MY ONLY THOUGHT AS I DROVE THROUGH some of the darkest night I’d ever encountered was, How the hell did I get into this position? My 1950 Ford car hit potholes as branches from gigantic roadside trees, bent with age, scraped the windshield. Through the dust and branches, all I could see was a single red light—the backlight of the 1956 Chevy ten feet ahead of me that I was following.
“How much further do you think we have to go?” my wife asked.
“I don’t know, Dorothy. I’m afraid to go any faster than ten miles an hour, but they keep speeding up and then have to wait for us. If I would have known we were going to have to drive through these conditions, I would never have agreed to go this way.”
Dale DeVivorus and Jim McQue, students of mine at O’Dowd high school in the Bay Area, had invited us (my wife, Dorothy, and me) to a cabin owned by Jim’s parents for the Memorial Day weekend. It was at some mountain lake, and for the life of me, I could never remember the name of it.
“What’s the name of the place were going? Deer Creek? Doe harbor?”
“Bucks lake.”
“And that is somewhere around the main town, right?”
“Yes, a town called Quincy.”
“Where the hell is Quincy?” I asked.
“They said about 20 miles on the other side of this mountain. By going this way, we don’t go through the town, but up the back mountain range and then end up coming out at Bucks Lake.”
As I continued regretting my decision, I remembered how the boys had said, “Meet us at downtown Oroville, in front of the courthouse. We’ll take you up the back way. It’s shorter. It’s called Bucks Lake Road.”
It had been dusk when they at last had arrived at the courthouse. The trip began on a paved, two-lane highway, which wound around the mountain with a rock wall to the passenger’s right, and a drop off on the driver’s left.
Just as the road narrowed down to one lane, my car hit another pothole, and we rocked back and forth. The red taillight, now some 15 feet ahead, was just barely visible.
“I should never have agreed to go this way, Dorothy. What do you do if another car comes at you?”
“I don’t believe this road is on the map,” Dorothy said.
Great! I thought. If we crash or fall off the edge, we’ll never be found.
When we started, it wasn’t so bad. At least we had two paved lanes and tree limbs weren’t obstructing the view.
“I can’t believe this!”
“They said it would save time.”
“They didn’t say it might cost lives! I could have at least traveled on the main highway at a safe 55 miles per hour, instead of 10 miles per hour on this desolate, single-lane dirt road with branches scraping the windshield. This is scary.”
From the back seat, our dog, Puppy Love, made a moaning sound, which meant she had to go or was about to throw up again. I beeped the horn and slowed the car down. The red light in front of us brightened as the boys stopped. Dorothy opened the door, and the dog jumped out.
Dale yelled, “Is everything okay?”
“Got to give the dog a kidney break,” I yelled back. “How much longer?”
“We’ll be there in about twenty minutes.”
An hour later, we arrived at the summit. The road improved from dirt to cement and became two lanes. After several turns and twists, we eventually parked in the back of a large maple cottage. I recognized Jim’s parents and his sister as they came to greet us.
“Where have you been? We were worried,” Jim’s mother said as she hugged my wife and me.
“We came the back way, Mom, and Mr. Probst wasn’t used to it,” said Jim.
“You guys probably scared the begeebees out of them,” his dad said as he shook my hand. “Hey, good to see you. Sorry about that back road. It’s only meant for locals, who don’t want to improve on it. Their afraid it will bring more traffic up here.”
“Well, as a witness, I can absolutely testify that the way it is now will discourage tourists.”
We entered the house and saw that dinner was prepared and waiting for us. After the meal, we realized the lateness of the hour and decided to turn in continue our conversations the next day. We were shown a bedroom with knotty pine walls, and windows that looked out into the surrounding forest. After crawling into bed, Puppy Love jumped up and took his place at the foot of the bed. We lay there listening to the rustle of trees as a slight wind broke the silence. In the air was the pungent sweet smell of pine.
“Well, this sure is worth coming up to,” Dorothy said.
“Yeah,” I said, “even though getting here is a death-defying feat! Sunday we take highway 70 out of here. I don’t care how much longer it takes.”
An owl could be heard in the distance as we kissed good night and drifted off.
Hours later, and somewhere in my half-conscious state, I heard Dorothy say, “The dog has to go out.”
“What time is it, anyway?” I asked, as she got out of bed.
“It’s about 4 a.m.”
I quickly returned to my slumber state and barely heard her and the dog move out of the room. Although I scarcely heard the back door being opened, even though half asleep, I had no problem hearing my wife’s screams.
“There’s a bear! A bear…a big bear!” She yelled as she ran into the room. The dog was right behind her. She slammed the bedroom door and said. “There was a bear. It stood up….
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