I had still failed to emerge from the Great Basin That Was. A prisoner to its many twists and turns. I awoke though, this day, with a key that would lead me out. My new map guided me from where I now was fully certain I was to the exit I’d been seeking for the past three days. I packed up and set off once more into the wilds.
Not long after leaving my site I ran across a family out looking over the grounds. They confirmed I was on the right trail and, more over, on their way out passing me again gave me granola bars, cheese sticks, water, and a tube of peanut butter. Different flavors of goodness. My dreams of food flourished ever more. I followed the trail onward through an old land mark to the Oregon Trail emigrants called the twin mounds and on to a main road. This main road I figured I knew from my map and was quite happy to be on it. As it turned out I came across a set of power lines many miles before I should have. When I realized this a BLM man rolled up next to me on the road and told me highway 28, my lost destiny, was a mere mile away. I consulted my map and looked in dumbfounded awe, but it was true. Twenty minutes later I was where I’d wanted to be for the past three and a half days. Free at last! Free at last! God almighty, I was free at last!
A mile away was a rest stop so I treated myself to this slightly out of the way convenience and made myself some lunch, brushed my teeth, and treated me right. I stayed a good two hours there recouping from my ordeal. By 4:40 I figured I should head on and I was off to my next dirt road shortcut by five. This one was on my regular state map so there was nothing to be worried about getting lost and fretting my way this time.
I walked another ten miles on top of the ten I’d walked to get out of the Basin. A mile before stopping I ran across two guys in a truck heading home from work and they gave me a Gatorade for my efforts. It tasted like heaven. I plopped my tent on a nice bluff and read more of my story before bed.