Exploring with Owl: Off the Beaten Path

A wandering trip along Second Life Route 6: High Mountain Road, where pavement disappears, the road ends, and exploring keeps going.

I was wandering Mainland recently when I found myself somewhere along Route 6: The High Mountain Road.

There was no plan to start at the beginning — or really to get anywhere in particular. I simply started following the road east.

Or at least, I tried to follow the road.

At first, I thought I’d stumbled into road construction.

Linden Lab has been doing road work on Mainland, and this particular route seemed to go from pavement to stone, to dirt, to logs, to something requiring a rather generous definition of the word road. I assumed I’d found a section that simply wasn’t finished yet.

Nope.

That’s the High Mountain Road.

And once I realized that, I liked it even more.

Exploring Second Life Route 6

Route 6 winds through some wonderfully rugged Mainland. Steep mountainsides, bridges, old stonework, forests and waterfalls line a road that sometimes seems in danger of disappearing into the landscape altogether.

The Second Life Wiki describes the High Mountain Road as a twisting, climbing route through the foothills of Mount Campion, the highest point on the Second Life Mainland. Those changing road surfaces aren’t an accident either. Pavement gives way to rough tracks, stone, log-lined stretches, trestles and other bits of creative Mole engineering.

Much of what I stopped to inspect along the way had been created by Garden Mole. I kept clicking things as I wandered — partly because I was curious about who had built them and partly because that’s what I do.

In other words, I hadn’t found an unfinished road.

I’d found an adventure.

One of my favorite discoveries was the Lapara Tunnel, a long brick avalanche tunnel built by Garden Mole into the mountainside beside a waterfall. I didn’t know its name when I stopped to photograph it. I just knew I wanted a picture.

That happens a lot when I wander.

Naturally, I Found a Cube

Then there was the cube.

Sitting beside all this dramatic mountain scenery was a random wooden cube. A prim. The little building block that once built nearly everything in Second Life.

Naturally, I clicked it.

It belonged to Sandor Wren.

Wait. I know Sandor.

And apparently the considerably less random-looking house perched dramatically on the cliff above belonged to him too.

Because this is Mainland, and apparently even random cubes can lead somewhere.

And Then Second Life Route 6 the Road Ended

Eventually I reached the signs:

NO THRU ROAD

Now, a sensible explorer might interpret that as the end of the adventure.

I am Owl.

So I kept exploring.

Beyond the road were woods, trails, old structures and more reasons to wonder what might be around the next corner. Interestingly, the old Route 6 documentation actually has a section called “Beyond the Road.” The public road ends, but a path continues through the undergrowth toward remnants of old mining and railway history.

Apparently wandering off the road isn’t even doing Route 6 wrong.

It’s part of the experience.

This Is Why I Still Wander Mainland

There are beautifully designed destinations all over Second Life, and I love visiting them. But Mainland offers something different.

You don’t always know what you’re looking for because, quite often, you aren’t looking for anything.

You follow a road.

You stop for a waterfall.

You investigate a tunnel.

You click a random cube and discover it belongs to somebody you know.

And when the road ends, you see what’s beyond it.

I only explored part of the Second Life Route 6 High Mountain Road this time, wandering east until I eventually ran out of road.

I started here – https://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Plebeja/139/117/130 and travled east.

Which means, of course, there’s still another direction to go.

Another day.

Sometimes the best part of exploring Second Life begins exactly where the path becomes a little less obvious.

Come explore with Owl.

Second Life Route 6 is part of the Heterocera road network. You can read the wonderfully detailed — and wonderfully old-school — description of the High Mountain Road on the Second Life Wiki.