The Wayward Axe

The Wild Ride-2

As light as the two axes were he couldn’t carry both with him hiking any distance but he was reassured by their presence and would make his choice shortly. Packing the van had been a major undertaking and he had pretty much drug with him everything he owned that could possibly make his life easier once he arrived because he knew he wouldn’t have the opportunity to resupply or locate such goods in the future. He had far, far too many goods to travel any distance from his vehicle and he had taken this into account when packing them but did so anyway in optimistic hope that it was possible, but pretty unlikely he would find what he sought not far from wherever he eventually broke down.

This dirt road that he was sitting on however was not what he had expected though even in his most pessimistic thoughts and that fact was his first major concern. There was nothing and I mean nothing along this stretch of road. He had seen very few houses on the way and he was surrounded by mostly wooded land that probably belonged to one of the timber companies growing pine trees. Not his idea of a bug out location by any kind of a stretch of his imagination. He could hang out in the woods for quite sometime but that wasn’t in his game plan and only a bit better than worrying some starving individual would try to break into his home in the city.

He decided he could cache his goods in the woods somewhere and set out on a hike to find a better area in the morning was his best option so he set about exploring the area for a likely stash point. Nothing miraculous or cool offered itself to him for a location but he did find a clump of bushes that looked like a good place.

It was about three in the afternoon and wouldn’t get dark until around 8 so he had lots of time to get his task accomplished and think about it. “I best try to put this stuff in two locations in case some hunter happens upon it or somebody spots the van and decides to investigate a bit.” Farley thought.

“Maybe I will stash stuff on both sides of the road and mix my trail up a bit,” he figured and set out up the road and then across to look that area over.

By about 6:30 he had hauled most of his gear out of the van and roughly stashed it. He wasn’t happy with his efforts at all though because he had only the one extra tarp to cover one pile of goods and in his rush to get the van loaded had forgotten the box of garbage bags residing under his sink at home.

“First good rain I am going to have a bunch of wet s**t to deal with on my return but that can’t be helped.” Farley mused as he attempted to pile on more branches to his stash to keep it from getting so wet but soon gave up the effort.

“Things could just stay as they are. Damn, it’s hotter than hell out here.” He muttered to himself for the umpteenth time today and went back to the shade of the van and the trees above it to think about his dilemma further.

The sign he had passed about 6 miles back down the road had indicated it went to the lake but just how far the lake was he had no way of knowing. He had water if you counted four cases of bottles and one 5 gallon jug he couldn’t carry with him. His web gear had one canteen and he had a separate two quart canteen on a shoulder sling he could tote but that was about as mobile as he could get. In this heat, water was the biggest threat to his survival that is, he reminded himself, if the damn mosquitoes didn’t drive him crazy first and thought about where he would bed down for the night.

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