All Hail, West Texas!

The astute reader will have noticed a larger than usual gap between this post, and the one previous, and may well
wonder why. After leaving Las Cruces, I made the short drive south to El Paso, where I caught a flight to Washington,
DC to spend Christmas with my family. I ate, slept, and watched football in excess, as a brutal winter storm battered
the east coast, and I must admit, it was a welcome break from the rigors of the road. After four restful days, I was re-
united with fair Brünhilde, heading east across a vast expanse of Chihuahuan desert.

As I approached the Guadalupe mountains, I spied these Pronghorn Antelope, nibbling sagebrush by the roadside.

One fascinating aspect of West Texas is the abundance of abandoned buildings. Amazingly, this phone booth was
in good working order.

Dell Junction, the home of the cougars, but regrettably, no gas.

The closer I got, the more impressive the Guadalupe mountains became.

Just past Salt Flat, I came across a group of ruins.

Just what purpose they once served is anyone's guess.

I have an theory concerning objects in a state of decay:

All things man-made seek approval, are ego-driven, and are therefore compromised. When the cosmic element is
introduced, in the form of decay and decomposition, the man-made aesthetic is improved immeasurably.

West Texas, in all its beauty.

Like many of the lost objects scattered about the West Texas desert, this water tower
is peppered with bullet holes.

After exploring the ruins, I continued on to the base of the Guadalupe mountains, where I stopped at a dramatically 

positioned rest stop.

This was the view to the south,

while to the north, this breathtaking peak towered above me.

It was my first taste of the many geological wonders of West Texas.

White Sands

After the long ride to Las Cruces, I decided to spend the following day at White Sands National Monument, which
sits in the Tularosa Basin, forty miles to the east.

It is a surreal, magical, and misleadingly named place,

as the eponymous white dunes are made not of silica, but gypsum,

a soft mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate. Gypsum from the quarries of Montmartre, Paris has long 

furnished burnt gypsum, otherwise known as plaster of Paris. However, because it is water-soluble, it is almost 

never found in the form of sand. White Sands National Monument is a stunningly beautiful exception to the rule.

Not all of the monument is devoid of life, as evidenced by the presence of this Yucca Elata.

In addition to plant life, several animals, including fox, porcupine, and oryx, make their home in the dunes.

The tracks above belong to a Roadrunner, 

while these were made by a Bleached Earless Lizard.

After riding around the park for a while,

I parked Brünhilde and set off to make some tracks of my own.

I found this handsome dune,

which afforded a nice view of the Organ mountains to the west.

The perfect spot for a cup of coffee and a Djarum.

In addition to its elevated status as a National Monument, White Sands is also doubles as a missile range. Note
the contrails from B-2 bombers in the image below.

As the sun set, the clouds turned purple, and the sand took on a pinkish hue,

making a beautiful backdrop for this photo of my lovely girl.

Globe Rathole

Due to the closure of the Apache Trail at Fish Creek, and the resulting sixty-mile backtrack, I was forced to stop
for the night in Globe, AZ. While the town itself had a somewhat funky charm, my hotel was a rathole of such epic
filth that it made the night I spent with the lepers in Agra seem like a stay at the George V. I resolved to get a very
early start. It was still dark, and bitter cold, as I headed east on State Route 70.

An hour later, I was rewarded with this spectacular sunrise.

I warmed my hands for a bit, then continued east to Safford, a fairly non-descript town where I stopped for some
gas. After a restorative cup of coffee, I continued northeast, toward the New Mexico border.

Entering the Apache National Forest, the topography began to change for the better.

I followed this serpentine road, up into the mountains. After several miles of lovely asphalt, I entered New Mexico
and stumbled across this alternative route through the Gila National Forest,

where the austere mountains turned first to dry pine forest,

and finally, to open grassland.

Not the most compelling countryside, but certainly good for making time.

Thanks to the early start, I reeled off 328 miles, arriving in Las Cruces just before sunset.

Apache Trail

Time to do some laundry. Not my favourite task in life.

Road Filth.

After a couple of days in Phoenix, attending to the quotidian obligations of modern life, I was ready to see something
real. I took off down the Apache trail.

The trail itself defies superlatives...

as it snakes through spectacular mountains,

and desert,

...on its way to Tortilla Flat. I posted a couple of letters, then had a beer at the saloon, where the bartended told me
some rather bad news: just past Fish Creek, the road was impassable.

Well, we'll just see about that, shall we? Beyond Tortilla Flat, the dirt road rises up to the top of this mesa.

I didn't think the landscape could get much more spectacular than here, but I was soon disabused of this illusion.
After a few miles, I encountered a locked barrier. As it happened, there were a couple of workers there, so I made
some inquiries.

At first they were firm: the road simply didn't exist. There was no way I was getting through. Five minutes later,
I had struck a deal. They wouldn't open the gate for me, but if I could get around it myself, they said they wouldn't
stop me from carrying on.

Needless to say, I made it past the barrier. For scenery, it turned out to be one of the most dramatic roads I've
ever had the good luck to travel. Clinging to the sheer edge of this amazing canyon,

the dirt road wound it's way precipitously down to Fish Creek.

On the other side of the guard rail, the dropoff was a sheer thousand feet...

...down to the canyon floor below.

After turning the corner, I ran into two more workmen. They flagged me down. Did I know that the road was closed?
I took off my lid, and started talking to them. A measure of charm, and before long, I was on my way. I passed a
work crew, who ignored me, then stopped here for a photo. One of the workmen suggested that if the supervisor at
the main works site didn't let me through, I camp at the Apache cave pictured here. If only!

At Fish Creek,

the canyon narrows,

and the road switches back, across this bridge...

...as it emerges on to the canyon floor. Tearing up this sandy track was a blast, until,

...a couple of miles later, where I ran into the stone-faced supervisor. He threatened to arrest me. I took off my lid and
pleaded my case. If he didn't let me through, I'd have to backtrack 60 miles. I travelled 1500 miles to get here. C'mon,
have a heart. I'd have had more luck appealing to the Tin-Man. The supervisor claimed the road narrowed to two feet,
with a sheer drop of 700 feet. It was too narrow to even get a quad through. Quad, I said? My good man, take another
look at what I'm riding. I was tempted to quote Full Metal Jacket: "Get this, little sister, what you're lookin' at here's a
prime example of Alabama blacksnake, but as you can see for yourself, it damn sure ain't too muthafu**in' beaucoup."
His assistant eyed Brünhilde lasciviously, as if to concede the point. Two feet is plenty of room, I insisted. The assis-
tant then told me that someone had tried it a couple of weeks ago, shredded a tire, then tried to sue for compensation.
I assured him that I was not a scumbag. But the supervisor was immovable. I had to turn around, and to add insult to
injury, he followed me back up on his quad...

...till we reached the workmen. It was tight getting past them this time, so I took off the
panniers, took the bike to here, then walked back and carried them up. As if to prove my
point concerning Brünhilde's slender frame, the supervisor was unable to get past his own
crew on the quad. He had to turn around.

That was that. I had to backtrack. At least I had the consolation of passing through countryside like this.

The detour wasn't too bad, either.