Brother Dave and I knew the bridge over Juanite Creek had collapsed. We would have to park our pickup truck there and carry our gear the last couple of miles, which was not something my brother wanted to do. So before we left Charlotte he built a bridge, loaded it on an orange, U-Haul straight-bed truck he had rented, and off we went.
We were headed for Snowbird, a remote area in Southwest North Carolina adjoining the 531,148-acre Nantahala National Forest. And when we got there, sure enough, the bridge over Juanite Creek was impassable unless you had a four-wheel drive. Or a bridge. We slid our bridge out of the truck and laid it across the gap –three bolted 2×8’s on one side, three bolted 2×8’s on the other.
Most people would not have attempted to drive a straight-bed truck across a creek on wobbly 2×8’s, but my brother is not most people. I held my breath, so to speak, and he did it. And then we put the bridge back in the truck, drove on up the mountain, parked the truck, and camped nearby.
A couple of days later, early in the morning, we had company — three hunters in a Jeep, pulling a trailer with a dog cage. They were able to cross the saggy bridge because they had four-wheel drive. You know they were wondering how we got across. Anyway, they parked a little ways from us, unloaded their dogs, loaded their rifles, and walked into the woods.
I don’t know where those fellows were from but I’ve always imagined –hoped– that one of them was a local and other two were from some big city up North.
I imagined the local boy telling them:
“You come down here and go hunting with me and I’ll take you to a place in the mountains no white man and few Indians have ever seen.”
They came.
He loaded up his dogs, told those fellas to get in, and drove his Jeep to Snowbird, across the broken bridge laying in the creek, to the top of the mountain. And there, waiting for them in the wilderness, was a big, orange, U-Haul truck.
Coming Monday: Two Sets Of Rules