The Folks At the End of the Trail
The Folks at The End of The Trail
by Bob Hicks
Rural New England has lots of back roads that just end. The towns keep them in repair only as far as the last house. Beyond that what’s left of the old road usually disappears into the woods, to later reappear on the far end at another house at that end of the road. These unmaintained midsections were used when people once lived there, and today the remains are usually passable to fourwheel-drive vehicles, trail bikes, or snowmobiles. Ordinary traffic would have to turn around at the house, so few have reason to drive there. Those who live in these last houses have a special set of relationships with the motoring public as a result of this circumstance. I get to meet a lot of these people because I’ve explored these old ways for more than 20 years on my trail bikes.
Lest you jump to the conclusion that my mode of travel creates a relationship w'ith that last homeowner that is an unhappy one. let me assure you that this is hardly universally so. I’ve had some rather angry confrontations, almost always with “summer people,” but Eve had far more visits oí a friendly nature. I always stop at the last house, even when I’m certain the way beyond is still a public one and I thus have right of passage. I don’t want to irritate people, and usually my brief stop results in the beginning of a friendly relationship.
To be fairly certain of my right of passage on unmaintained roads. I’ve obtained official state highway maps of large scale which show all public ways, from Interstate to primitive. Sometimes in the intervening years between the date oí last mapping and present, some oí the ways have been closed by an act of town meeting. but the vast majority are still as they are presented on the maps. It is when the people at the end of the road don’t agree with this evidence that I have most of my confrontations.
But most of these folks are OK. they know the old road past the barn and down by the pastures to the woods is still public, even if subject to gates and bars to keep the livestock from wandering. They regularly have hunters passing by in the fall, snowmobilers in winter, and trail bikers any time in the non-snow months. I gather the traffic never stops, so my policy of visiting first time through seems to please the people; most love to talk a while. Over the years, certain basic types have become familiar.
Usually a native of the area, the person I call The Scoffer agrees readily enough that the woods road is indeed a public way, but assures me I’ll never get through. “The bridge is out over the brook back in there, young fella, even the Jeep guys can’t get across.” I often wonder what this person thinks after I tell him maybe I'll have a look anyway, and then never come back. A two-wheeler can get through much tougher going than other vehicles, so I seldom have been turned back.
The Nostalgia Tripper is usually an older man who years ago (right after the 1918 war) rode a motorcycle. My arrival sets him off on a long chat about those good old times. But my favorite was the dear lady of some 75 years who was a widow living on a run-down old place. She chatted a bit and then asked us in. she had a photo she wanted to show us. It was one of those brownish prints of yesteryear and it showed a young couple in Sunday best, he astride a motorcycle, she in the sidecar attached. It was her honeymoon trip!
There are old folks tucked away at these road ends, waiting out their late years apparently without many visitors. One elderly couple in a place that was half caved in from winter snows were apologetic about the appearance of the house, and explained how they were in the middle of fixing up the place so I should pardon its condition. There wasn’t any evidence of fixing up, just plenty of evidence of poverty and loneliness. Another couple on a
New Hampshire hillside invited me into their unpainted old home after I’d admired the hand-hewn wooden gutter across the eaves over the front of the house. The man proudly allowed as how he’d made that 46 years ago (the year I was born!) and it was still as good as new. I was invited into the dim interior to be offered coffee and a viewing of family photos hung on the walls of the living room, with slightly wistful explanation of how this daughter was in Sacramento, this son was killed in World War II and such. I must have been there an hour.
A shrinking number of working farms exist at the ends of the roads. The road passes-into the barnyard, house tight to one side, barn to the other, the way they were made 75 or 100 or 150 years ago. Just beyond there’s often a gate across my path, usually with an ample supply of barnyard manure for pavement. It soon develops that this is “one of only three working farms left in this here town!” Next comes the revelations about local tax assessments going up way too far, about not being able to find good help and about the lousy wholesale prices being paid for milk. Sometimes I get a tour of the barns because I grew up on farms, know the language and am interested.
Young people seeking an alternative lifestyle head back to the land and sometimes occupy the house at the end of the road, often in large numbers, and usually offer a welcome.
You might wonder why I’ve gone on about all these nice encounters I’ve had. “What about the confrontations?” you ask. “I want to hear about you getting kicked out.”
The people I call Blockers usually know the old road is public but try to discourage passersby by parking junk farm machines, old fire trucks, or wrecked cars right smack
in the middle of the way. Or they pile the manure or the compost heap there, or put up an archery range. One even had horseshoe pitching iron stakes driven into the middle of the way. Upon approaching them I usually get a pretty straight out, “We don’t want you around here,” but not convincingly delivered because they know they can’t stop me legally. I simply travel on.
Another type has found a quiet place in the country and wants it all to himself, which is understandable. But he extends his domain beyond that which he has purchased, and to discourage passersby and intruders, he has fenced off and perhaps gated the road, has a big fierce dog on a run right across the way, and when approached takes a domineering get-thehell-out-of-here attitude. He isn’t interested in what I’m doing nor in the fact that “his” road isn’t his.
One man I met was convinced I was a scout for a gang of thieves who would return in the fall to clean out his lovely home after he’d gone back to New York. Because he stated he was reporting my number to the police, I took the time, after proceeding through his yard on my way, to visit the local chief and introduce myself so he'd know what I was doing. The road was still public, the chief assured me, but they try to keep tabs on strangers.
The nature lover objects to my passage because I may disturb the animals. Usually this encounter isn’t loud and abusive. When I learn the beavers have dammed the brook flooding the old way, or the waterfowl have refuge back in there I agree to detour. While antagonism toward my mode of travel exists here, it is muted and reasonable. I’m more accommodating too.
Occasionally there’s one of life's downtrodden living at the end of the road. Uneducated, poor and resentful, he just doesn’t want anyone coming by. One vivid incident found a very large, very angry young man doing a frustrated jig in anger at my intrusion past the farm, screaming at me incoherently with simple graphic profanity. Then Pa appeared, mad, but more intelligible. Ma soon joined the fray and I found they were caretakers for the summer home just beyond at the end of the road, and I guess they had to be pretty sure that nobody robbed the big house.
All these people, friendly or not, share a common situation. They’re where the road stops and cars can go no farther, but often have off-roaders passing by. People who live at roadside have to accept the passing traffic, but at road’s end it isn’t so easy to do for some. For others, those passing by relieve loneliness and provide interesting moments of communication.
I usually enjoy meeting the folks at the end of the road. It’s a human interest side of trail riding not always apparent to those who ride by and never stop. E3
