Left and Lost in the Woods!

On Wednesday, a church memnber and I made plans to take a little ride on our four wheelers on the upcoming Friday. The trip was only to be a short one. Around 4:30 p.m. me and a church member set forth on our evening journey. Along the way we met another church member, he told us he brought two hounds--hog dogs primed and ready to tear the ear off the biggest bore hog in the woods.

Excited about a little hog hunting we set forth into the depths of the pine thickets and hardwood bottoms of Ashley County. As we journeyed along, looking for the illusive hog, we enjoyed a variety of obstacles. Nothing was too tough for our Honda 4x4's. We road in the water, the mud, up hills and down hills. We jumped over logs, dogs, and almost hit 2 hogs; what a wonderful time we were having. Are you familiar with the phrase "all good things must come to an end"? Around 6:15 me and my church member began to experience the reality of that old saying.

SO, here it is,

We were on the way back home when the lead man took a detour. I knew where he was going because I had hunted with him on previous occasions. He left the trail and headed through a hardwood bottom/cutover/ a bunch of blown down trees. I started to continue with my present bearing, but, we were hunting and I did not want to leave him to find his dogs alone. I cannot begin to explain what the remainder of the ride was like. We very methodically and maticulously weeded our way over, under, around and sometimes up obstacle after obstacle. Finally,after about 500 yards we began to go through really tough terain. There was no path, no trail, only woods, thick dark woods.

As I followed my church member--who makes Grizzly Adams look like a city slicker--I began to fall behind. My four wheeler was larger than his, the church member behind me had an even larger bike. We were hanging up on limbs, logs, stumps and vines that would wrap around your bike and squeeze the life from it. The lead man never looked back. He wove his four wheeler from side to side, around and around--at one time he actually had to go between two trees on two wheels. We were in a world of hurt.

Then it happened. As I waited on the man in the back, the man in the front traveled out of site--out of site does not mean he was a long distance from us, he was no more than 25 yards--We Couldnt See Him! Yes he had his lights on. After searching diligently back and forth, on a piece of realistate the size of a living room, we decided to go back the way we came, but which way should we go? We found no path only trees and brush that all looked the same. We were left and lost in the woods.

Alas! my faithful church member, who left us in the woods, called for us. He was only about 100 yards ahead of us. We went to the right and then to the left, but nothing. We could not get through. After about 30 minutes of playing marco polo with the church member who left us in the woods, "JD" (from this point I will refer to the culprit as JD) cranked his four wheeler and left. I could not beleive it. After another 30 minutes of dead ends I called JD. He was at home eating a cinamon role. I told him to come get us. Of course JD, Mr. woodsman, Mr. walks through the woods at midnight with no gun or light, well he told us all we had to do was: I stopped him, he might have well been explaining the physics of the atomic bomb.

Finally! I hear JD calling for us. Funny thing was that he was behind us. I guess we were facing the wrong direction. After one more hour of marco polo, drive left, drive right, get agravated and drive left and right, we park. I called another church member to aid, in what was now a rescue. This church member helped tramendously. He told me to find the big dipper, put its handle on my left and follow it to the road. This really worked great, until the woods got so thick that we couldnt see the sky.

At this moment I began to realize that we were on our on. I decided that we would go towards the highway, even though the voice of our rescuers were in the opposite direction. Now you will never guess what happened next. We found an oppening, we drove in haste and with hope: then the creek stopped our escape. We now drove right and drove left, over and over again. Now dont think that this experience did not have its positive moments. We had about 25 positive moments. About 25 different occasions we found JD's four wheeler tracks. Each time we got excited. Each time we traveled with hast and hope. Hey, do you that all four wheelers make the same tracks? At this point we have realized that we were going in circles, triangels, rectangles, figure eights, I think we even spelled out the Greek alphabet.

Picture this. Picture two grown men on four wheelers on less than a half an acre of land and in the dark: we traveld over 5 miles on this small piece of land. It looked like 500 bikes had traveld through it over 500 times and from all different directions.

Now we are still playing marco polo, at this point very loud. It has been over two hours of playing this game and am growing tired of hearing "WHOOOOO--WHOOOOOO--WHOOOOOO". Did I mention that I split my pants? Of course I did, I am famous for spliting my pants. The worst part is that lately I have been retaining some water. This water retention made my pants a little snug. I found a solution to the snuggy fit. I decided to give my fruit of the looms a break for this trip, this was a mistake.

So during my adventure my pants have been ripped open. I am now experiencing maximum exposure. Remember the limbs, logs, dogs, hogs and at one point I thought I hit a frog, well these have become a nuscence to many parts of my anatomy. Sticks, ticks, briars, weeds, pine straw, my pants are really torn. What started as a small tear has now turned my pants into chaps. I am still left and lost in the woods.

Wait! I see a light to my left. It is JD and another church member. They have walked into the woods and found us. JD began with "all you had to do" I stopped him before he could continue with my own little discourse of the situation. I climbed off my bike to stretch; he got mooned. Now we begin the journey out. They came in on my left but lead us out on our right. Guess what? They took us back through our very high tech figure eight Greek tracks. "See all you had to do was come right here". We had, many many many times. I had the scars to prove it. These two men began to weed their way through a thicket that was alomost impossible to walk through. Then one of them said "come on". Word cannot explain what happend next.

We took our overworked, overheated bikes and put them to the test. Every briar, root, limb, blow down, VINE--man! a vine will pull you from your bike and suspend you in mid air--thanks to my split pants I--well never mind. The next one hundred yards were treaourous. I would never have gone through that--i did however have a good plan. I started to take the tracking collers off the dogs and put them on our bikes and walk out.

Picture if you will. We were thronged by the woods. My pants are nor pants but chaps!!!!!!!!!! Sticks jabbed, briars tore, fenders snapped, break lines ripped from their places, tires blew, motors overheated--My pants are split wide open! I was at the mercy of the prodding forest with millions and millions of sticky thorny things.

Finally we made it to the trail. To our surprise we were only six miles north of where we thought we where. The big dipper let me down this time. I traveld home only to have my wife chastize me. Oh yes, I did call her from the woods and told her my present cituation, she chastized me. To top off the eventfull evening I cooked steak--they were good.

As I was writing this blog I discovered that my head was still full of pine straw. I dont know what is poking me in my backside, and my pants are still split.

So to all my brothers, if you cant really get a good idea of what my evening was like; get on your four wheeler, go out into the woods, find a thick briar patch, take off your clothes, and take off. Dont worry about a trail. We made our own. Dont worry about the limbs, sticks, stumps, briars, vines and poky things, be sure they will find their mark.
LLL