@ev wood gave some background, and I wasn't expecting anything like a welcome center, at all..
I've had plenty of experience with communal living & intentional communities, including trying to start one of the fuckers out in the fucking boonies, to know that getting there is yer own problem, for the most part..
My fucking toyota camry was pretty solid..
Many, many hard, potholed& unpaved roads..
The following was explained to me:
The 'ranch' has/had several folks with vehicles, but being where it is & money being as scarce as it is there, automotive runs are done only when necessary, not because conditions prohibit it.
So... If that is true...
It just seems that folks didn't go out of their way to follow through on their intentions.
Dig this:
I spoke to them for a *week* ahead of time, & though I can't recall everything, what I was told was to stop in at the little hamlet where the secondary road turns off the main & runs along the river & *they* would be able to show me a map of the fire roads or some such.
I know fire roads..
Been driving Datsuns, Toyotas, Volkswagens, shitty little ford geos & big ass GMCs, etc on them for fucking decades..
So.. I go to the hamlet, stop in, look at their maps & they tell me "the road to black bear doesn't show here, but when you get to the top, take the one to the right"..
Now, *before * I head up, I call them *again*, and they say " yes, take the one to the right of the fire road.. "
I get to the 5 way branch, or whatever it is, and only 1 or 2 are marked FR#.. Sooo..
I go to the right of the rightmost marked FR..
It unfortunately is *also* a fire road, so *this* is actually the road i should havr used for reference, rather than gone down.
My bitch with this road was not the potholes, not that it was, at points perhaps less than 7' wide, nor even that the edge was at times along a 200' high precipice..
My bitch was the fucking rocks, and if, in fact, it had been the road to bbr, I would agree.. "They must not want people coming here"..
I had a passenger, a young woman who *also* wanted to check the place out (& oddly, when I mentioned that development, receptivity seemed to increase greatly, but perhaps only seemed), and after driving out a mile fucking *backwards* on that fucking road & then getting back to where there was cell service, I asked them, rather heatedly, "Why don't you have the way in marked??" & the answer was "we have problems with some of the locals, and the take down what we put up".
& that is just bullshit.
You don't live in the fucking woods & not know how to clearly & permanently mark a trail unless you are just lazy or fucking irresponsible.
& it the attitude that justifies it is "well, let them find us, because it will keep the weak ones away" then don't fucking make a public presence for yourself, & post "no trespassing" signs & stay in your fucking woods & rot, but *dont* give a more or less open invitation, or worse *specifically* accept an inquiry & then be too fucking limp dicked to mark the way in, in such a fashion that any 11 year old cub scouts that can swing a fucking axe could do.
Little shit like that that is ignored tells you a *lot* about the people whom ignore it.
Has nothing at all to do with my car vs. the fact that I did not walk or horse or bike in.
Anybody who has seen me work knows I am *not* *that* fucking soft, even if I do use a machine to take me from place to place.
Now.. Maybe, since I've never actually been there, I dunno..
Maybe it's just an enclave of folks poking around at fire pots & latrine holes..
Maybe I just talked to the wrong person (though i wss referred to them as being some 'elder' or some such).
I dunno..
Anyways..
The girl I gave the ride to went home, which was probably best for her, but it's a bit unfortunate, because I really would have liked to have had the experience..