So how did I manage to pick the road less travelled? Because it's my usual misadventure, that's why. The directions said to take a particular road for 4.3 miles, then proceed to the right for another 3.1 miles. At this point the route turned into a gravel road. It was like a washboard in lots of places. We thought the car was going to bounce into a million pieces. Towards the end, we noticed cars to the left moving along at a normal speed and realized we were parallel to the Blue Ridge Parkway. Duh! That would've been so much easier.
Wait a minute! Haven't we been here before?
Nine years ago, I went with the same friend to the Skyline Drive to meet her parents who were vacationing in a lodge. She had printed directions from a map program pre-MapQuest. We followed the directions carefully and the main road turned into a smaller road, then around a steep curve, finally to a dirt road through the national forest. At the end was not an entrance to the Skyline Drive but instead a metal gate. We could see the nicely paved parkway on the other side but couldn't get to it--so close but yet so far away. We had to backtrack 10 miles to find a gas station where we could ask directions to the huge stone entrance (we are women so are not afraid to ask directions). From there, it was a long, slow 25 miles to the lodge where we were headed. When we left we passed that entrance only two miles from the lodge. We learned that it was the employee's gate, which required a key. The shortest distance is obviously not always best.
The funny thing is that Miss E, her mom and I were in the car together both times. Miss E was just a year old on the journey down that first dirt road. Now she is 10 and was excited to be in the middle of Miss Margie's misadventure. The giggles from the back seat made it all worthwhile.
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