Hot Potato

It was an action-packed Fourth of July Weekend for me: I landed in the emergency room and was pulled over by an ATV.

To start the weekend I decided to go on a strenuous mountain bike ride. It was nothing I hadn't done before, but I left in the morning with nothing in my stomach but a large cup of strong coffee and a piece of toast. Oh, and the temperature was in the 90s.

Shockingly enough, toward the end of my ride I didn't feel very well. I nearly vomited, nearly passed out and then my left hand went numb, which I figured was a bad sign. Two hours, two IVs and probably two hundred dollars later, I was feeling better. After hearing my story, the emergency room doc said, in not so many words, "Don't be an idiot next time, eat a goddamn power bar and drink some water," and diagnosed me with heat exhaustion (which I guess is better than heat stroke, but still not good).

The next day, Anna and I headed up to the 19th century boom town turned 21st century ghost town, Silver City, located in the Owyhee Mountains southwest of nothing. Concerned about tales of woe on the dirt road leading to Silver City, I had this conversation with the hotelier there:

Me: "I'm driving a Subaru legacy. Will I make it up that road?"
Hotelier: "Oh, yeah, you'll be fine. See you tomorrow."
Me: "Don't I need to give you a credit card number or something?"
Hotelier: "I'm cookin' a burger. Taking your credit card number would be too much of a pain."

What he failed to tell me and I failed to notice on a map was that there are actually two roads to Silver City and the one for non-SUVs is the long way. Not knowing this I headed out on what looked like the direct route, planning on a two-hour drive. About an hour and a half in we started winding up into the Owyhees (yes, it is a bastardization of 'Hawaii'), then we got to a large sign that said, "4WD with clearance only mile 11-16."

"Hmm," I thought. "That's curious. The hotel guy said I'll be OK, so we're probably fine."

So I kept going and the road was OK. Until it wasn't. It got rocky and steep in a hurry and the dirt bike riders kept looking at me askance as I gingerly crawled up the rough sections.

"Hmm," I thought. "There were thunderstorms in Boise last night. Maybe they washed out this road. If we take it slow, I'm sure we'll be fine."

Then my car started scraping, even when I did take it slow and just as I was thinking, "Maybe this isn't going to work," I saw a man on an ATV coming up quickly behind me and I heard him yelling.

I pulled over, thinking I would let him pass, but he pulled up next to me. His hat said "Owyhee County Sheriff" and his mustache did, too.

"Can you not read? Didn't you see the giant sign that said four-wheel drive with clearance only?" he said.

"Uh, no, I can read," I stammered lamely. "I was just realizing it's time to turn around."

"You better head back right now, before I have to give you a ticket," he said.

"All right there, Boss Hog," I thought but was too cowardly to say.

We limped back, rescraping going down on all the rocks we scraped going up, fuming a little about the lost trip but glad the guy was cooking a burger and couldn't take my credit card number.