Road Trip, SW USA

 
In May, two British journalist/photographers undertook a road trip around the South West of America. Armed with far too many cameras, a misguided beatnik-style idealism and a terrible sense of humour, they spent several weeks wandering the magnificent Colorado Plateau. They drove a chrome convertible, camped in the wilderness, took many photographs and even more wrong turns. One of them almost got eaten alive by mountain lions. Paul Sullivan presents some highlights (and lowlights) from his tour diary…



Pheonix, AZ

And so we land: blurry eyed, hungry and excited. Our car (a shiny Chrysler convertible no less) – winks at us from the airport car park. We hit the highway under an Arizona sun that’s white, thin and cruelly hot. Classic south-west scenery immediately assails us: long freight trains loping lackadaisically across the landscape; mini dust tornados whirling atop arid red earth; huge thundering trucks commandeered by sinewy men whose moustaches expand and contract before our very eyes. We are truly in the United States of America.

Las Cruces, NM

After spending a night at hip Tucson and dawdling awhile at Alamogordo to check out the groovy space museum, we arrive at Las Cruces, NM just before sunset. Once there, we unpack our tent and lock our car keys in the boot of the Chrysler. We then wait several hours for an emergency locksmith to come out from El Paso, Texas.

Cloudcroft, NM

After a trek around the amiable alpine village of Cloudcroft we return to the car, chatting briefly across the roof about where we will head to next. I forget my new and expensive digital SLR camera is still on said roof until we drive away and I hear it smash to tiny fragments on the road behind us. Fortunately, I have a spare.

White Sands National Monument, NM

275 square miles of billowing white sand dunes really is something to behold. We trot friskily across the desert-scape for a couple of miles to get away from the ugly footprints that threaten to mar our photographs. The sun sets and is swiftly replaced with utter blackness. We are lost. Embarrassingly, we have to be rescued by a ranger (female) who cheerfully tells us of a Japanese tourist who died here a few weeks ago after doing what we had just done.

Roswell, NM

Even back in 1947 aliens couldn’t have been naïve - or tasteless - enough to choose this place as a landing destination?

Santa Fe/Taos, NM

The capital of New Mexico is vibrant, artistic and peppered with rustic adobe buildings. It is also unashamedly commercial. Taos, further north is rawer. But affable and happening though these towns are, the highlight is driving through the countryside between them and witnessing the setting sun paint the mountains, prairies and plateaus an unforgettable marmalade colour. We camp in SF National Forest, coo-ing at the clearness of the skies, wow-ing at the fluttering of the stars. Our food crackles crisply on the barbecue. Tall ponderosa pines samba softly in the breeze. We feel…liberated.

Canyon de Chelly, AZ

The next morning, during a hike through the forest, my hiking stick breaks for no decent reason and I forget my hat up a tree. Later, we emerge at Taos pueblo, a fantastic living monument, virtually unchanged since 1540. Crossing the border back into AZ we then arrive at the jaw-dropping Canyon de Chelly, cornerstone of the Indian Navajo Nation and major feature of the mighty Colorado Plateau - a physiographic area 500 million years old and 130,000 miles wide that’s spread across Utah, New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona. The size and beauty of de Chelly is overwhelming. We prepare a special dinner at the campsite, which is promptly stolen by a wily coyote when we’re not looking.

Flagstaff, AZ

Living out of a car, sleeping in a tent, eating fast food and drinking bad coffee takes its toll. By Flagstaff, a small but happening town used as a jump-off point for the Grand Canyon, we are ready for a soft mattress and a large infusion of alcohol. In a funky bar a folk band play covers of Radiohead songs and Debbie, a pretty but inebriated local girl tells us about the aliens she has met in the nearby ‘nu-age’ town of Sedona. Rob accidentally sits on her sunglasses. Several Jaegermeister’s later a huge native Indian man is banging our heads together in a tacky nightclub and telling us that the Indian people made America powerful. We vehemently agree, then, when he finally lets go, we run briskly away.

