It all started with a rough week at work. I was tired of seeing beige walls, and needed to break out. This, my friends, is the very reason I keep my hiking backpack in the trunk of my car at all times. It was Friday, and at 2pm I decided I was going to go hit my favorite camping spot. Weather issues don’t usually bother me while I’m camping, I enjoy roughing it. So when I saw that it would probably be raining some of the time I was there due to the remains of hurricane Ike approaching, I wasn’t too worried. It looked like the brunt of it would hit late Sunday, at which time I fully intended to be back home. I sent out the pre-requisite “Here are the GPS coordinates of where I’ll be, and here’s what time I’ll be back” emails to a few friends (ALWAYS do this if you are going hiking), and braced myself for an awesome weekend.
I left work early, drove to the store to get a few supplies, and headed to my spot. A weary 2.5 hour drive put me there at around 6:30pm, and it was already getting dark. Slinging my pack over my shoulders, and taking my trusty walking stick in my right hand, I checked that the car was locked and headed towards the trailhead. As I walked across the creek on the small footbridge, I looked down to see the creek water gently flowing by 15 feet below me. I smiled at the reminder of how beautiful nature is, and carried on walking.
It had already been raining a little, so some sections of the trail had already been turned into a big puddle which I would have to wade through, but for the most part it was fine. I carried on up the trail and found my spot. Ahhh, heaven. I put down my gear, and walked over to the Outcrop, about 30 feet from my site. The view blew me away as it always does. The Outcrop is a large rock sticking out from the bluffs, from which you can look 50 feet down to watch Cedar Creek rushing by, or look out over the landscape and realize just how small you are.
I returned to camp, and tried for 30 minutes to make a fire, unsuccessfully. Everything was just too wet. So failing that, I set up my bivvy, tying my tarp to a couple of trees, and then anchoring it to a couple of big rocks. I don’t tend to take tents unless it will be cold. I’m happy enough to sleep out in the open as long as I’m not getting rained on. After grabbing a quick bite to eat, I fell asleep.
The next morning, I woke up to the usual slew of daddy-long-legs crawling all over my sleeping bag. I don’t like spiders too much, but I’ve gotten used to waking up to seeing them 6 inches from my face on my sleeping bag. A quick spaz-out session and scream usually knocks them loose. Yeah, that’s right. I’m a manly man.
The sky was mostly clear for the morning, clouding over later in the day. It started raining again at around 3pm, gradually getting heavier. At around 6pm, I decided to go take a look at the creek and the low-water crossing down by where my car was. Again with my trusty stick in hand, I set off down the trail, stopping only to refill my canteen with water from one of the smaller streams on the way. I checked on the car, then carried on a little ways to check the crossing. The water was only an inch deep, two feet below the road. Pah, that’s nothing, it’s fine.
Heading back up the trail, the rain got harder still. I got back in my bivvy to wait it out, and just sat and listened to the rain for hours. Sound dull? Then you’ve never done it. Go, do it now, then come back and read the rest of this. Anyway, I digress.
I cooked up some instant noodles under my bivvy, ate, and fell asleep to the quiet cacophony of rain hitting tarp. I awoke at about 2am, with something of a weird feeling. I felt like I was being told I had to leave (weird, huh?). It was raining rather hard, and of course it was pitch black, so I thought on it for a short while. I tend to go with my intuition though, so I got out of my sleeping bag and started packing up site in the pouring rain, my only light source was the gas lantern I keep with me. “This is fucking crazy” I kept telling myself. I had no idea.
With all of my belongings packed, one more time I took my walking stick in my hand, and started up the trail, the lantern swinging wildly as I walked. It’s a very disconcerting feeling you get walking through the woods in the pouring rain with only a lantern to light the way. It’s even worse when you come up to a foot-deep stream that is rushing quite quickly. This was the same stream I had gotten my drink from hours earlier, when it was only an inch or two deep. I braced my stick against a rock a couple of feet upstream for support, prayed that I don’t drop my lantern, and worked my way across. Whew. I carried on.
