Follow Your GPS

Amelia Island, FL

         I hope everyone is enjoying their winter, or maybe you are more like me and are just praying for spring.  I titled this post "Follow Your GPS"  but it also could have been titled "I Really Need a Camera"  because in following my GPS I have seen some very interesting things, and only a few I have managed to get pictures of. 

       In my new role as a signal construction engineer, I drive.  A lot.  And I don't always know where I am going. I am often told to go survey one job or another, given a mile post or signal name, patted on the head and sent on my merry way.   Enter my handy, dandy GPS that is programmed with every mile post on the system.  This is a truly handy thing to have, but it doesn't always work as intended, or at least not how I intend it to work.  On occasion the GPS has told me things like "Turn left on road"  or "Navigate off road".  In both scenarios there is usually a corn field or a deer trail where it tells me to turn.  That leaves me driving around trying to find access to the right of way.  The bad part is I can usually see some railroad tracks they just right there!  Although there was the time I saw a back hoe, and a signal bridge and thought I found what I was looking for, only to find a crew of very confused NS signalman.  Ooppss wrong railroad.

      Even when you put in what sounds like a normal address, it does not always take you where you want to go.  For example, I punched in the address for the Days Inn in Bridgeport, WV and ended up on a single lane road in front of a lovely farm.  Honestly I would have gladly stayed at the farm, but it didn't look like they left the light on for me.  So I found a hill where I had 1 bar of signal and pulled over to call the Days Inn to get some real directions.  Judging from the number of cars doing U-turns on this road, I wasn't the only one with this problem. 

      So you really have to have a sense of adventure to do this job and blindly follow your GPS all over the countryside.  Sometimes it takes me down highways, sometimes back roads, the occasional dirt road and sometimes it is just confused and I am out in the middle of no where looking at one of those strange paper maps trying to figure out where to go.  The one thing I can always count on is that I will see something beautiful, strange, or otherwise interesting.  Although I hate the snow, some of the scenery it creates is amazing and I often find myself wishing for a better camera then the one on my phone.  Since it is currently the only option, I have included a few pictures that I have taken with my phone, and hopefully I will soon be the proud new owner of a digital camera, and can show you some of the other things I run across, you know, like the haunted mansion/campground. 

 Keyser, WV

Snownado