We ride south?

[Guest]

OK, how the hell did this work?

You know in western movies when a couple of guys have a posse on their arse, when they have said chasers about two days behind them, and they reach some spot in a vast rocky, sandy, dusty landscape, one of them blokes say:
- They’ll think we’re heading west, but let’s turn south, towards Mexico.

It’s always bloody Mexico. But my question is, how the hell can they be spot on their trail?
I can’t be in bloody Gothenburg somewhere in the centre and decide to head south, with someone after me knowing if I’m heading towards the stadium, the Catholic church, the Opera house, O’Learys pub, or what!

On a bit more serious note, in war back in the days of Alexander, or the Romans, or you take your pick, how the hell did they march straight towards one another?
If their in one place, marching towards south for days, just a few degrees towards west or east would mean miles apart.
OK, so I know they had scouts, still.

I think it was all decided with dice or arm wrestling.

[Sean of the Shed]

We ride south?

The following posse usually had a stereotypical native with warpaint on and a feather in his hair who would put his ear to the ground and tell them what had happened in that spot for the last two days. The old joke used to be
"Many buffalo pass this way."
"How the hell would you know that, injun"
"Me put my face in buffalo shit."

[Guy Profumo]

We ride south?

Sean of the shed wrote:

The following posse usually had a stereotypical native with warpaint on and a feather in his hair who would put his ear to the ground and tell them what had happened in that spot for the last two days. The old joke used to be
"Many buffalo pass this way."
"How the hell would you know that, injun"
"Me put my face in buffalo shit."

Which is presumably why you sought a career in advertising, rather than in stand-up?

[Wyatt Earp]

We ride south?

ganja wrote:

It’s always bloody Mexico.

Isn't that a bit like the woman in Fawlty Towers complaining that the view from her window isn't good enough because it's only a view of Torquay? (I mean, where are they going to ride south to, from the Western US? The Hanging Gardens of Babylon?)

[Amor de Cosmos]

We ride south?

In the seventh century BC Chinese soldiers marched with their faces facing in a southerly direction, (obviously if they were supposed to go north this posed something of a problem.) Perhaps there was a bit of ancient Shang dynasty in the old West.