As I neared the bridge over the creek, I saw a light in the distance. Awww crap, did I leave my lights on? Then I heard shouting. “IS ANYBODY THERE?”… Umm… It’s 2:30am, in the middle of nowhere, pouring rain, and there are strangers looking for people. This can’t be good. I responded and began to walk across the bridge, as did the strangers. I met them about halfway across the bridge. Each of them was about a foot taller than me, and looked probably 5 times meaner than me. One of them had one hand hidden in the depths of his jacket, as if reaching into the inside pocket for something, but he never took it out, he just kept it there. The other guy was holding a billy-club.
“Is that your car over there?” one of them shouted. I was soon to be notified that I “wasn’t going anywhere”, and that my car was under water. Fuck. Somewhere in this exchange, I realized we were shouting to hear ourselves over the din of the creek below us. About 3 feet below us, actually. The creek had risen by about 12 feet in just a few hours, and it was still rising, quickly.
My choices at that time were to hike a mile back into the woods and set up camp again to wait it out, or to trust these two obviously drunk rednecks with weapons. The decisions we make sometimes don’t look so wise in retrospect.
I decided to trust them. Leaving the bridge and approaching the spot where my car was parked, I saw the true extent of the situation. The only way out was past my car, and through a 100 foot stretch of 3 foot deep moving water. We prepared ourselves for the crossing and set out. The water was rushing from our right side over to a field on the left side of the road. If anyone would have slipped and taken by the current, their only hope would have been that they would get snagged in a bush or on the razor wire fence, instead of being washed into the field and then into the creek.
After some very careful placement of foot and walking stick, we made it across, back to their waiting truck. The rednecks told me that they were looking for me because they thought the car was occupied because the lights were on (no doubt something shorted and caused them to kick on by themselves). After asking me if I was a crazy murderer a few times, Paul offered me the use of his couch for the night. Back to his place about a mile up the road we went. As soon as we got there, Caleb shoved a beer into my hand, then removed a handgun from his jacket and set it on the counter. I knew it. I didn’t care though, because I was drinking the best beer I ever tasted. After everyone smoked some to calm down from the life-threatening situation we’d all just gotten out of, things calmed down, and eventually I got a couple of hours of sleep.
The next morning I was awoke by sirens. First a cop, then an ambulance, and a firetruck all whizzing past the house. Paul ran into the living room, looked out of the window, and shrugged. “Huh”.
About 30 minutes later, while I was out having a cigarette on the porch, I saw a truck drive by with a rescue boat in tow.
“Wow… sucks to be whoever they are looking for right now,” I told myself, shortly before realizing they were looking for me. I informed Paul of the situation, and we quickly took to the road on his 4×4. When we got down there, the emergency personnel asked us to leave. When I told them they were looking for me, every one of them stared at me like I had just said “DURR 2+1 IS 5″. They pointed me to the sheriff, whom I promptly went and spoke to.
The sheriff wasn’t too amused, after having coordinated a rather impressive rescue mission, only to find that some dumbass hadn’t notified the authorities that his car was under water but he had been rescued by two local heroes hours earlier.
“Next time, you make sure and let us know”.
“Yes, officer. Hopefully there won’t be a next time”, he looked like he was going to choke me.
Paul ended up giving me a ride into Columbia so I could get a coach back to St. Louis. I never actually saw my car again, for which I still feel a little guilty. I know, I really shouldn’t anthropomorphize an automobile, but me and my car had been through a lot together (130,000m in 4 years), and I kinda viewed Grey as my ‘03 Pontiac Grand-Am friend. A week later, once the water had subsided, she ended up mistakenly being towed to a scrap-yard in Kansas City, instead of St. Louis. My salvageable belongings were sent back to me in a box, along with my license plates.
My plates are on my new (old) car now. A ‘93 Honda Civic. I love my Civic now, but I still reminisce about the old days with Grey.
Good times.
May 21st, 2009 by 
Keith 
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