Arizona baby! Desert time

So here’s the deal. Just before I came to Palm Springs I had to decide my route out of Los Angeles. So what’s the deciding factor? Whatever route has more couchsurfers of course! Seeing that coming down route 70 out of Phoenix had precisely 2 couchsurfers in the whole 300 mile stretch, which was 2 more then Flagstaff had- I went that way! Scary, had the prophet been right, or was it just coincidence?

So back to Palm Springs….I had a dream dammit. And that dream was to walk across the Mojave Desert. Unfortunatly like most dreams this one ended up stuck up a pipe. I left Palm Springs with 3 days worth of water, a ridiculously heavy backpack and high hopes. A day and a half later my water was all gone, and the realization hit me that there was nothing, NOTHING out here. Except desert, endless desert.

So alas, if I had a team supporting me I could have walked it- but much like most of my life I was all on my own here. So I hitchhiked it out of there to Pheonix, a good 150 mile cheat. I will say considering I spent nearly a month going south down the California coast when I could have been going strait east more then makes up for it. So I consider my conscience clean.

And thus I arrived in Avondale (suburb of Phoenix) and partied it up with Larry Streech and his brood for a few days. The most memorable night by far being when he took me to this crazy bar. Remember when I mentioned Bob Hoskins? There’s this scene in Who Framed Roger Rabbit where Donald and Daffy Duck are playing pianos opposite each other in some kind of stage act. I’m sure there’s an official name for this, but god help me if I know what it is.

Anyway, these two guys sat opposite each other playing crazy jigs while doing shots, and I ate up every second of it. Also hilarious was they would not ever give up on trying to get someone to flash them, and when a woman finally up and did they wouldn’t let up on her for the rest of the night. I nearly coughed up my beer laughing when-mid song-both of them stopped playing with the suddenness of a car crash and demanded she sit back down (she had been getting up to go to the bathroom, or perhaps escape)

This was the only picture from the night, a good representation of my level of sobriety

But soon enough I had to leave Phoenix and begin what I call “the long desert haul”. This was it, hard core time. As I soon learned, the Arizona Desert consisted of nothing but rattlesnakes, road kill and the occasional passerby who felt so sorry for me they pulled over and offered me some water. Thankyee!

I camped out in the desert a good 3 or 4 days on my way to Globe, and it’s funny. I wouldn’t consider myself a very spiritual guy, but there are sights to be seen there that get into your soul. That sunsets especially, I can’t imagine many things more beautiful. It’s as if the sky is on fire and the clouds glow like embers. A nice prelude to the horror or the freezing desert night to come….my god it’s cold camping in the desert.

My host there were real “mining town folk” I.E covered in tattoos and riding dirt bikes. A true moment of gluttony occurred when-sitting on their couch- I think I consumed about 5 hot pockets in a row. Man, I was hungry though. Water and crackers for 5 days will do that to you. I sat there wallowing in the afterglow of those sweet, sweet hot pockets for about 30 minutes. Mmmm to be traveling again, only after crawling through the desert do they taste so sweet.