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My route is shown in purple (or magenta, or red -- depends on your browser / machine / whatever).
It had been raining in the days previous, so the truck's lack of four-wheel drive was a little bit of a concern. I had to keep moving at a pretty good clip, to avoid getting stuck. The Mojave isn't where you wanna get stuck -- there's no one out there. Or so I thought ... Finally, I reached the road that leads to the Booth (on the map, it's where the line turns north near the letter N in NATIONAL). As I turned the corner, I nearly got stuck, so I punched it, spun the wheels & climbed out, & immediately saw two figures walking down the road towards me. I hoped they weren't people who'd been trying to find the Booth, cos that meant they'd been wandering for who knows how long -- the booth is several miles yet from there. |
 Click the map for a larger version. |
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They turned out to be a couple of Mormon Boy Scouts, one tall, the other short. The short one was crying. "He hurt his ankle," the taller one said. I asked whether he'd turned it. "No," said the tall boy, who was obviously the spokesman. "It's just sore from walking." He said their leaders were cruising the trail in trucks and would pick up stragglers. Then why not just sit and wait for the trucks, instead of walking on a sore ankle? I suggested. They treated this as a great revelation, & plopped down. I continued on towards the Booth, meeting unhappy-looking Boy Scouts for miles after that. It was a narrow trail, with brush scraping both sides of the truck much of the time. Despite this, most of the Scouts weren't bright enough to realize that they would have to yield the trail to let me by. Guess they hadn't yet earned the coveted Common Sense merit badge. Neither had their leaders, who were walking in a cluster, oblivious to their straggling charges.
I later found out that the Scouts had eaten lunch at the Booth, and even taken phone calls there from people expecting to talk to me. I think they should receive some sort of badges for that. |
