Hogback Mountain

Saturday morning, my roommates, Sarah's sister and I went out to hike Hogback mountain. or we would have, we never got there. Instead, I drove everyone around in my tiny Passat, on roads that I really should not have taken it on. If living out in Nevada had taught me anything, it was how to drive a non-four-wheel-drive car on off roads. (I know, ill advised.)

Walking out to the car, I had assumed that Kate knew the way to Hogback, seeing as she suggested a hike out there in the first place. I was wrong. I called out "Shotgun has heated seat and also has to navigate!" Kate claimed the heated seat and pulled up google maps.
We were almost out of the parking lot before she had to borrow someone's phone because her's was at 3%.
But that's okay because google had no clue where we were going anyway.
Let the adventure begin.

The first fork in the dirt road that I followed for way to long was the wrong way. I had been that way for my biology field labs before, so I wasn't quite lost. We went almost all the way back to the main road, where there was a couple people with Nerf Guns and filming equipment. Kate decided this was an excellent time to ask for help. She jumped out (so glad I'm not the only one who's father taught them to jump from a slow moving vehicle) and asked for directions. They didn't know where we could hike to Hogback either, and apparently they were filming Nerf gun and sword fights for a YouTube channel they have. Kate came back and we took another look at google, I first wanted to get back on the main road, but we decided that going back and taking the opposite fork in the road that we had previously come across would be the shorter route. It wasn't. (spoilers)

The second dirt path was, at first, much easier on my car though got more difficult as we went along. And the private property we passed by was much more concerning. The one that unsettled us the most had a simple camping trailer that was surrounded by off-putting painted scrap metal and attached to one tree was a satellite dish with the words "WE CAN SEE YOU EVERYWHERE YOU GO" painted on it, a massive traffic cam pointed at us just above.
This was the point at which we all thought we were going to be murdered.
I made sure that everyone knew that if they were locked in my trunk, there's a convenient glow-in-the-dark release handle they can pull to escape. Because that's what friends do.

So we were, at this point very high strung and pretty sure there was an ambush waiting for us up ahead on the road because the camera saw us coming. Kate was formatting a plan, I don't remember who she said would team up with who and run in what direction, its not important. As I was coming up a hill that curved down, creating a blind spot, a dog ran up the hill towards me and I screamed, stopping the car. Kate then saw the truck come up the hill behind the dog and screamed, followed by Sarah, Emily and Alyssa in the back seat all screaming at the top of their lungs. (later they confessed that they didn't know why and couldn't see what was going on, it just seemed like the thing to do in that moment).

The Truck casually stopped and backed up down the hill so we could slide past, and on the way I rolled down the window to ask the older gentleman for directions to Hogback.
What he said, a summery;
"Got matches and camping gear? it's a tough trail and many people accidentally wind up staying the night on the mountain. The trail head is about two miles further down near the main road, but if you want you can pull into my campsite and look at the mountain from my yard. I'm just going out for some beer and lunch, but I'll be back to watch the wolverines play tonight. you ladies make sure you're all prepared for that kinda trail before you go up, your not far from the trail head, but like I said feel free to pull into my camp and take a look at the mountain before you go climbing."
When he finished, Kate leaned over and asked, "Hey, do you know whats up with the traffic cam guy back down the road?"
He replied, "Oh, he's completely harmless, just an eccentric artist who specialized in Junk Art, and thought that people might come to steal his work, so he put up cameras. but yeah, he's harmless, but don't go drinking over there."
We weren't quite sure what he meant by that last bit, maybe we looked like the sort of girls that went drinking on random, scary looking private property in the middle of the woods. Regardless, I thanked him politely for his help, then rolled up my window and as soon as we passed, I declared, "Yeah we are not going on that guy's property."
Kate said, "Thank You! was that weird or what?"

We continued on our way, passing the man's camp. We felt more confident now that we were close to our destination, and firm in our belief that we probably wouldn't get murdered. My car only had to be pushed out of the sand one time and by this point we had been wandering around for nearly two hours. We found a trail head map, none of which leading up Hogback, but one expert level trail named Jedi trail. eventually things started to look familiar as we reached the harrow lake area which is spotted with lots of trails, one of which presumably leading to Hogback.
Unfortunately, we had to go back to campus without being able to stop and truly find it, I promise there will be a sequel adventure another day.

When we reached the dorms I made it all the way to my third floor destination before realizing that I had forgotten my muffin in the car and would have to go back for it.
Muffin in hand, two crows landed on the tree outside the door and, hoping they would remember my face and become the beginnings of a crow army I could summon at will to do my bidding on campus (my bidding being mostly to make me look like a bad ass on campus by having a crow army), I tossed some crumbs on the ground for them to enjoy.
Upon entering I climbed the flights of stairs all the way to what I thought was the third floor (it was the second), and took note of the interesting new display that the RA had apparently set up. after inspecting the change, I proceeded to my room, opened the door and was slapped in the face with pink. This is NOT RIGHT I thought alarmingly to myself. No one was in the room, but someone was showering and what really hit me as it not being my room was the fact that 'my bed' wasn't lofted. I stepped out of the room as quietly as I could and looked up at the name card on the left of the door. "Alyssa." Just like always, though it was a different shape and color; on the right was a different name where mine should have been. Is this my room? It's not, it can't be. My mind fuzzed over with the familiar dream fog of nothing being quite right. Is Alyssa even my roommate? My name isn't on the other side of the door, so who is my roommate? Where is my room? has everything for the past four weeks been naught but a deception? It was at this point that I noticed the room plaque had a 2 not a 3 on it and I mentally slapped myself for being a dumbass. I was on on the wrong floor and had apparently caused Sarah and Alyssa some concern with how long I'd been gone to get my muffin.

It had been a long morning.