Expedition to university

Yesterday I thought it would be cool to walk to uni without looking at maps, just following the GPS arrow. According to the GPS, I was 3.7Km from the music college. I started along Hawthorne, turned right into Blackacres, crossed Wonderland into Whiteacres and walked down it. I thought I was in trouble, as I could see no way out of Whiteacres and I knew that plenty of residential areas around here have no way out. There are lots of dead ends and U-shaped streets, some of the worst enemies of the GPS-guided philosopher. Right at the end of the street, however, there was a path into the forest. The path was precisely aligned with the GPS arrow, so I was happy to take it.

There was a large group of people running along this path, and I thought that perhaps they were coming from the university. Great, I thought. This takes right into campus. But it was not to be... Soon that path veered right and I took a narrower one that seemed more convenient for where I was heading.

But there were more and more trees, and the path seemed a bit less used. I was wondering where this would take me... But I relaxed a bit when I saw a kind of a gate. Maybe this signals the path that will take me to uni, I thought. I was assuming there had to me something like this, an easy direct way to get to uni.

In fact, the gate was signalling the entrance to no man's land. A few metres ahead, I came across the rapids.

OK, this wasn't the Colorado river, but I couldn't cross it. If only I had a long pole which I could use to jump across, or a canoe, I thought... There were some logs next to the bank, and it occurred to me to build a raft. Unfortunately I had no rope on me. And it would be ridiculous if people had to build rafts every time they walked to uni. I went looking for a bridge.

I kept walking along the bank, and after a few metres there was a bridge, but it was just crossing a stream that led to the river, rather than the river itself.

,

After this bridge, I walked another 10 minutes. I was getting further and further away from university, and I saw no way to cross those rapids. I was also getting higher. Finally, I discovered an entrance to what seemed to be a lost city of the forest people.

I was expecting to see a bunch of Ewoks jumping around, but at the top there was only a platform, from where I could see the river down below, and the absence of a bridge everywhere.

I kept going, following the bank. Then I hit the swamps. The Evil Black Swamp, more precisely, where squirrels come to die.












Rotten squirrel meat is sticky and it took me a while to escape the EBS. Beyond it was the hope of one day returning to civilisation. I had been half an hour without broadband Internet and I was starting to feel nauseous.

I began considering to build some kind of shelter and live off the berries. They were some tasty-looking ones!








But wait! Could this be poisonous? It looks completely harmless, of course, but what do I know? I decided to keep walking, deaf by the noise of the crickets, half-blind from hunger... Mummy! No, wait, mummy would hit me with a hammer.. Better no mummy.

Suddenly, behold, Shangri-La!

The wild Canadian thorny bush gave up and a beautiful path opened before me. I was going home. Soon the crickets were gone and I could hear the buses! I ran, I ran like the wind when it wants to get out of the forest and find the music department. By the time I saw the campus I was a wreck of a man, with blood-shot eyes, in raggedy clothes. But I was alive.