Leaving the well and corral area, we continued on “further up and further in” — well, sometimes up and sometimes down, as it happened… until we came upon a gorgeous little valley area containing a pond and several cows. We stopped for a bit, and took some pictures, and knew we must be close, but according to the GPS, we weren’t quite there yet.
So back in the truck we went – and it was at this point that I decided I was not going to drive any further – the narrow road wound steeply uphill around a curve with a drop-off to the right, and I simply couldn’t handle it. I turned the wheel over to Paul and buried my head until we were up past the scary part!
Up and around a few more curves, we came to a stop where GPS said we should find the spring, only what we found was a view of a gorgeous vista, but no water at all. Furthermore, the road ahead was blocked by someone sitting in, of all things, a camouflage golf cart, sporting a rifle case on the back! Paul hopped out to run ahead and say hello while I stayed in the truck with the kids. It turned out to be a wise old man who has lived in the area all his life, and he and Paul talked about the spring and its history — Paul said when he got back this gentleman was so old, he could have been on one of those water teams himself. He directed us back down to the little green valley and said if we followed the canyon back about a quarter mile, we would find the spring.
Since I was even LESS interested in riding in the truck on the way back DOWN that steep road, I and a couple of the girls decided to walk down. I grabbed a pic of the golf cart after our new friend passed by. I wished like everything I was bold enough to ask him for a photo, but I wasn’t, so you’ll have to take my word for it – he was OLD.
We rallied down in the valley, and found at first what seemed like it might be the spring, but sure enough, we needed to follow the stream, tramping through the nuclear-green algae, until we found the source of the water. The sun was burning my Norwegian skin cells, the gnats and flies and dragon-flies were swarming, and I was getting dehydrated by the time we turned around to head back to the truck. Thankfully there was an old water bottle rolling round in the the back, which we all shared and thus survived the lonnnnng drive back.
Oh, one of the oddest things we saw on that drive was a stretch of road overrun with tumbleweeds, and off to the side, all by itself, a lonely, wrought iron gate. We speculated some upon the story behind such a tableaux, and surmised that someone had come out there with grandiose romantic dreams, only to see them crushed by the difficult realities of the wild countryside.
