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(You can click any picture below to
enlarge it.) Ring...
Ring... "Yo!" It was Josh.
"What up?" It was me.
Apparently Angie, Josh's wife, has a shower or party
or some event to go to and Josh is not going. He wanted to
know what I was up to.
"Chillin'"
He tells me he is thinking about going to Huntsville,
TX to the National Forest to go camping. His parents have a
5th-wheel trailer, and they are staying out there... though, he is
taking his tent, he explains. "Let
me ask my wife... I'll call you back."
My wife's father's 60th birthday party is on
Saturday, so I need to be home by then. Actually, this is the
reason I was unable to go on the Chain Gang Charity Ride. My
wife says that I can go. "OK, I'm
packing... I'll meet you at Beltway 8 and I-10."
Josh and I met at 8:00PM and quickly found a Quizno's
and had a little something to eat. We got under way after
filling up both motorcycles with gas and headed north.
Josh knew some back roads, so if you
are interested, this is the route we took: E on I-10,
Beltway 8, N on Crosby-Huffman Road which is actually 2100, N on
1010 into Cleveland, TX, then N on 2025. From there we took
945 to 150 and headed west. We crossed
over I-45 and then continued west on 1375 and shortly after that
we ended up at the
Cagle Recreation Area in the Sam Houston National Forest.
We ended up finding Josh's parents around 10:30.
The ride there was 110 miles in absolutely perfect weather. We
did hit one little patch of light rain, but it passed quickly.
This was the first real test for both
Flash's sealed
battery and my
PIAAs. It was extremely dark riding through the National
Forest, and the headlight on Josh's KLR... well... let's just say
it is not all that bright. I hopped in the lead and fired up
the PIAAs on full blast for several miles. Absolutely
perfect. The lights were amazing and the battery performed
flawlessly. The voltage indicator LED stayed green the
entire time and it was as bright as the sun being out with my
high-beam PIAA bulb and the auxiliary PIAA 510 driving lights.
Very very nice... and SAFE! We
proceeded to unload the motorcycles and set up our tents before we
retired to the lawn chairs in front of the fire. If you want
to know EXACTLY where we were, here you go: (N30 31.247 W95 35.442):
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After the sleeping bags were unrolled,
and we were all comfortably sitting by the fire, my cellular phone
rang. It was "Bill No. 391 Las Vegas." Bill is a 77
(maybe 78 now) year-old gentleman I met at the
Jailbreak in Mena, Arkansas last
year.
Bill commented on F650.com forums that he would be making a "Four
Corners Tour." Reading this, I offered to put Bill up
for the night when he drove through Houston. Bill had phoned
to say he was running a bit behind schedule and would not be in
Houston on Sunday, but he would call me in the next day or so to
give me an update on his schedule and let me know when I could
expect him. (Be Safe Bill!).
I crawled into my tent around midnight, put in my ear
plugs and climbed into my sleeping bag. My head found rest in
the old pillow my wife said I could take with me. Needless to
say, this pillow was not the same pillow my head finds rest on most
evenings. Stained and smelly, it was better than nothing.
I awoke around 7:00AM Saturday morning. Having
the earplugs in all night, I was not prepared for what had crept
into our campsite during the night. Standing formidable in the
gravel patch across from our tents, it stood in defiance looking
squarely at us with scorn in it's eyes:
Josh started to approach it, but the danger became
clear as he neared the creature. We decided that ATGATT would
offer Josh the protection he needed to address the situation.
It was a horrific battle,
but in the end, Josh was able to overcome the odds and prevail
over the beast:
After the battle, we were treated to a breakfast of
champions prepared by Josh's mom:
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After the fantastic meal, we loaded up
our gear and prepared for the ride home.
We basically took the same route upon which we had
come since it was dark when we drove up.
We found a few dirt roads and did some exploring:
The first interesting place we visited
was
Purkerson Cemetery (N30 25.921 W95 09.422). Set back a
ways from the road, it was interesting to see. I didn't count
the number of graves at the location, but I would imagine there were
only 20 or 30 there:
I did find it shameful that someone
found it necessary to shoot at the balls on the top of the fence
corner posts. We continued
on our journey looking for more off-the-beaten path places to
explore, and we found it in this little store:
We stopped and had a Coca Cola while sitting on the
concrete parking area out in front.
As our journey continued, we saw a sign for Cemetery
Road. We figured we might as well have a look at this one
since we had just visited one earlier. The sign out front said
Wells Cemetery Association (N30 18.724 W95 05.573). It is
located near Cleveland, TX:
The grave markers were the most interesting part of
this particular cemetery. It appeared that many of them were
made by either the families of the people who died, or maybe by the
church, but not "professionally-made" stones.
Given literacy rates in the early 1900's, it is even
more interesting to note the direction of the "J" in "July" in the
first picture below. Another interesting, though sad observation, was the age of many of
the people who died. We found many people who lived from the
early 1800's into the early 1900's, but unfortunately we saw many
graves of children:
You have to wonder what kind of life
these families lived. It's sad to think of life where you lose
your child to an illness that in today's world could probably be
cured with an inoculation or pill, and you're faced with the task of
making the child's tombstone... ... definitely not a thought I want to spend a lot of time thinking
about. Josh and I continued south
and split at the intersection of highways 90 and 2100. He
headed back to Pasadena, and I continued into downtown Houston. I was in the door of my house at
1:00PM on Saturday and made it to my father-in-law's birthday
celebration with time to spare. Miles on Saturday = 120.
Thanks for coming along on our ride. |
