He is simply not sure about what is so intriguing about the unpaved road. Yet he is drawn to them time after time. These roads are rarely used because when they do begin to become used they eventually get that asphalt top coating, causing him to lose interest.
Paved roads appear to be the gold standard in America. Gravel roads are a considered undeveloped, unsophisticated, rural. Or perhaps even third-world. He determined once that the farthest it is possible to be from a paved road in this country is twenty miles. All intended to move our cars and trucks, not horses, as was the case less than a handful of decades past.
On one occasion he was traveling with his nearest in age older brother down to an orphanage in Baja, MX. On the trip, about 250 miles down the coast from San Diego they were told that the road they were on was paved less than ten years ago. Before that, gringos would take to the dusty dirt road and drive the 850 mile length of the peninsula. That’s where they came up with the annual Baja 1000 off road race.
When he and his brother realized that only one road was paved on the entire peninsula, they understandably needed to get off of it and back up in the hills, down the sand beach, through dry gullies, anywhere but on that damn paved road. Someone at the orphanage had a 4-wheel drive vehicle, and so they did.
As one might expect, much can be found off the bituminous bi-way, normally attracting the search for commerce and profit, and getting lost on the paths that are…..well……..less traveled. They discovered an old primitive abandoned cable car that crossed a dry river bed, better served during the rainy season once upon a time. They studied it long enough to ride it back and forth across the small canyon. No one around, nothing for sale, only the dry warm winds.
Then again, he does remember ripping down the deserted beach only to stop and pay a few pesos to a local Indian catching lobster. Vende la lobster, senor? Commerce yes, but no billboards or neon signs out on that sunset beach.
“That’s when I knew that I had enough, burned my credit cards for fuel, headed to where the pavement turns to sand”………..N.Young
Please feel free to e-mail a comment to chasingthecenterline@gmail.com
