Finder Of Lost Things

Seriously, my feet have not crossed the threshold of a garden shed in over twenty-ish years, and now I am sitting in my second in under a week. 

My Uncle would be proud.

While I can make an exception for Beatrice’s, I’d renamed it The Map Room which transformed it into an entirely acceptable place to visit. I do not think calling the building I currently sat in a shack changes things in the slightest. 

A shack is a shed built over water instead of on the ground. 

How did the situation, me sitting in a shack in the middle of one of the largest national parks in the country by myself with a pile of luggage, come to pass?

Because apparently, I’m a silly goose.

Six days ago Wood made reservations for the five of us and the boys to participate in the first-ever Fall Foliage Tour. Wood deciding that Pumpkin Mountain the perfect location for said first trip. Somehow, the stars and schedules aligned allowing all of us to take a three day weekend together. 

Unable to talk Wood out of it I spent the remaining five days making copious notes trying to cope with this new wrinkle. FLYT, my house sitting cousin, the Residents, and luggage & equipment lists all sported a plethora of check marks. I’d also worked out a plan (tentative to say the least – but hey, some plan is better than no plan at all) to deal with my tag-along passenger and the risk she posed to the Residents and myself, without alerting or scarring my friends for life. 

So this afternoon the Princess and I picked Beatrice up from Pulp, Sarah from Nevermore and we set out for the Hilltop Hotel (Wood, Laney and the boys left yesterday). A few hours later the Princess pulled into a slot in a damp parking lot. The ever practical Sarah was the first to voice the concern we all felt, “Ummm, where’s the hotel?”

In my hasty preparations, I never thought to take a gander at the Hilltop Hotel’s website (apparently neither did Beatrice or Sarah), relying instead on Wood’s intelligence. Clearly, he forgot to share a few details…

Leaning forward we peered thru the windshield, “Should we call Wood?” ventured Sarah pulling out her phone. Not a flickering bar, fortunately, I spied a bulletin board partially obscured by some ferns, “Let’s take a look.” On it, we found a map which helpfully highlighted the serpentine path we needed to follow, thru the old growth, to a dock. A laminated brochure next to the map told us we would find a boat waiting at the dock to ferry us across the lake to the Hilltop Hotel. Easy as pie.

This place doesn’t sound like a Scooby-Doo set up at all.

Emptying the Princess of her cargo we lugged our luggage (down a trail which grew creepier the further we walked on it) to the dock where we found a shack and a man inside it, “Evening. You three ladies part of the Utley party?”. We nodded, speech being a bit beyond our capabilities since our discovery that rolly wheels, plus a half mile stint on a dirt trail were not a match made in heaven. He went on, “My name is Sam. I’ll just load the boat  and zip you ladies across the lake.” 

When he’d loaded half of our bags, Sam rejoined us, “Have you ever heard the riddle about the Chicken, Fox and a Sack of Wheat?”

We looked at each other, Beatrice spoke first, “Of course, the chicken and the wheat can’t be left alone together, nor can the fox and the chicken – yet all three must make it across the river whole. Why? Oh. You’re telling us the boat cannot take all of us and our luggage in one trip.”

“You’ve got it in one.” he replied. Sam, the boatman, didn’t appreciate the sheer number of bags three women can pack for a trip and used Hilltop’s smaller boat to fetch us. (I’d dedicated one entire suitcase to books, pretty sure Beatrice did the same, and both of us brought our own hiking equipment. Seems neither of us trust rentals).

So long explanation not very short, this is how I found myself sitting in a shack with half our luggage waiting for a man about a boat. Sam didn’t like leaving me alone, whether he worried about wolves or woodsmen attacking, I’m not sure. Personally, I thought a shack induced panic attack more likely, but hey what do I know?

That’s the how it happened. The why is very simple.

It was due to my lack of participation in a trip down memory lane, which featured several 64ounce Slurpees and the mistaken notion that our route held a plethora of rest stops along the way.