Years ago a few friends and I used to do Sunday rides without benefit of maps (long before GPS). We'd kind of know the lay of the land, and our rides followed the simple rule that whoever was up front at the moment could make any turn. So one day riding in the lower Catskills , we found a small road and followed it for miles, working ourselves up a valley until it petered out at some farm near the saddle between two peaks.

Faced with a long trip back to the turn, I suggested that over the hill there had to be another road serving another farm and leading back eventually to a branch of the same river we started on. So we hoofed it across the farm, avoiding the grazing cows (no bull around) up and ver the hill and sure enough found a road back down. 80 or so miles later we got back to start.

For a few years after that, riding to the ends of valleys, and hiking to the next if necessary was a regular feature of our riding, and opened up loops that we never would or could ride otherwise.

BTW- farmers are nice people, and not one ever said an unkind word about our little trespasses.