By a man who just wanted to visit his sister but apparently signed up for West Virginia’s “Worst Roads and Existential Crises” tour.
Years ago, I used to drive from Virginia to Indiana once a week. Like clockwork. Didn’t even need directions. Just coffee, an audiobook, and the vague hope that the car wouldn’t explode. But this time, it was different. This time, I brought reinforcements—my girlfriend and my small dog, Georgie, who has the attention span of a moth and the attitude of a retired wrestler.
We were going to visit my sister. Lovely woman. I used to live with her and her family back in the day, and figured, why not make a road trip out of it? I was excited. Very excited. So excited that I showed up at the rental car place twice that morning, just to make sure everything was in order.
Which, of course, it wasn’t.
They gave me a car that smelled like someone had been chain-smoking inside it since the Clinton administration. The A/C was blasting so hard when I got in, I didn’t notice the smell right away— probably because my face was too busy freezing off. Or maybe I was just high on road trip adrenaline. Either way, I didn’t notice.
But then my girlfriend got in.
Her face did this thing. You know that face people make when they walk into a gas station bathroom and immediately regret every decision that brought them to that point? That was her. “OH MY GOD—it smells like SMOKE!” she yelled, while Georgie sneezed dramatically in agreement, because even the dog had standards.
So back to the rental lot we went.
Now the guy at the counter gave me a look. A look that said: “You’ve had this car for 20 minutes, and in that time, you managed to smoke a full carton of Marlboros and now you want a refund.” I told him I don’t smoke. Never have. Never will. But I might’ve considered taking it up just to make the story make sense to him. Still, he grunted, swapped the car then off we went.
The plan was simple: drive to White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, crash for the night, then carry on to Indiana. Easy.
We arrived around 7:30 PM, absolutely starving. I called up the General Lewis Inn, one of my favorite restaurants in the area. Closed. Because of course it was. So we defaulted to America’s second-best option for fine dining: McDonald’s. Got our food, found a quiet spot by the Greenbrier River, and ate our cheeseburgers in front of a view so stunning it made my fries taste philosophical.
Now, this would’ve been a lovely end to the day. But no.
I told her it was getting dark. She reminded me that I had promised. I reminded her we don’t even know where the park is. She gave me that look—the one that says you’re either coming with me, or you’re going to hear about this every day until the sun explodes. So off we went.
My girlfriend, feeling adventurous, suggested we go explore another park—in the mountains. At night.
We found a park on Google, put it into the GPS, and headed out. Past White Sulphur Springs again, through some charming small towns, until eventually we ran out of paved road.
And now the fun begins.
We’re on a one-lane dirt road. On the left? A mountain wall. On the right? A drop. A big drop. The kind of drop that ends with a news story and a helicopter shot of twisted metal. Our SUV, which I had initially enjoyed, now felt like trying to steer a cruise ship through a car wash.
Every time we neared the edge, my girlfriend made this sound—like a terrified eagle with asthma. If I braked too hard? A high-pitched AYEEEEEEEEE! Close to the mountain? Sort of a low whimper, like a badger with relationship issues. And when another car came the opposite way—on this single-track road—she made a noise that can only be described as a banshee having an allergic reaction.
Then, like a cruel joke from the heavens, the GPS gave up. Just blanked out and said, “Good luck, loser.” Didn’t even bother with “Recalculating.” It just left us to die.
I didn’t tell her, of course. No sense in both of us panicking. But I did start quietly counting how many snacks we had left in case we had to survive out here for the night.
Eventually, she caught on.
“What if we get stuck?” she asked.
“We wait until morning,” I replied, calmly.
“And then?”
“We go on foot.”
She blinked. “What about bears?”
“I’m not worried about the bears,” I said.
“You’re not?!”
“No. Because Georgie and I can run faster than you. And the bear only needs one of us.”
There was a long pause. Then she said, “Well, if we get stuck, I’m staying in the car.”
“Fine,” I said. “Just don’t mind the ghosties and mountain spirits.”
That nearly earned me a punch. But before she could commit to violence, salvation appeared, like a miracle sent from the Mountain Gods themselves— just when I was mentally drafting my will and wondering if squirrels could be bartered for food, we saw it—a house. Then another. Then a glowing streetlight, like the torch of liberty, only less majestic and more fluorescent.
The GPS suddenly woke up like it had just come out of a two-day bender and said, “Oh hey! You’re alive? Great, turn left in 500 feet.” I nearly kissed the dashboard out of pure relief.
We rolled back into White Sulphur Springs like survivors of an expedition, pulled into a quiet spot by the river, and just sat there—completely drained, staring off like two people who’d seen things… and into the distance, exhausted and mildly traumatized.
We both agreed, in perfect silence:
Never. Doing. That. Again.
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