Grand Canyon, AZ

The Grand Canyon receives millions of visitors a year yet its sheer magnitude makes it seem infinite, untouchable. We descend along the South Kaibab trail. Humans have lived in or near here for at least 4000 years. We ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’ at impossibly big drops and heart-wrenching views. At Skeleton Point we see the mighty Colorado river, principal sculptor of the canyon (and the entire Colorado plateau) – now an innocuous slash of emerald amidst the multi-layered rock. In the evening, our car’s power adaptor – used for charging out laptops and iPods - breaks inexplicably. So do our torches.

Death Valley, NV

Instead of drinking lots of water before exploring Death Valley (as is recommended by the local information office) we down strong black coffee in accordance with our Road Trip diet. We almost pass out as the mid-morning temperatures hit the mid-thirties. It all gets too much, so we drink more coffee and read the paper in the car. We learn that the second highest temperature ever was recorded here, and that a German man recently died of heatstroke during a two-hour trek because he didn’t carry enough water. We retreat into the mountains for some fresh air.

Las Vegas, NV

The remoteness of Death Valley gives way to an incongruous mix of the desert city; Britney Spears, Egyptian pyramids, Prince, a statue of liberty, Drive Thru wedding chapels, Rod Stewart, David Copperfield and more wild neon than you could shake a copy of Fear & Loathing at. We rewire our heads with Jaegermeister to cope with the hallucinogenic assault. Later, we are driven along the strip by a grinning, wild-eyed cabbie; he grinds dramatically to a halt outside an anonymous venue we haven’t requested. We walk in and spy semi-naked girls with Barbie-like bodies gyrating around poles and grinding males into armchairs. Rob pulls his hands out of his pocket to protest but – would you believe it? - a fifty dollar note floats through the air and into the cashier’s hand. Then a bachelor party outing pushes past us and we are shoved rudely through the barrier with them. Rob trips and I fall over him and we both end up sitting right in front of a podium where a scantily clad girl with legs the colour and length of Copacabana uses ancient techniques to make us stay. For hours.

Bryce Canyon, UT

The following day we’re too hung-over to leave town but we have to check out of our hotel. We book into a cheap seedy ‘motel’ across the road. When we feel better, some twenty-four hours later, we rejoin the Colorado plateau as it extends into the South-Western corner of the state, encompassing frondescent Zion National Park and the bizarrely banded rock formations of Bryce Canyon, which rise up dramatically out of the earth like giant white-orange fingers. We miss the sunset by a few minutes and vow to get up early the following morning so we can photograph the remarkable views at sunrise. Unaware that the time zone changed an hour when we left Nevada, we scurry out the tent the next morning at what we think is 4am and blink uncomprehendingly into bright sunshine. I find a large, hairy spider in my shoe.

Canyonlands, UT

At Canyonlands, further north, more rock formations merge with colourful slickrock mesas. We trek through The Needles and The Arches National Parks, both of which are mesmerising. At the former we hike three miles to get to The Needles – tall rocks that look suspiciously like the ones at Bryce Canyon. Night draws in and we return hurriedly to the car to avoid getting lost (yet again). Rob falls behind to take more shots. An hour after I reach the car he’s still not back. He must have gotten lost, or fallen into a steep, deadly ravine. Two hours later I am still alone in the deserted car park at the isolated trailhead and my mind is plagued by gory visions of dead human eyes staring out from beneath a pack of ravenous, blood-stained mountain lions. Something furry scurries across my foot and I have to suppress an almighty urge to scream like a girl and flee. I report Rob missing. The ranger assures me there are no mountain lions and asks me to “please calm down sir”. At 7am, Rob returns to the car, explaining that he got lost and slept in a cave. He starts to invent yarns about fending off dangerous mountain lions. I tell him the ranger already told me there were no mountain lions in the area. He falls silent, stares out of the window.

San Francisco, CA

A month’s worth of red earth, blue skies, preposterous rock formations and wild deserts has been enough. We hurl through California – so green! alive! so welcoming! – to get the car back to the SF drop-off. In a dive bar we let a final (final?) Jaegermeister slip between our lips and reflect sagely that the trip was much harder work than anticipated. We meet a pathological liar from NYC called Tyrone, join him in singing some old rock & roll songs from the juke and realise that, well, staying at home is hard work too. And not nearly so much fun.