Tales from the Trail #17: Flowing freely down the Freeway …
I had been walking a ways towards the town of Henryville, thinking that it would only be an hour or two more of hobble-limping down the tarmac until I could arrive and find some rest there, when I saw up ahead that the road was blocked off by signs claiming that there was no through passage up ahead. Initially hoping that this official closure was for cars and not pedestrian pilgrims, I stopped a local motorist who informed me that the bridge up ahead on Highway 31 (I think the one that sends the highway over Blue Lick Creek) was indeed completely out, and that there was no way at all for anyone to either walk or drive past the same. Of course, this meant that I had to either walk about a dozen miles through the “wilderness” to the east (via Opossum Trot Rd & County Highway 160) to then hook back up with 31N in the town of Henryville (roughly a 10 mile detour – a detour that would take me well over 5 extra hours of walking in my current physical condition) OR wobble the short nearby byway over to the Memphis I-65 truck-stop exit and thereafter either hitch onward on the Interstate or walk along 4+ miles of freeway to the subsequent Henryville exit …
Now I never have taken kindly to “going out of my way” at any time in my life, and I certainly didn’t want to add that many miles to my walk when I was already having so much trouble getting by, so I opted for the shorter (and admittedly more dangerous) option and headed for the truck-stop. I made my way to the same easily enough and then waited at both of the large gas stations there (first at Love’s on one side and then at Thornton’s on the other) for anyone to see my sign and offer to help me. And yet it soon enough became quite apparent that no such help was going to be offered. And so it was that I simply buckled up my inner grit-bag and headed out onto the Interstate – starting originally on the northbound side walking with traffic, and yet soon crossing over the median to walk against traffic on the southbound side. The latter option was much safer, no doubt, and yet also battered me with a continual speeding-truck-caused headwind, and this for much of the first 4+ miles of the walk. And yet progress was made nonetheless (fueled by a large & steady rush of adrenaline, without question).
As I finally began to near the Henryville on-ramp, a police car then drove by and I noticed that an officer therein had seen me quite clearly. Having no troubles admitting that the very last thing I wanted was to be arrested for walking along an Interstate – especially after such an arduous, and to that point highly successful, freeway jaunt had already been completed – I immediately looked for and almost immediately saw a section of side-highway fencing that had indeed come undone. So I smoothly enough made my way to this blessed aperture, vaulted myself quite inelegantly over the same, and then proceeded to walk down a local parallel side road until the latter came to a freeway-side cemetery and veered off into the local nothingness. Not wanting to go many miles out of my way in the glaring heat to somehow someway get to the Henryville Interstate overpass up ahead – an overpass that was quite close to my current location at the time, at least any crow might fly, I chose to leave that roadway, walk straight through the cemetery, and hop over the same the fence again – this time back onto the freeway shoulder, right where the on-ramp led up and away, both from any police who might be looking for me on the Interstate, and from the racing cacophony that was the freeway itself.
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