Today, as many days before, I walk this road. I have traveled many today but the one I am referencing here, is a special place to me. I have traveled this road nearly my entire life. It is now an old washed out logging road. This creek bottom is ever changing, as are all things in life. The old logging road meanders alongside a small creek. As I know to call it, Big John Branch.

This is the same branch that runs almost through my backyard. I’ve drank from it, played in it, caught fish from it, lost a pocket knife in it (found a few days later), and I’ve even used it as an ambush point on turkey. This particular waterway has been the death to many a turkey for several miles that I can hunt from it.

When I was a young kid, this road was fairly passable in a truck. I faintly recall the big hardwoods that once dominated this bottom. I vividly remember my first trip down this road. It was a trip I’ll never forget.

Myself, my brother, and some cousins, decided to ride it on our bicycles. The timber had just been cut and the road was in pretty good shape, at the beginning. The cut area was holding some water but road was fairly dry with only a few muddy/wet spots along the way. I do not remember my exact age but would guess to have been around 10 at the time, give or take a few years. The road starts on a hill and drops off and runs the Big John. It loops around to the west, close to the big creek. We found the road would end at the last log loading area. The road had gotten worse with much more water and mud. I was the oldest of the bunch and probably the infamous leader of this misfit crew. I have never liked to backtrack, plus it looked much closer to get out if we simply struck out across this cutover. I could see the road on the hill. It did not look all that far and I could hear violent thunder in the distance. I can remember discussing what to do and a few boys wanted to turn back. I do not recall exactly who, but they decided to follow their infamous leader, right into a mess. At this point, we couldn’t ride our bikes any longer. We were pushing or toting them. The ground was extremely muddy and it was plowed up in rows. Similar to a garden with much bigger plow rows. I later learned this is called beds.

Timber companies use this method of bedding with mechanical equipment. The equipment will pull a big bedding plow to row up the ground so that trees can be planted on them. This helps with tree rooting and allows the tree to be above a standing water level in these bottomlands. It made for an absolute disaster for a bunch of kids trying to cross with bikes.

As we fought row after row of the bedded ground, we also ran into old sloughs and areas that were totally underwater. A few were well over waist deep, some we had to go out of the way to get around. A couple bikes got left behind fairly quickly. I can remember telling them, we have to keep going, you can’t stay here and cry. By now, it’s pouring rain. We were already wet but the feeling of being trapped
amongst a thunderstorm in this hellhole of a cutover was almost too much.

Papaw knew we should’ve been back already and he was concerned. I’m not sure if he knew where we were but, he found us. I can still see him pull up on that hill top that overlooks the bottom. We all hollered and he thought something was wrong with one of us. So, here he comes, wide open across those beds and right through the water to our rescue. We all made it out alive and those bikes were retrieved at a later date. This was possibly my first real adventure. It was definitely filled with all the stuff that my typical adventures consist of for sure.

This same road is mostly impassable now. I have worked new trails, with my dozer, down beside it. The last forester that managed this place for the previous owner, let loggers absolutely destroy it. Now in the wet seasons as it floods, water rushes down the road. The fact of road being lower than ground level now helps turn the road into the secondary route of the Big John. I am not even sure how this will ever be corrected or possibly fixed. For now, it’s only my concern and I can’t do anything about it. I just have to deal with it.

Everyone in the neighborhood thinks this place has all the big bucks. Unfortunately this is not true. I have only taken a handful of decent bucks off of it. It is hard to hunt, too. Only a few places to plant patches, access is terrible, almost need hip waders to trek around on it. The big pipe that was installed years ago to gain access across the Big John, has blown out every time it has been fixed. The pipe has now collapsed or gotten buried in the sand. I have managed to hang on to this place even though many have tried to snatch it away from me. I know who they are and I don’t forget things like that. I’m not even that mad about it, though. Kind of glad to know who to keep both eyes on now.

I have strung many a turkey leg over my shoulder, drug many a deer, and found a bucket full of points/arrowheads down this road. I take pictures of all different critters, neighbors, strangers, and every dog in the community on this place. I have found folks camping. They welcome themselves to it like it’s a public place. I haven’t let that bother me too much. No harm done and I asked them to leave. It’s hard to blame anyone for wanting to be there, I suppose.

I have walked this road as much as I’ve walked any. I have witnessed many changes along this road. Some, of the road. Some, from the timber. Some, of the game I chase, but many are from myself. From how I look at this place, what I expect from this place, even how I hunt this place. I have changed, my life has changed, every bit as much as this same ole road has changed through the years. The struggles and adventures I found here as a kid, are not much different than those I still find today. I have to keep building trails around the bad places so that I may find the other end of the road. No matter the times I walk it, I always notice something. This is what I found today, other than a nice quiet evening doing what I love to do. Some things may get broken or washed out, but they can still be treasures to a few of us.