While it Lasted

Heather and I went to Little River Park for our Sunday morning walk. We hiked the Ridge Trail. The information board told us it would take us 4 hours. When we completed the trail and arrived back at the information kiosk, it had only been 1.5 hours. Huh?
You'd think we didn't stop and smell the roses (or in this case, watch the water) but we did. We also looked closely at beech trees, nodded to other hikers, sidestepped dogs on leashes, drank from our water bottle, and generally had a casual, yet purposeful, walk. Heck, we even sat down for awhile, see the picture! We weren't running for pete's sake.

Did we take a drastic short cut? Was the sign wrong? Did it intend 4 miles instead of 4 hours? Had it actually taken someone 4 hours to walk that same trail? Had the sign erred on the side of safe planning while trying to account for an average measure of outdoor human foot powered locomotion? Maybe the person that made the sign had gotten lost and said "Screw it, I'm not walking that trail again, it took me 4 hours."
Regardless of the logic of the sign, it got me thinking about its effect on people and its effect on the land. On a simple level, I thought Wow, I bet a lot of people look at that sign and take a different trail. That's funny, people really missed out on a beautifully simple path through the woods. This must be a relatively well preserved trail we just walked. Why DID we take it after reading the sign...WE didn't want to walk for 4 hours did we? And finally, I imagined a few adventurous folks were flustered to find themselves emerging from the woods so soon after entering.
Anyway, you get the point. I'm easily amused. We had a good time while it lasted.