GPS Funnies - God Answers Prayer

For those of you coming back for more...Don't always trust the GPS, especially when it needs upgrading. How do I know this? The hard way. :)

During our research trip, God answered my prayer. Our small group loaded into my car and before I pulled out I prayed, "Lord keep us safe and let us have fun. Amen." We had no idea He would answer so abundantly and use a GPS to boot. Anyway, we head out for Colorado Bend State Park. A place that is advertised as being an untouched portion of the Texas Hill Country. (P.S. They weren't lying.) Possible dirt roads expected, right? You have no idea.

Picture Courtesy of Williamson Photos

Using Chip (my beloved name for our GPS), we head out on a paved highway going up hills, around curves, until we're instructed to turn onto - you'll never guess - a dirt road. We go by this guy in a pick-em-up truck who stares at my car like he's never seen another vehicle before. By the way, this is, I believe, at a cattle guard crossing (you know, those metal bars you drive over that make your eye-teeth want to jar out of your head). Is Chip steering us wrong?

Miles of dirt road traveled at 30 mph or less, empty fields spreading from both sides of the road, and we come to another cattle guard crossing. Chip is suspiciously silent at the moment, but my riders are not. By now, my mother has questioned my cousin about her beloved cell phone. The kind with internet access...A MAP...something to help us know we're going the right direction because, of course, the paper maps we normally bring with us have conveniently missed catching the ride out of town. I begin laughing even though my cousin seems to only consider the lack of the inanimate object as an annoyance. But it's either laugh or cry especially when we see ... cow patties ... in the middle of the road.

Picture Courtesy of Williamson Photos

I laugh harder! The whole car joins in my merriment. We soon jar our way across the third cattle guard of the morning and lo and behold... the depositors of the smelly piles dotting the road. Yes, Black Angus bulls and heifers blocking our path and standing by fences looking at us from big ebony eyes full of question - You want me to move?

I can barely breath! Laughter has me in a death grip. Bad for the person driving, right? I look at the GPS moments later and it shows us no longer on a road. No, it has us in the middle of a field! Well, he finally got that right! We reach a dead end at a large gate to someone's property and have to turn around. Yay! We get to go through three rattling cattle guards, the miles of bumpy dirt road, and patches of curious cows all over again - in reverse! I'm nearly crying and my cheeks hurt from the joy of it all. Surely my sides are aching at this point. But when we return to fetch the real map (we fired Chip), we realized God answered my prayer.

We definitely had fun!

To top it all off, when we finally get on the right road and make it to the state park, we have to travel down 10 miles of dirt road which traveled across someone's property! (No kidding, there was a sign saying: Private Property - Don't stop or exit your vehicle.) And guess what? There were more cattle guards and cows too. Who says God doesn't have a sense of humor! :)