National Historic Park. We actually drove on "roads" worse than the one in the picture and at one point we came to a dead end at a drop off to a river 15-20 feet below us. Good thing Larry wasn't driving fast.