The Road to Tassajara Isn't Paved (Part 3)

A smell of straining engine wafted in through the open windows.

Wayne peered at the rpms.

"What gear are you in?"

"Creep," I said.

"I think you'd better put it in a higher gear or we'll overheat."

"But, then I have to ride the brake."

"Just put it in 2nd," he instructed. "I have a feeling the road is going to get better."

"You saw the sign, right? Danger?"

A stream of water ran down the mountain near the sign. Mounds of gravel filled in the washed out areas replacing what had been packed dirt. There was evidence of recent (possibly within minutes) rock slides.

"This reminds me - " I began.

"Of what?"

"Being on a horse whose foot slipped over the edge of the trail 3000 feet above a rocky chasm in Ladakh."

"No scary stories about heights! You know I don't like them. And watch that rock!"

"What if this road just keeps going?" I wailed.

"It has to end somewhere."

"What if it's closed or what if they're just building it now?" I demanded, pointing to a stack of orange and black striped wooden sawhorses heaped around another blind curve.

"Keep your hands on the wheel. Look, we're getting down into forest again. I think that's a good sign."

"Do you?" I said, as we skidded nearly sideways through mud and gravel for several hundred feet.

A bit farther on another sign appeared, one featuring a hiker with a staff and a pack on his back. The number 13 was painted in white on the rock face. The forest thickened. A solitary figure appeared, jogging slowly uphill towards us.

"Oh, look, a person! Now, we can get directions!" I cheered.

"Absolutely. I have no problem at all asking for directions," Wayne said. "None."

I stopped the car and leaned out the window as a tall, slim young man wearing a watch cap and navy blue sweats jogged up.

"Where are we?" I asked.

"I was hoping you could tell me," he smiled.

I gaped. "Is this the road to Tassajara?"

"Yes. It's just down there," he pointed, "About 500 yards."

"Really?" Relief flooded me,warm as maple syrup.

"But, it's closed now."

"Closed?" repeated Wayne.

"Yeah, until April 1st. There was a sign. We're on retreat."

"Closed? But, we're here for meditation instruction," I said. "We drove all this way. We risked our lives."

"You'll have to come back in April," he said.

"What if we don't make it back before dark?" I whined. "What if we're stranded?"

"Oh, you'll make it," he smiled. He inclined his body from the waist and formed his fingers into the anjali mudra.

"Namaste," he said, and jogged off.

"Fucking namaste?" I said to Wayne. "That's it?"

"I think he might have at least offered tea," Wayne commented.

"So, now what?"

"We turn around and go back."

I drove the car to an obvious turn-around where other cars were parked. There was a stone path and a long, low brown building, wrapped in mist. Shadowy figures moved about.

"So much for the monks," I said.

"Yeah, and I'm driving ," Wayne said.

We bounced back up the mountain in silence. Wayne seemed less concerned with his personal safety once he was behind the wheel.

"Watch it!" I growled occasionally. Dusk fell and the sky purpled as we barrelled along, the cavernous ruts easier, somehow, to negotiate. We slid and slipped, but the boulders remained suspended miraculously above us; the road intact.

"You know," I said. "I think we had our Zen experience."

"We're still having it," Wayne said, "Now, shut up, please, I need to concentrate."

"Fine!" I said, "but, I still want that pine cone."

The Road to Tassajara Isn't Paved (Part 2)

The big wooden sign read: Tassajara Zen Buddhist Center Closed September-April 1st at a cluster of dilapidated outbuildings as we turned onto Tassajara Road.

"What do you think that means?" I asked as we drove by.

"Who knows," Wayne said.

"Do you think that was it?"

"No, I think it's about 13 miles in, unless there was a trail that led to the Center, but I doubt it," he said.

"So, let's keep going," I urged, lured by the vision of lowering my tired and slightly stiff self into burbling hot springs, and receiving meditation instruction from a Zen master, possibly a disciple of Suzuki Roshi himself. The road arced sharply upwards through forest for a few miles before precipitous cliffs fell away on the passenger's side of the car.

"Slow down!" Wayne said.

We had borrowed Pete's shiny, new blue Honda Fit, which could be squeezed into 3-foot openings in San Francisco, but its low undercarriage now bumped ominously into ruts on the unpaved road.

"We can't tell Pete about this, right?" I joked. Pete was Wayne's son-in-law.

"Right! Watch it!" Wayne barked. I had lurched close to the road's edge to avoid a canon ball sized rock. The road shifted beneath the wheels.

"I am watching, and you can't say a word!" I warned. "Not one. No flinching either."

"I will say something if I feel unsafe," he retorted. "It's my life."

"It's my life too," I growled. Sweat broke out on my neck.

"What the hell," I said, as the road narrowed and sank into a series of pot holes deep as sand pits.

"Careful!" Wayne warned.

"Shut up!" I snapped, guiding the car up and over the next series of rubble-filled bunkers. "Do you think this is the right road?"

"Who the fuck knows?" Wayne said.

"Well, let's keep going a bit more," I said. Teetering at cliff's edge held a certain adrenaline junkie juiciness that made my palms tingle. We inched on.

"Whoa! Did you see that huge pine cone?" I asked.

"Forget pine cones! Keep your eyes on the road!" Wayne ordered.

"But, I want to to take it for my collection."

"If we make it, you can get it on the way back. Just keep watching the road. I'm concerned for my personal safety."

As we climbed higher, the rock-strewn road shrank to a width exactly the dimensions of the Fit. The mountainous Ventana Wilderness stretched infinitely before us, the ruddy brick-colored cliff face on one side, blazing blue sky overhead, an abyss on the other. Boulders the size of VW bugs loomed above us, wedged precariously among scrubby roots.

"I wonder if we ought to turn around," Wayne mused.

"Where?"

"Good point."

"And there's no backing down," I stated.

The spine of the desolate mountain road was lined with charred, skeletal black tree stumps from a past forest fire. A rusted truck was pulled off the road amidst a littering of spent red shotgun cartridges.

"Serial killers, no doubt," I muttered. I pictured our two bloated, maggot-encrusted carcasses, throats slashed, entrails slung from the rear view mirror.

"Yeah, the mountains are full of 'em," Wayne said. "Watch the fucking road!" Giant rocks like the teeth of angry gods rose in every direction. We blundered around blind curves with no idea if the road simply ended with a catapulted launch into space.

"I'm having a Thelma and Louise moment!" I blurted.

"What do you mean?" Wayne demanded. He flinched.

"Relax," I said.

"No, you relax!"

"I am relaxed!" I snarled, my stomach clamped in a vise of steel.

"Oh, look, there's a sign!" Wayne interrupted.

"So, at least we're somewhere."

"Of course we're somewhere."

Danger! I read loudly. Flash Flood Area!