Going South

Things went south even as we proceeded to go south. Well, sort of. Wengerd took the wheel in I Falls and headed south on 53. He'd done it often enough that incompetence should not have been an issue.

Whatsoever.

Well, things were pretty normal considering we'd just pulled out from Subway and he was cradling a 12" Chicken Marinara Sub on a 9 grain honey oat bun loaded with every conceivable vegetable known to Subway in his lap. He set his cruise control on the borrowed Nissan Sentra and began the navigation process with his legs while unwrapping this 12" sumptious delight with both hands. Ahhh, the smell was delightful. And so was the taste. But this was normal.

Even the napkin/bib stuffed down his shirt. That was normal too.

But, alas, things went south from there. We got into Duluth, a massive conglomeration of confusing intersections, and he set about exiting onto I-35 S when in reality we wanted I-35 N which ran in conjuntion with US 53 S. Even in the gathering darkness, the local scenery was not looking very familiar to him. He woke his snoozing passenger with the words, "I think I missed 53."

The awakened passenger dutifully opened up the map while shaking the cobwebs that had settled in his brain as he rested his eyes. "I think you want 2 East. That should get us to 53."

And it was so, even though the residents in the rear parts began to snicker at Wengerd's wanderings. Later, when we joined US 2 E/US 53 S, we continued our journey in a southerly fashion. Little did Wengerd realize that 53 did the splits with US 2 in the town of Wentworth, WS, not far at all from Duluth/Superior.

Half an hour later he wondered at a sign he saw. US 2 and something else, but no US 53! How could they miss putting up such an important sign on this major road? Maybe there was one further up. There wasn't. This would explain the lack of expected four lanes. So once again to the peacefully napping passenger, "Uh, could you look at the map? I think I missed 53."

He tried to ignore the ridicule emanating from the rear of the vehicle. One rider thought maybe it was time for a change in staff manning the wheel. He laughed appreciatively at their juvenile humor as he turned around and headed for some obscure back roads that appeared to offer some hope. It turned out we had not been headed south, we had been headed east. We did need to go east, but not there we didn't.

So at the direction of our staff passenger/navigator we got on 27 headed south. This was really out in the boondocks. No houses. No cell phone service. Nothing, just trees. We nearly went right by county road A. Wengerd slammed on the brakes just in time to make a hard right turn turn into the left lane of A. Of course there was no one there, which was handy. (I thought I saw some deer standing along the highway snickering, but I'm not sure. jk.)

Indeed A took us to our beloved US 53 S. Albeit Business US 53 S, but it worked. And things didn't go quite so far south after that, but we did. Praise the Lord.