After our visit to Tunnel #7, we took a different route back to the lodge at North Bend State Park. I'd noticed this road before when traveling Route 50, but was surprised to see that the other end of it came out on Route 31, which goes to Cairo and the park.
It was a pretty drive, even with the fading light. It's not easy to get used to the dusk coming so early, is it?
The road started out as a prett good road, but soon narrowed to gravel. We later learned that the original name was Bear Run, but was changed during the 9-1-1 project to Rolling River (just as my road was changed to Railey Ridge, for reasons unknown to anyone who lives here).
Stones lining the creek at the edge of the road made us wonder if perhaps there'd been a grist mill here.
I imagine the road floods easily along this stretch.
An old one-room schoolhouse has been converted to someone's camp.
The road forked, with a sign saying North Bend State Park leading us to a better, paved road. So we didn't get to the end of Bear Run, but the next morning, after finding a couple more tunnels (more in my next posts) we followed the rest of the road. It followed the North Branch of the Hughes River for a little while,
I do love trying to capture reflections.
The road curved up and up and up, and got narrower and narrower, finally dropping down off the ridge to the river again.
A river or creek crossing, not sure which. I wouldn't want to try this in rainy weather. My poor little van is not an off-road vehicle by any stretch, but even with 249,000 miles on her, she's game!
And finally back to pavement and eventually, to Route 31. We saw very few homes along this pretty little road; very lonely, lovely country.
Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.
